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Deep Inlet Notice
To Deep Inlet THA Fishery User Groups:
A reminder about boat traffic and anchoring near island homes in the Deep Inlet area.
Please review our plan:
Berry Island Resident Impact and Noise Reduction Plan
Crawfish Inlet SHA to Open Sept. 13
There will be a common property seine opening at Crawfish Inlet on Thursday September 13th. Look for the official ADF&G announcement on Tuesday September 11th. I expect there will be one or two additional openings to clean up the tail-end of the run (announcement possibly on Friday, September 14th). Cost recovery is expected to harvest <one million pounds total between today and Tuesday with no cost recovery on Wednesday.
The run to date is just over 3 million fish; 1.6 million have been harvested by the seine fleet and 220,000 by the troll fleet. Approximately 480,000 chum were caught on the past Thursday opening.
As most people are aware this run is an anomaly in several regards. Broodyear (BY) ’14 had 184,000 3s return in 2017 (1.4% marine survival) which was a very, very good survival. The 4s from that year (BY’14) also survived well with 501,000 4s so far, or 2.7 fours for each three year old. Adding the 3s and 4s from BY ’14 yields a 5.1% marine survival (that will go up with next year’s 5s). All this is very good but not an anomaly.
Broodyear ’15 chum return this year as 3’s is off the chart! 2.5 million chum have returned in 2018 as 3’s. This represents 9.1% marine survival just for 3’s. I would call that Anomaly 1. The proportion of male to female is unusual as well. We do not have the weighted average complete but it appears the male ratio will be on the order of 70%, or Anomaly 2. The high male ratio is being driven by Age 3’s, although in the past week 53% of the harvest has been female, both 3’s and 4’s.
So what happens next year? What will the forecast be? This will be difficult to predict given Anomalies 1 & 2. Even if we used 2.7:1 or the ratio of 4’s to 3’s we saw for the BY’14 return the forecast would seem improbable or 2.7 x 2.5 million 3’s = 6,750,000 4’s plus additional chum for BY’16 3’s and BY’14 5’s. It seems fairly certain there will be a lot of chum at Crawfish Inlet in 2019.
The NSRAA board will be discussing a management plan for Crawfish at its November 14 & 15, 2018 board meeting. It is unlikely NSRAA will need to conduct cost recovery at Crawfish Inlet in 2019. Trollers will continue to have a preference in Crawfish Inlet, but given the magnitude of this year’s return there will need to be a minimum of one seine opening per week in the early and late segments of the run, and two openings during the peak weeks to maintain high quality fish throughout the run.
Finally, NSRAA has two seine seats, as well as four other gear seats, expiring in November, with nominations due on November 14th at 5 pm. The election count will be conducted in February with winners being seated at the March 2019 board meeting. Please take an active roll in your organization.
Crawfish Inlet to Open Thursday Sept. 6
We will suspend cost recovery after Wednesday and have a common property seine opening Thursday September 6th. I will need to confer with ADF&G tomorrow morning for this to be official; expect ADF&G to get an announcement out Tuesday afternoon.
Sampling at Shamrock Bay and Crawfish Inlet today showed brighter fish and slightly more females at Shamrock. My observations on the two harvest boats and tender in Shamrock Bay was no very dark or nasty chum and only low numbers of gillers in the web. Fish density in Shamrock was lower than expected with only 200,000 lbs of chum taken. This seems to confirm that the chum move through West Crawfish and up into the inlets such as Shamrock, but then back out and continue on to Crawfish Inlet. Additional evidence for this is that the trollers were not happy with the harvest boats fishing in Shamrock, which suggests the trollers fish on chum moving east in West Crawfish but also west as the fish leave Shamrock and head to Cedar Pass.
Look for the ADF&G announcement and good luck.
Crawfish Inlet Update September 3
The Crawfish Inlet run continues to develop with exceptionally strong 3s at about 82% of the run or 1.5 million fish, and surprisingly low 4s (330,000 fish), although not terrible, lower than expected. The run isn’t over so I am hoping more of the remaining females are 4s rather than 3s. We are seeing a bump in female ratio with the last two CR harvests and seine samples close to 40%. Today’s CR harvest appears closer to 50%.
The sex ratio is another anomaly – 75% males so far, this is likely driven by the high number of 3s which tend to be precocious males. These unusual data make predicting where we are in the run and forecasting next year’s run difficult. Nevertheless, I expect another several hundred thousand fish before it is all done. The run total to date is about 2.1 million fish and will likely hit 2.5 million or better.
Cost recovery will continue tomorrow Sept. 4th.
The troll fishery at West Crawfish continues to be robust with 25 boats and a total harvest of 175,000 chum.
Hidden Falls: Sunday June 17, 2018 Opening
The initial Hidden Falls opening is coming up on Sunday, June 17.
Note that the THA is restricted to approximately 1 mile offshore, due to this spring’s Chinook restrictions.
An excerp from the June 7 ADF&G News Release:
District 12
The following area will be open to purse seining from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., Sunday, June 17, 2018:
Section 12-A: will be open in the following areas:
Point Augusta: will be open within 0.5 nautical miles from the Chichagof Island shoreline south of 58°03.00′ N. latitude and north of a regulatory marker at 58°01.63′ N. latitude (located one nautical mile south of Point Augusta Light);
Hidden Falls Terminal Harvest Area (THA): will be open in the waters of Chatham Strait within the boundaries of a line from South Point, as indicated by a marker at 57°16.28′ N. latitude, 134°51.78′ W. longitude to a point offshore at 57°16.28′ N. latitude, 134°49.94′ W. longitude, then running south to a point offshore at 57°06.76′ N. latitude, 134°45.37′ W. longitude then due west to a point on the Baranof Island shoreline at 57°06.76′ N. latitude, 134°47.50′ W. longitude with the following restriction:
Kasnyku Bay: will be closed north and west of a line from North Point at 57°13.36′ N. latitude, 134°50.53′ W. longitude to the northernmost tip of Round Island to the southernmost tip of Round Island to a point on the Baranof Island shoreline at 57°12.48′ N. latitude, 134°50.98′ W. longitude.
Approximate lines are shown here:
Hidden Falls THA – 6.17.18
Visiting Hidden Falls
NOTICE:
Effective March 20, 2020:
HIDDEN FALLS and all NSRAA facilities are closed to the public until further notice due to the Covid-19 shelter in place policy.
Hidden Falls has become a popular destination for visitors!
To provide the best opportunity for visitors, and to minimize impacts on hatchery staff, NSRAA is implementing a reservation system for visitors.
- Visitors will now be required to have a reservation.
- Visits are limited to 1.5 hours and must be scheduled between the hours of 9:00am and 4:00 pm daily.
We have set up a web page for submitting visitation requests. Here you can view a calendar to see what dates and times are open and submit your request. The page is listed under our “the FrontPage” menu listing, and can also be accessed on our homepage.
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