Sockeye salmon runs on Alaska’s Upper Cook Inlet should bounce back to above historical levels this coming summer after a paltry 2018 harvest, according to a forecast recently released by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G).
ADF&G predicts Upper Cook Inlet will see a total sockeye run of around six million fish, which would be nearly double last summer’s run of just 3.1 million fish.
“The preseason estimate came in above average for all of Cook Inlet and for the Kenai River, which is what I mostly deal with. Those are all pretty good signs,” said Brian Marston, ADF&G’s area manager for Upper Cook Inlet.
Marston pointed out that more than half of the six million fish in the run are expected to go up the Kenai River, which is forecast at 3.8 million.
If predictions hold, the commercial harvest for 2019 would be three million sockeye, around 200,000 more than the 20-year average. Another one million fish are expected to be scooped up for subsistence and commercial fishing, mostly on the Kenai River.
Following the Kenai River in volume is the Kasilof River, which is forecast to get nearly 900,000 sockeye next summer. The remaining fish in the predictions will run up the Susitna River and Fish Creek.
ADF&G puts their margin of error for the prediction of six million fish at 4.8 to 7.3 million. Last season, the Department forecasted 4.6 million sockeye in Upper Cook Inlet, about 1.5 million over the final tally.
“Last year, something failed,” Marston explained, “But when you have a bad year like that it doesn’t typically happen year after year. And the other problem with last year was that particular cohort that didn’t make it, the 1.3s, are the major portion of the Kenai run.”
Marston said the Kenai age-1.3 sockeye fish that have spent one year in freshwater and three in salt water—typically make up about 60 to 80 percent of the Kenai run.
Area predictions for king salmon, meanwhile, were not so rosy. ADF&G announced preseason restrictions on king salmon fishing for the Northern Cook Inlet, citing low runs on the Deshka River, where the 2019 forecast is far below escapement goals.
