Alaska’s preliminary wild salmon forecast has reached 93 million fish, confirmed the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG), but pink salmon catches have so far proved slow.
Through to 9 August, the total preliminary catch amounted to 51.6 million sockeye, 28.4 million pink, 11 million chum, 1.6 million coho, and 333,000 king salmon.
In a discussion paper, ADF&G highlighted that its forecast of 34 million pinks was below the 10-year average harvest of 38 million and that the warm sea surface temperatures that have persisted throughout the Gulf of Alaska since 2013 caused uncertainty.
According to biologists, the pink salmon that went to sea in 2014 returned in numbers well below expectation in 2015, particularly in the southern half of the region, and pink salmon that went to sea in 2015, and were set to return in 2016, experienced similar above-average sea surface temperatures. There were also widespread reports of more southern species in the eastern Gulf of Alaska in 2015, suggesting pink salmon could experience more competition or predation than normal.
The preseason forecast for Alaska’s salmon catch was 161 million fish, down 40 percent from the 2015 harvest of 268 million fish because of an anticipated drop of 100 million pinks.
The species tends to follow a two-year cycle in which odd-numbered years see the biggest returns.
With regards to the state’s other salmon species, the 2016 forecasts for sockeye, coho and chum were 48 million, 4.4 million and 19 million fish, respectively. For king salmon, a catch of 99,000 fish was projected for all areas except the Southeast, where the harvest is determined according to Pacific Treaty agreements with Canada. Last year’s statewide king salmon catch was 521,612.
