Another robust commercial salmon season is off and running in Alaska, with the preliminary statewide harvest through June 25 estimated by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game at some 15 million fish.
That total includes some 7.7 million humpies, 4.4 million sockeyes, 2.8 million chums and 66,000 Chinooks.
At this point of the season, production of all species except the king salmon are stronger than for the same period a year ago, says Garrett Evridge, a fisheries economist with the McDowell Group who write a weekly report on the season for the Alaska Seafood Marketing Association.
Year-to-date sockeye catches are 29 percent over those of 2018 and 12 percent below the five-year average. Prince William Sound continues to outpace last year, while Chignik, Cook Inlet and the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands tag the historical average, Evridge said.
Early indicators for Bristol Bay are favorable compared to 2018 and in line with the long-term average, he said.
For humpies the year-to-date harvest is more than seven million fish, likely a record for early-season production. Landings in the Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands and Kodiak are roughly seven and three times the year-to-date 2017 volume, respectively, he said.
The harvest of keta salmon, which has reached about 2.5 million fish, is 29 percent above that of 2018 and 60 percent higher than the five-year average. Strong harvests in Prince William Sound are offsetting slower fishing elsewhere. Keta production in Southeast and the Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim region have been particularly slow, though it is still early in the season, Eridge said.
The king salmon harvest of 42,000 fish to date is 14 percent below the pace for this date through 2018.
Daily preliminary harvest updates are posted online by ADF&G at adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=commercialbyfisherysalmon.bluesheet.
