February 03, 2007
Saturday

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) has released its annual salmon harvest forecast for 2007, and is projecting that the Alaska statewide commercial salmon harvest will be significantly larger this year than it was in 2006. The pink salmon harvest is expected to be higher than last year's, the sockeye salmon catch is expected to be similar to that in 2006, and chum salmon harvests are expected to be higher than in 2006.

The 2007 commercial catch all-species projection of 179 million includes estimates of 789,000 Chinook salmon, 40.9 million sockeye salmon, 4.8 million coho salmon, 108 million pink salmon, and 24.8 million chum salmon.

At this time last year, ADF&G biologists were expecting an all-species commercial catch of 167 million for the 2006 season. As it turned out, the all-species catch reached 141 million. In 2006, the overall catch of pink salmon was 73 million compared to the preseason projection of 108 million. The lower-than-expected pink salmon catch in 2006 was due to a very weak 2006 pink salmon run to southern Southeast Alaska. The overall chum salmon catch was 21.1 million compared to the preseason projection of 17.6 million.

If realized, both the 2007 commercial catch all-species projection harvest of 179 million salmon and the 2007 pink salmon harvest of 108 million fish would be among the top ten harvests since 1960. The 2007 chum salmon harvest projection of 24.8 million salmon, if accurate, would mean a record harvest this year. The projected 2007 Chinook salmon harvest of 789,000 salmon would be the second largest harvest in the past ten years if realized. The 2007 sockeye salmon harvest of 40.9 million salmon is on a par with harvests in the past three seasons.

These forecasts are based on quantitative projections of next year's salmon run using information on previous spawning levels, smolt outmigrations, returns of sibling age classes, and recent survival rates observed for hatchery releases.

On The Web:

Annual salmon harvest forecast
http://www.sf.adfg.state.ak.us/FedAidpdfs/sp07-01.pdf

Inseason harvest information, postseason statistics, and other information about salmon in Alaska
http://www.cf.adfg.state.ak.us/

Source of News:

Alaska Department of Fish & Game
www.adfg.state.ak.us

 

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