imitation kings?

[204tcak]

folks, many rivers in Alaska have heavy restrictions in place to protect the king runs. I here the same thing year after year, "blame , blame, blame " pointing fingers. enough pushing the blame around. I didn't have any problems harvesting chums for subsistence with a dipnet on the lower Yukon last summer. it took a little longer but jot the job done. its time to flip the coin over and look at the pink salmon. every other year or so, there's enough pink salmon running in the lower Yukon, you can almost walk on top of them.
now there's got to be some genius out there who can work with a fisheries group like cvrf (coastal villages regional fund) to create a market with the pinks. perhaps the guy who turned white fish and pollock into imitation crab.

[MRFISH]

There have, in the past, been some innovative attempts to do something more with pinks. The Norton Sound CDQ group used to bring up one of their partners factory trawlers in the "off season" and made boneless/skinless blocks from pinks. Then the Steller Sea Lion regulations required that the pollock season be spread out more in time, and they needed to fish pollock more in the summer months (and catching pollock was more valuable than processing pinks). I think there was a similar effort in PWS by SeaBear (?)...using a factory processing vessel to do similar products w/ pinks.

But that back was when pink markets (and prices) were near rock-bottom. Things have improved quite a bit since then. The big hitch with pinks is how quickly they change near or in fresh water. What do the pinks caught in the lower Yukon look like? Post a pic when they show up!

[204tcak]

they definitely change into the spawning shape but the first runs still have the silver color. I'm sure if someone can turn fish into imitation crab meat, something can be done with the pinks.