With just a week or two left until season’s end, the common property harvest of pink salmon in Prince William Sound stood at around 41 million fish, with another 2.9 million brought in for cost recovery at hatcheries through Aug. 30.
Harvesters will probably get a few more fish, but still be shy of the forecast of about 59 million humpies, said Charlie Russell, seine area management biologist at Cordova for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
The latest preliminary harvest data from ADF&G showed that the overall commercial salmon harvest for Prince William Sound through Aug. 30 was 51,300,000 fish, including those 44 million pinks, 5.4 million chum, 1.4 sockeye, 140,000 silver, and 13,000 Chinook salmon.
Preliminary statewide commercial harvest totals stood at nearly 202 million fish. The catch included 124,491,000 pink, 51,775,000 sockeye, 21,784,000 chum, 3,508,000 silver and 243,000 king salmon.
The latest regional data showed the Prince William Sound general seine harvest to be 42.3 million salmon, including 39.7 million pink, 2.4 million chum, 121,000 red, and 79,000 silver.
The Prince William Sound hatchery sector had 3.5 million pink and 724,000 chum, while the catch in the Coghill District drift fishery stood at 2.9 million fish, including 2.1 million chum, 657,000 pink, 112,000 red and 4,000 silver salmon.
Eshany District drift and setnetters had more than a million salmon, including 613,000 sockeye, 350,000 pink, 119,000 chum and 4,000 silver. The Copper River drift fishery harvest stood at 712,000 fish, including 568,000 sockeye, 69,000 pink, 50,000 silver, 12,000 chum and 12,000 Chinook salmon.
In the Westward region, processors have received nearly 63 million salmon, with 28.9 million of them coming from the Alaska Peninsula. Including nearly 20 million pink, 7 million red, 2 million chum, 332,000 silver and 9,000 kings.
Kodiak area harvesters brought in some 26.7 million fish, a catch including 22.4 million pink, 2.2 million sockeye, 1.9 million chum, 215,000 silver and 6,000 king salmon.
Chignik harvesters had 7.3 million fish, including 5.8 million pink, 850,000 red, 548,000 chum, and 4,000 kingsl
Southeast Alaska had produced a commercial harvest to date of 41.8 million fish. That total includes 30.5 million pink, 8.6 million chum, 2 million silver and 164,000 kings.
Bristol Bay and Cook Inlet stood at 39.3 million and 4.5 million salmon respectively.
The Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim harvesters meanwhile have delivered 1.9 million fish, with the bulk- 945,000 fish- coming from the Lower Yukon.
