Pinks arriving in record numbers

Klas Stolpe

July 21, 2005.

Strong to Excellent. That is what is written in Alaska Department of Fish & Games 2005 salmon forecast for Southeastern Alaska pink salmon.

“It’s early and it’s strong,” commented Petersburg’s Icicle Seafoods Fleet Manager John Baird on the 2005 humpy run that has started to hit the docks.

If fishing were fashion then Pink would be this year’s Green, as in pink salmon bringing in record catches for fishermen. Over 49 million humpback salmon, with a range of between 25 and 72 million, are expected to be harvested in Southeast Alaska for the 2005 season. Last year’s catch came in at close to 45 million, the 7th largest in the last 10 years and 13th since 1960. Pink salmon catches are at historically high levels, partially due to conservative management in the 60s and 70s and more favorable environmental conditions. The 60s and 70s were drier, the 80s featured warmer winters and summer temperatures and higher precipitation, which plays into pink salmon survival.

The Alaska Department of Fish & Game is expecting a 2005 statewide pink salmon run of 114 million, along with 17.6 million chum, 5.1 million Coho, and 765 thousand Chinook.

“Petersburg set a record for one-day offloading of salmon yesterday,” stated Icicle Seafood’s Board of Directors member Bob Thorstenson. “Two point five million pounds were offloaded on the docks.”

Icicle Seafoods, Ocean Beauty, and Norquest had deliveries contributing to that record on Tuesday, July 19 and tenders were still taking fish from that opening on Wednesday.

“In 52 years I’ve never seen anything like it,” Thorstenson commented on the early pink run. “This is like when I first started fishing.”

Thorstenson was 17 years old when he fished reef nets in Puget Sound, Wash. in 1949. In 1954 he ran the tender Bernice for Petersburg’s Kayler-Dahl cannery, then in 1959 he became superintendent for Pacific American Fisheries, working up to being general manager for eight canneries in 1963-64, stretching from Bristol Bay to Bellingham. In 1965 he started Petersburg Fisheries Incorporated (now Icicle Seafoods) as a 25% shareholder with Magnus Martens, Gordon Jensen, and Tommy Thompson (all 10% shareholders) and local fishermen. Seiners bought 2% of stock and gill-netters one.

“I don’t know why it’s happening but it sure is something to see all this salmon,” Thorstenson went on to say.

Fish & Game biologists will start to determine the projected catch in the coming weeks. To determine run sizes Fish & Game biologists take catches from the seine fishery and calculate catch per unit effort, how many fish each boat is catching per day per opening. They then run a regression and compare that to the historical catch data effort by week, that forecasts what the catch will be for the season.

“We also look at pink sex ratios in season,” Ketchikan Fish & Game Pink Salmon Fisheries Biologist Steve Hittle said.

With all salmon the males tend to predominate at the beginning of the run. As the run progresses the ratio of males drops.

“When it hits about 50 percent males and females you figure the run is about half over or is reaching a mid-point. Towards the end of the run the sex ratio will drop below 50 percent males.”

The biologists collect sex ratios in all fish districts via purse seiners but to date there have been just a few openings. Some northern areas have produced sex ratios this season lower than they have been historically, which leads Hittle to believe the run is early. Other areas were average.

“It’s hard to get a handle on that until we have had a couple more weeks of fishing,” Hittle said. “It looks like right now catches are really strong and I’ll be really surprised if we do not hit the forecast harvest or go over it.”

The preseason forecast is done in November. The classic method figured the number of spawners and what catches were; if you know how many fish spawned, two years later you look at how many fish were caught and how many spawned, building up a data base of spawners and recruits (the fish that were harvested and returned to spawn. The number of spawners was used to forecast the run two years later but the method was not very successful. In the last three years ADF&G has just been forecasting the harvest, basing it on past harvests. Harvests from 1960 on were tabulated and rated into five categories; Disaster (less than 10 million fish harvest), Weak (10-17 million), Average (17-30), Strong (30-53, 2005), and Excellent (above 53).

Processor capacity and market conditions could also play a role in the pink harvest, as it did in 2003 when fishermen were told not to fish as the catch number climbed to 53 million and there was no market, resulting in large escapements.

“All the processors will be canning at their capacity,” Icicle’s Baird commented. “Which is typical of a high run season.”