Returns of summer chum to NSRAA remote release sites through stat week 29 continues to be poor and all indications to date are that we will be at or well below the low range of our preseason summer chum forecast. Catches at Thomas Bay and SE Cove this past week, were weak with few boats at each site. The only positive indicator is that both sites are still running above 55% male but the combined cumulative catch to date of the two is less than 50k fish total. We continue to see a slow building of chum at Gunnuk Creek and yesterday was the first day NSRAA has had the fish ladder on and fish have made it up into the raceways. We anticipate beginning egg takes at Gunnuk Creek Tuesday this week. Our pre-season summer chum egg take goal at Gunnuk is 20 million eggs. I hope that our first egg take effort at Gunnuk Creek goes as smooth as possible and the recruitment up the creek to the hatchery is without issues.
Weekly test fishing has continued at Hidden Falls. Last week we saw our average catch per set drop from 300 per set to 150. This was discouraging for staff and the cost recovery vessel as we had several positive reports of large numbers of fish in the Hidden Falls THA. These estimates ranged from 40k to 200k in the entire THA. Such large variation in estimates makes it challenging to predict the overall strength of the return to date and make decisions on when we have sufficient brood stock. Earlier today (Monday) we initiated an additional test fishing effort and have observed quite a change in volume. The initial 5 sets averaged ~900 fish per set. Several additional sets were made to the south of Kasnyku Bay with some being quite large. Today’s test fishing effort puts us close to halfway through the cost recovery cap for the Hidden Falls test fishing. We are closely monitoring brood stock numbers to Hidden Falls and will likely make an additional test fishing effort later this week. There is growning indicators that the HF chum are returning from the south end of Chatham instead of the more recent trend of from the north. This is being seen in the Test Fishery data at Hawk Inlet, Pt Gardner and Kingsmill (data available at: https://www.nsraa.org/?page_id=5485 , with cost recovery/test set info at : https://www.nsraa.org/?page_id=5448) . Yesterday we began egg takes at Hidden Falls with a total pre-season goal of 140 million eggs. Once we are assured we have brood stock secured we will begin common property openings on any surplus.
Deep Inlet has really slowed this week and effort has dropped to very few boats of either net fleet. It looks like we just hit the low point of our pre-season forecast for summer chum at Deep Inlet and they are now sharply falling off the curve. We continue to see very few 5-year olds and the sex ratio has dropped to 39% male. There has been little sign of the fall chum showing up yet although the 5-year old percentage did tick up a few points from 1% week before to 4% of catch last week. Egg takes began Friday last week at Medvejie on the summer Hidden Falls stock chum with a little less than half of the 30k of what we need for brood visible in Bear Cove. Goal at Medvejie is 30 million summer stock chum.
Overall summer chum returns continue to be poor but it is looking better for brood at our 3 summer stock chum sites, Hidden Falls, Gunnuk Creek and Medvejie. This next week will be critical as we will have egg takes underway at all 3 facilities meeting egg take goals and balancing brood stock numbers between them as well.
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