And the Kasilof starts with a BANG!

[smithtb]

7,587 Sockeye counted on the first day!

From what I could tell, largest first day count in the last 20 years - maybe longer - that's as far back as I looked.

Early or not, these are strong numbers for the Kasilof. Gentlemen, start your engines...

[smithtb]

Another strong day for Sockeye in the Ditch...

One thing I noticed is that historically any day now the Crooked Creek weir should be showing some signs of life. If all of the runs are early like suspected, that should have already happened or should happen soon, no? I know that inriver harvest can affect that weir quite a bit. Embarrassed to say I don't know - are they king fishing on the Kasilof right now, or have these fish not showed?

[4merguide]

Embarrassed to say I don't know - are they king fishing on the Kasilof right now, or have these fish not showed?

They've been fishing, and catching, kings for awhile now. From what I hear nothing to write home about, seeing that you can't keep a native....

[smithtb]

... Buuut you can play one half to death...

Ha. Just kidding. Kind of.

[33outdoorsman]

I must say smith last year with the same regulations if I recall correctly, Crooked Creek had a very good year king wise. It's still early this year and with low water in the tributary streams, due to lack of snowmelt, it will be interesting to see what the kings do.

[smithtb]

Kasilof still killing it...

Crooked Creek Weir now ahead of last year...

Here fishy fishy...

Would hope to see a revised projection for the Kenai ER Kings, along with a revised projection or forecast for the LR, seeing as how we have been relying on the ER-LR correlation so heavily in the last few years. Would hate to see fishermen out of the water when there is an abundance of fish, which there appears to be.

[fishNphysician]

WHOOP! there it is….



http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/static/ap.../421902799.pdf



As of 8:00 a.m. on Sunday, June 22, 2014, nearly 82,000 sockeye salmon are estimated to have passed the Kasilof River sonar site. This is the second largest cumulative escapement ever measured in the Kasilof River through this date. Therefore, this announcement opens the set gillnet fishery in the Kasilof Section in order to slow the rate of escapement of sockeye salmon into the Kasilof River.

[fishNphysician]

How was the fishing, tb?

[Nerka]

How was the fishing, tb?

He is probably still fishing. But it may be a dollar short and a day late. When fish are building on the beach and the counts are starting to go up ADF&G waits until the back side of a push to fish. Not a good sockeye to chinook ratio when that happens. I hope the push is still on but the numbers do not reflect that right now. Also, they are so far ahead of the curve in escapement that more fishing time is needed if they kill less than at the peak of this first push. If Kasilof is one million strong then there is a lot of fish to be harvested and you want those sockeye to chinook numbers to be good. Otherwise when Kenai comes there may not be any fishing time. It is a hard fishery to manage and I respect that - just thinking the politics of user groups came into play already for this year.

[smithtb]

Fishing was so-so but I'm not complaining. As Nerka said, we caught the tail end of that slug of fish I believe. As for the sockeye to King ratios - they don't get much better. Didn't see a king all day. But then again, I AM an ESSN, so you know I must be lying about my king catch...

Yes, unless we get some hours when it counts, the Kasilof is gonna get slammed and will end up a terminal fishery again. I've tried to talk ADFG into letting the Kasilof district fish 600' from shore only rather than the terminal area - would likely be effective at killing Kasilof sockeye and less kenai kings, and WE WON'T KNOW UNTIL WE TRY - however for some reason ADFG upper level management is opposed to it. It's already in the plan. Don't know why they refuse to even try it, but now would be the time. Those fish are hugging the beach right now.

I expect to see another push of fish on Thursday, and again on Saturday. Seriously though, any day I'll bet we see another slug.

[Nerka]

Fishing was so-so but I'm not complaining. As Nerka said, we caught the tail end of that slug of fish I believe. As for the sockeye to King ratios - they don't get much better. Didn't see a king all day. But then again, I AM an ESSN, so you know I must be lying about my king catch...

Yes, unless we get some hours when it counts, the Kasilof is gonna get slammed and will end up a terminal fishery again. I've tried to talk ADFG into letting the Kasilof district fish 600' from shore only rather than the terminal area - would likely be effective at killing Kasilof sockeye and less kenai kings, and WE WON'T KNOW UNTIL WE TRY - however for some reason ADFG upper level management is opposed to it. It's already in the plan. Don't know why they refuse to even try it, but now would be the time. Those fish are hugging the beach right now.

I expect to see another push of fish on Thursday, and again on Saturday. Seriously though, any day I'll bet we see another slug.

smithtb - ADF&G can only use time and area modifications if there is a conservation issue. So far early run chinook are on track to meet the goal and of course there are few to zero early run fish on the beach, next late run chinook based on the early run to late run regression indicate a stronger return than forecasted, and sockeye are fine. So to limit the nets to the beach would require ADF&G to justify it with a conservation concern which does not exist right now. If they did it they would be allocating resources and that is not what one wants ADF&G to do. There is no provision in the plans to go outside of them unless the goals will not be met.

[yukon]

12 kings caught in the set net opener.
Already hearing a push to eo Saturday.
Better hope there are more kings which would indicate a good second run coming, especially since f&g think it is an early run timing this year.

[yukon]

Smithtb, weren't you complaining about no data to support shortening nets as a step down method to reduce king harvest but still catch sockeye?

[smithtb]

12 kings caught in the set net opener.
Already hearing a push to eo Saturday.
Better hope there are more kings which would indicate a good second run coming, especially since f&g think it is an early run timing this year.

That's right, 12 Kings caught by the Setnetters. Approx. 21,904 reds. That's a red-to-king ratio of 1,825 to 1. Oh yeah, the drifters caught 19 Kings and only 16,436 Reds, for a ratio of 865 to 1. That's right, the drifters were the primary harvester of Kings on Monday. Better start cutting you nets boys. The Canucks recommend a mesh depth of 15... Ha ha.

Yukon, if the ESSN's had caught 300 Kings on Monday, you would be screaming that they caught too many Kings and should not fish. How can we win? Why are you ignoring that historically this time is a good time for killing Kasilof reds without a large King harvest?

Have you also forgotten about the Early Run - Late Run correlation (which your representatives have used the last several years to keep us closed) which would suggest that the Late Run will also be much stronger than forecast? I have a hard time believing they could run the regression model and come up with anything less than a number which would warrant you fishing with bait for the late run, and me fishing according to the Sockeye plan rather than being held to your king plan. I say your king plan because there is nothing in it for me even if 100,000 Kings return, like in the Mat-Su. Only restrictions.

Have they updated the projection for the LR yet?

Already a push to EO Saturday? How about today? Or Yesterday. For Christ's sake man, the Kings are making goals, and the Kasilof Sockeye are breaking every record in the book, on track to surpass even last year's over-escapement.

If not now, when? Never? Are you one of those guys?

[Nerka]

Caught and reported are two different things smithtb - not suggesting anything illegal - but the word on the street is that a number of set net fisherman are releasing kings caught in their nets in the hope that they make it to the river. I know this sounds great to the average Joe but in reality it is self defeating. If I as a manager only saw 12 kings reported and thought that was true I would be in a bind - is the run really weak or did the release of kings happen. In this situation a manager has to assume the kings are weak without data on the release numbers. So I would suggest that KPFA and other fishing organizations start keeping track of released fish and report them on a voluntary program to ADF&G. If numbers stay low the ESSN catch rates become a thorn in your side as the run will look very weak.

I have never been an advocate for releasing chinook out the nets. First they take a long time to reach the river so they are likely to be caught again, it confuses the data base for management, and if one fisherman gets caught selling chinook and not reporting everyone who is fishing will be labeled as doing this as the numbers are low. So it is not good for the industry or management.

I think KPFA should be a leader here and have a full out effort to get people to just be fisherman and not try to game the system.