By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
The preseason Chinook troll treaty allocation for 2020 is almost 50 percent higher than the 2019 limit, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game announced this week.
“That’s fairly significant,” said Grant Hagerman, F&G troll management biologist, who issued a news release Tuesday with information about the Southeast Alaska troll Chinook salmon harvest allocation and management restrictions.
While the higher figure is good news, Hagerman said it would be premature to anticipate more Chinook retention days for trollers this summer.
“It’s too early to say what that will mean for the summer troll season,” he said. “We won’t have that till the end of June.”
The troll season customarily opens July 1.
The announcement said under the Chinook salmon management provisions of the 2019-28 Pacific Salmon treaty the annual all gear allowable catch limit for Southeast is 201,100 treaty Chinook – non-Alaska hatchery produced Chinook.
“This year’s all-gear catch limit includes a 2 percent reduction that will serve as a buffer to avoid exceeding the all-gear limit and payback provisions within the treaty,” he said in the news release.
But Hagerman said the big news for trollers is the sizable increase in the preseason troll treaty harvest limit. The 2020 preseason limit is 148,000 Chinook, which is 47,200 fish higher than the preseason limit available last year.
“Comparing that to 2019 – at the 2019 level of abundance – it would’ve equated to three or four more Chinook retention days in summer,” Hagerman told the Sentinel. “It’s 47,000 more fish – it most probably will translate into more Chinook retention days in the summer, but we won’t know what the summer target will be until we calculate the treaty harvest for winter and spring.”
Under provisions of the treaty, the Chinook salmon harvest limit for the Southeast all-gear fishery is determined by the estimated “catch per unit effort” metric from the inter power troll fishery in District 113 during statistical weeks 41-48 (Oct. 11-Nov 30).
The CPUE metric is translated into a seven-tiered catch ceiling table, with each tier representing a range of CPUEs, the associated Abundance Index (AI) values, and the applicable harvest ceiling.
Hagerman said the summer troll fishery harvest allocation is calculated by subtracting the treaty Chinook salmon harvested in the winter and spring troll fisheries from the annual troll treaty allocation.
He said the winter fishery is generally managed to not exceed the guideline harvest level of 45,000 treaty Chinook salmon for the season.
“However, in 2020, under provisions of the Unuk River Chinook salmon action plan, the winter troll fishery will close March 15,” he said.
The news release said that while there is no explicit guideline harvest level for Chinook salmon harvested in the spring fisheries, they are managed in order to limit the harvest of treaty Chinook salmon; non-Alaska hatchery fish are counted toward the annual treaty harvest limit of Chinook salmon while most of the Alaska hatchery fish are not.
Hagerman said the fishery will be managed to harvest 70% of the remaining fish on the troll allocation in the first summer king opening in July, with the remainder available in a second opening, typically in August.
If the remainder of annual troll allocation isn’t harvested in the second opening, and if the department determines that the number of kings remaining on the annual troll allocation isn’t sufficient to allow a competitive fishery, the commissioner may, by emergency order, reopen the troll fishery to the taking of Chinook salmon during a limited harvest fishery.
“The decision as to whether the first summer opening will be managed in season rather than for a fixed number of days will be announced just prior to the July 1 opening,” Hagerman said.
He noted that the Unuk River and the Chilkat and King Salmon Rivers Chinook salmon action plans were adopted by the Alaska Board of Fisheries in 2018 to provide direction for measures to conserve these stocks of management concern.
“Management actions are being taken across all Southeast fisheries, including sport, commercial, personal use, and subsistence, to reduce harvest of wild Chinook salmon,” he said. “The Unuk River Chinook salmon action plan restricts spring troll fisheries to terminal harvest areas, waters in close proximity to hatchery facilities or release sites, and in areas that have been identified as having low proportional harvests of wild stock Southeast Chinook salmon.”
In addition to the conservation measures of this action plan, supplementary actions for conservation of Southeast and transboundary-river Chinook salmon will include June fisheries in select terminal harvest areas and a few defined spring troll fishery areas located on the outside coast to target Alaska hatchery Chinook salmon during May and June.
