Tuesday 8/24 Update-Crawfish Inlet will open Thursday (8/26) for seine
The NSRAA Crawfish Inlet SHA will open Thursday (8/26) for seine. Openings in the Crawfish Inlet SHA for seine will mirror the Deep Inlet seine rotation with the exception of an hour later start time of 7am. ADFG has determined that it is warranted to open West Crawfish at this time as well and the West Crawfish area will be be open for seine the same days as the Crawfish Inlet SHA. Openings will continue through September 24th, 2021 or unless modified by subsequent ADFG Advisory Announcement. Cost recovery is still ongoing in both West Crawfish and Crawfish Inlet but it is anticipated...
Read MoreSunday 8/22 Update
Cost recovery at Crawfish Inlet has gone very well the last few days and we are now at 60% complete. It is likely cost recovery will be complete Tuesday 8/24 and Crawfish Inlet will open to commercial seine Thur/Fri and mirror the Deep Inlet schedule the rest of the season. ADFG announcement will likely go out Tuesday afternoon. The last few days there has been a buildup in West Crawfish in Shamrock Bay and we have been performing cost recovery there as well. ADFG will look at buildup in West Crawfish next week and determine if a seine opening is warranted in West Crawfish as occurred...
Read MoreFriday 8/20 Update
What a difference a week makes. Chum returns to the Sitka area have improved greatly over the past week. We have seen our weekly catch numbers match our long-term average for Deep Inlet for stat week 33, and based upon current catch, this week at Deep Inlet may surpass the long-term average. Most recent Deep Inlet gillnet sample indicates 65% male and 63% 3-year olds. Troll catch continues to be excellent at both Deep Inlet and West Crawfish with a current catch rate of ~80k per week for the troll fleet at Deep Inlet/Eastern Channel alone. An additional 50k chum were caught last week in...
Read MoreMonday 8/16 Update
The Deep Inlet fall chum catch continued to be strong over the weekend with another good catch on Sunday by the seine fleet and the combined gillnet, seine, and troll catch for stat wk 33 is looking to be over 200k fish. The most recent seine samples from Fri and Sun show a drop in male ratio to ~50% male and an increase in the 3-year old percentage from the mid 30% range prior week to 65% 3-year olds, with age fours making up the remaining 35%. While the recent strong catches are good to see the rapid drop in 4-year olds is concerning and likely means the run will have a sharp drop off...
Read MoreDeep Inlet update Fri 8/13
The fall chum catch in Deep Inlet has remained strong since the uptick in gillnet catch Monday morning through the Friday seine rotation. Initial indications are the gillnet catch will surpass 35k fish for M-W and the Th-F seine catch will almost certainly top 100k fish. There have been reports that Friday afternoon the seine catch had slowed but still is an impressive build from the extremely bleak stat week 32. The Tuesday 8/11 gillnet catch was 67% male with a 60% 4-year old component and 39% 3-year olds. We will be sampling the Th-F and Sun seine catch to see if the sex ration and...
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