Fish Radio
Fishing updates, beyond salmon
August 5, 2016 
This is Fish Radio. I’m Laine Welch – Lots of fishing going on besides salmon. Updates after this –
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Alaska’s statewide salmon catch is falling short of projections except for sockeyes. The 2016 salmon harvest is pegged at 161 million fish, down 40 percent from last year, and the catch so far is just over half way to that target.
We’ll have a complete salmon wrap up next week; for now the focus is on the many other fisheries underway across Alaska.
Beam trawling continues for coon and side stripe shrimp in Southeast waters. The summer Dungeness fishery is going strong with crabbers averaging $3.05 a pound, up slightly from last year. A combined summer and fall dungie fishery is expected to yield just under 3 million pounds.
Scallopers are still dropping dredges around Yakutat and in other parts of the Gulf and Bering Sea.
Lingcod fisheries are ongoing since July 1st in Southeast Alaska, Cook Inlet and Prince William Sound, primarily by small boats using jig and hand troll gear.
Alaska longliners have taken 64 percent of their 17 million pound halibut catch limit with just over 6 million pounds left to go. Kodiak and Homer remain nearly tied for ports with the most landings.
For sablefish, about 8 million pounds remain out of the 20.3 million pound quota. Seward is way out in front for sablefish landings, followed by Kodiak.
Fishing fleets are targeting Pacific Ocean Perch, rockfish, cod, flounders, pollock and other groundfish in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea. The Gulf reopens to pollock fishing on August 25th.
The golden king crab fishery along the Aleutians opened August 1 with a catch below six million pounds for the first time in decades. A 25 percent cut was made due to stock declines in the western district.
Norton Sound’s summer red king crab fishery closed in late July after about a month that yielded over 440-thousand pounds of crab.
Finally, the public has until August 18 to submit agenda change requests to the state Board of Fisheries upcoming meeting cycle which begins in mid-October. The Board this go around will take up fisheries in Cook Inlet, Kodiak and statewide king and Tanner crab, minus Southeast.
Fish Radio is also brought to you by Ocean Beauty Seafoods, an Alaska corporation proudly supporting Alaska’s coastal communities and the Alaskans who depend on fishing for their livelihoods and culture. www.oceanbeauty.com In Kodiak, I’m Laine Welch.
