Salmon notes

Here's an update on the 2024 season, which is all but done.

• This will finish as a poor season, at least in terms of harvest volume. The statewide, all-species catch stands at 96.2 million fish. The season likely will finish with a harvest under 100 million for the first time in 37 years, since 1987, when the tally was 96.5 million.

• The Prince William Sound purse seine fishery closes today, perhaps appropriately on Friday the 13th. It's been a nightmare year for seiners with a catch of less than 5 million pink salmon, far below forecast. Expect pleas for disaster relief coming out of Cordova.

• Alaska never has produced many salmon north of the Arctic Circle, but this season's production was particularly paltry at Kotzebue. "The 2024 commercial harvest of 5,392 chum salmon was below the 1962-2023 average harvest of 231,196 chum salmon and the poorest harvest since the state started managing the Kotzebue District in 1962," the Alaska Department of Fish and Game reports.

• It wasn't gloomy everywhere this season. On Aug. 12, OBI Seafoods blew the cannery steam whistle in Petersburg to mark 100,000 cases of canned salmon produced.

Salmon way up north

Kotzebue Sound hosts the farthest north commercial salmon fishery in Alaska. And the 2013 season opens tomorrow.

A good run of chum salmon is expected, and the harvest could reach 250,000 fish, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game says.

The buyer, Great Pacific Seafoods, is putting a strong emphasis on quality this season, requiring fishermen to bleed their catch.

More details here.

Kotzebue's turn

The 2012 season opens tonight at Kotzebue, Alaska's farthest north commercial salmon fishery.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game says it expects a good run of chum salmon, forecasting a harvest of 250,000 to 280,000 fish.

To put that in perspective, the projected chum harvest for entire state this season is 19.1 million fish.

Here's the official announcement on Kotzebue's kickoff.

Salmon Santa on the way to Kotzebue

This just in from the U.S. Coast Guard:

Dec 23, 2009

Coast Guard to deliver 13 tons of donated salmon to Kotzebue

KODIAK — A Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak C-130 Hercules aircraft crew is scheduled to deliver approximately 27,000 pounds of donated silver salmon fillets and dry goods to Kotzebue on Monday as part of a special food drive held by Wells Fargo Bank and NANA Regional Corp.

The donated food is scheduled to be accepted by the Northwest Arctic Borough and delivered to families in Kotzebue and surrounding villages.

The Coast Guard aircraft is scheduled to depart from Elmendorf Air Force Base at 10 a.m. Monday and return to Elmendorf around 5:45 p.m. After the delivery the aircraft is scheduled to stop at Coast Guard Loran Station Port Clarence as part of a scheduled logistics flight.

Wells Fargo Bank and NANA Regional Corp. teamed up for a food drive beginning in February which raised more than $11,000 and the 27,000 pounds of fish. The fish fillets came from Sitka and were donated by SeaShare in Washington.