Salmon Archives - Page 112 of 141

Washington: Congress Voting To Let More Sea Lions Be Killed To Protect Salmon

August 1, 2018 — In a clash of protected species, Pacific Northwest members of Congress are coming down in favor of salmon. The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee is scheduled to vote Thursday morning to make it easier to kill sea lions who feast on Columbia and Willamette River salmon and steelhead.

A wide majority of the U.S. House has already voted to raise the limit for how many sea lions can be killed below Bonneville Dam and Willamette Falls. Now a companion bill in the Senate is gaining steam. It’s very similar in giving state and tribal wildlife agents more latitude to kill the nuisance predators in the river system.

The Senate bill is co-sponsored by Idaho Republican Jim Risch and Washington Democrat Maria Cantwell.

Sea lions gather each winter and spring below the Bonneville Dam fish ladders to intercept salmon moving upriver to spawn.

“Salmon consumption at the Bonneville Dam is five times what it was five years ago, and threatened and endangered species of salmon are being damaged by sea lions in the Columbia River,” Risch said in a statement.

Lately, there’s increasing concern about additional sea lions that have discovered a veritable buffet at the foot of Willamette Falls. Their appetites could doom Willamette River winter steelhead to extinction.

Read the full story at KUOW

Early salmon prices point to good paydays across Alaska

August 1, 2018 — Salmon prices are starting to trickle in as more sales are firmed up by local buyers, and early signs point to good paydays across the board.

At Bristol Bay last week, Trident, Ocean Beauty and Togiak Seafoods posted a base price of $1.25 a pound for sockeyes, according to KDLG in Dillingham. Trident also was paying a 15 cent bonus for reds that are chilled and bled, and the others may follow suit.

Copper River Seafoods raised its sockeye price from $1.30 to $1.70 for fish that is chilled/bled and sorted. That company also reportedly is paying 80 cents a pound for coho salmon and 45 cents for chums and pinks.

The average base price last year for Bristol Bay sockeyes was $1.02 a pound, 65 cents for cohos, 30 cents for chums and 18 cents a pound for pinks.
Kodiak advances were reported at $1.60 for sockeyes, 55 cents for chums and 40 cents for pinks. That compares to average prices of $1.38 for sockeyes, 40 cents for chums and 31 cents for Kodiak pinks in 2017.

At Prince William Sound a sockeye base price was reported at $1.95 and chums at 95 cents.

At Norton Sound the single buyer was advancing 80 cents a pound for chums and $1.40 for cohos, same as last year, and 25 cents for pinks, an increase of 22 cents.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Does California’s Bay Area Have Enough Water for Economic Growth and Salmon?

July 31, 2018 — California’s Economy is thriving and its population is growing. San Francisco County alone added more than 120,000 jobs in five years – a huge leap in economic productivity that owes itself largely to the lucrative worlds of finance, technology and biotechnology. As people from around the country and the world continue clamoring to find their place in one of the most expensive and most congested cities, an important question is emerging in public discussions: Does California have enough water to go around, or will natural resources be sacrificed for economic success?

“That’s a question of carrying capacity and social values,” said Peter Drekmeier, policy director of the environmental organization Tuolumne River Trust, which lobbies to protect the main waterway from which San Francisco receives its water.

Drekmeier is one of many who believe that California can grow as an economic powerhouse while maintaining productive aquatic ecosystems resembling their natural and unimpacted character – if, that is, water is divided fairly and consumed efficiently. Others, however, feel that the state’s economy – including agriculture but also urban elements – will need more water in the future, even if this drives some fish species extinct.

These differing perspectives are at the heart of a current policy battle in California as the State Water Resources Control Board works to finalize a plan that will determine how much water should be left in critical rivers feeding the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. It’s a decision that will impact not just fish and farms, but urban areas like the San Francisco Bay Area where strongly held environmental values may be challenged by economic aspirations.

Trouble for Fish

The Tuolumne River is a major tributary of the San Joaquin River, which feeds into the Bay-Delta, the linchpin for California’s statewide water delivery system. It’s also the place from which the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission draws the majority of its water to serve 2.7 million people in San Francisco, Alameda, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties.

As recently as the 1940s, more than 100,000 fall-run Chinook salmon spawned annually in the Tuolumne. In 2015, a little more than 100 of the fish swam up the river. Today, the river, studded with several dams and heavily diverted for human use, is considered by many to be in critical condition, and scientists and river advocates say what the Tuolumne and its native fishes need more than anything else is increased flows of water.

“Water is just one component of habitat, but it’s a very important one,” said Rene Henery, a biologist with the conservation group Trout Unlimited.

State agencies agree, and early in July the State Water Resources Control Board released its final draft of a plan to increase the amount of water left in the Tuolumne and two other San Joaquin River tributaries to about 40 percent of their historic, or “unimpaired,” winter and springtime flows. This Bay-Delta Plan Update was announced on July 6 and would allow for flows as low as 30 percent and as high as 50 percent between February and June, a key period for juvenile salmon migrating toward the ocean.

“While multiple factors are to blame for the decline [in the Central Valley’s Chinook salmon runs], the magnitude of diversions out of the Sacramento, San Joaquin and other rivers feeding into the Bay-Delta is a major factor in the ecosystem decline,” the board said in a statement.

Read the full story at News Deeply

Value of Bristol Bay salmon rises, even as the fish shrink

July 31, 2018 — 2018 has been a year for the Bristol Bay record books as total sockeye run surpassed 61 million on Thursday, putting it just a half-million fish behind the largest run of 61.7 million in 1980.

Bert Lewis oversees commercial fisheries in Bristol Bay, Cook Inlet and Prince William Sound for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. He’s impressed at the strength of the Nushagak district’s run and even at Bristol Bay’s east-side districts, which came in “late but solidly.”

“That stands out really statewide where sockeye runs have not been strong. I know that westward Kodiak area is meeting their goals, but with very little fishing opportunity. Cook Inlet right now is under restrictions,” Lewis said. “King salmon statewide are of concern with low returns, but meeting goals solidly in Bristol Bay.”

King salmon escapement was strong enough that nearly 100 anglers filled the Nushagak River this June for a new king derby, even as poor returns canceled a handful of derbies in southeast Alaska.

Lewis said the prevailing theory for Bristol Bay’s bounty is “the blob” — an unusually warm water mass that filled the northern Gulf of Alaska as this year’s returning fish migrated out to sea a few years back. It disrupted food webs that support the forage base that juvenile salmon feed on in waters across southeast Alaska and the north Gulf.

Read the full story at Alaska Public Media

ALASKA: Kenai River dipnetting to close early due to low sockeye returns

July 27, 2018 –The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is closing the Kenai River personal use dipnet fishery starting 12:01 a.m. on Monday, July 30, citing less-than-expected returns.

The fishery would normally have ended on July 31.

ADF&G says the closure is necessary to meet the sustainable escapement goal of 700,000 to 1.2 million late-run sockeye salmon in the Kenai River–a goal officials say “may not be met without a reduction in harvest of this stock.”

The order says that additional restrictions on commercial and sport fisheries are also being implemented.

Read the full story at KTUU

ALASKA: Bristol Bay harvest hits 39 million, but statewide take down by a third

July 27, 2018 –Alaska’s salmon fisheries continue to lag alarmingly in several regions, with overall catches down by a third from the same time last year.

The single exception is at the unconquerable Bristol Bay, where a catch of 39 million sockeye so far has single-handedly pushed Alaska’s total salmon harvest towards a lackluster 60 million fish.

It’s too soon to press the panic button and there is lots of fishing left to go, but fears are growing that Alaska’s 2018 salmon season will be a bust for most fishermen. Worse, it comes on the heels of a cod crash and tanking halibut markets (and catches).

State salmon managers predicted that Alaska’s salmon harvest this year would be down by 34 percent to 149 million fish; due to an expected decline of pinks.

But with the exception of Bristol Bay, nobody expected fishing to be this bad.

Read the full story at the Alaska Journal of Commerce

With Strong Run and a Big Increase in Boat Prices, Bristol Bay Harvesters Get Big Payday This Year

July 27, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS –KDLG has been surveying processors in the Bay to get this year’s sockeye salmon prices, and the result shows a big jump in the overall value of the fishery this year.

Both Trident and Ocean Beauty have confirmed base prices of $1.25 per lb., and prices go up for fish that has higher quality handling such as being chilled, floated, and bled. These fish get $1.40 per lb.

Copper River is paying a premium for chilled, bled, and separated sockeye, from $1.30 to $1.70 reports KDLG.

Meanwhile, Icicle, Togiak, and Peter Pan have not released base prices.

Last year’s base price in the Bay was $1.00, for a harvest of 38.8 million fish. This year, harvests reached 38.2 million, higher than the preseason forecast, and these numbers still may be adjusted.

The upshot is the sockeye fishery is likely worth about 25% more than last year, and as Bristol Bay is such an important part of overall Alaska salmon value, this run will go a long way towards making up some of the shortfall in other areas in terms of overall value.

But that is small consolation to those communities where the sockeye run failed or came in way below expectations, such as Chignik, and along the Copper River.

This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

Alaska: Salmon ballot measure proponents fight back after legislative hearing

July 26, 2018 — Proponents of the pro-fisheries Ballot Measure 1 are fighting back after a Friday legislative hearing that saw state officials discuss the costs and consequences of the proposal.

“It was just a way for industry and for a state government that doesn’t approve of this initiative to kind of torpedo it,” sponsor Mike Wood said by phone about the hearing. “That kind of bums me out.”

Wood, who was filleting salmon strips, spoke three days after the Alaska Senate State Affairs Committee held a four-hour meeting discussing the measure. During the presentation, state officials said Ballot Measure 1 would cost millions of dollars, lengthen the permitting process for some construction projects, and make larger projects impossible.

The measure would “make it nearly impossible to permit the Alaska LNG project,” Department of Natural Resources Commissioner Andy Mack told the Senate State Affairs Committee, referring to the proposed trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline.

“That is total bull—-,” Wood said.

Asked whether he thought the presentations were overly pessimistic, he said, “absolutely, without a doubt.”

Lindsey Bloom, a Juneau-based commercial fisherwoman and state policy director for SalmonState (a group supporting the intiative), said by email that Alaska’s seafood industry, particularly the salmon industry, is a multibillion-dollar per-year industry worthy of protection and preservation.

Read the full story at the Juneau Empire

Study Shows Importance Of Puget Sound Chinook Production To Starving Orcas

July 26, 2018 –A new analysis is showing the importance of Puget Sound Chinook for the inland sea’s orcas.

Fall kings from the Nooksack to the Deschutes to the Elwha were ranked as the most important current feedstocks for the starving southern residents, followed by Lower Columbia and Strait of Georgia tribs.

For the analysis, NOAA and WDFW sampled orca doots to “assist in prioritizing actions to increase critical prey for the whales.”

Nutritional stress has been identified as among the chief causes of their declining numbers, and the news comes as officials report a newborn calf died off Victoria yesterday. Just half of the 28 reproductive-age “blackfish” have produced calves in the last 10 years, another report said.

“Ramp up the hatchery production. Do it now. It’s the only way,” says Tom Nelson, co-host of Seattle outdoors radio show The Outdoor Line on 710 ESPN.

He was reacting this morning while fishing for coho at Possession Bar to a Seattle Times scoop on the findings.

Read the full story at the Northwest Sportsman

Alaska salmon catch down by a third in most regions

July 25, 2018 — Alaska’s salmon fisheries continue to lag alarmingly in several regions, with overall catches down by a third from the same time last year.

The single exception is at the unconquerable Bristol Bay, where a 37 million sockeye catch so far has single-handedly pushed Alaska’s total salmon harvest towards a lackluster 60 million fish.

State salmon managers predicted that Alaska’s salmon harvest this year would be down by 34 percent to 149 million fish; due to an expected shortfall of pinks. But with the exception of Bristol Bay, nobody expected fishing to be this bad.

Catches of sockeye, the big money fish, are off by millions at places like Copper River, Chignik and Kodiak, which has had the weakest sockeye harvest in nearly 40 years.

The weekly update by the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute said that coho and Chinook catches remain slow, and while it is still way early in the season, the “bread and butter” pink harvests are off by 65 percent from the strong run of two years ago.

Read the full story at National Fisherman