A salmon cam in Alaska’s Steep Creek is showing fair numbers of
sockeye swimming upstream near the Mendenhall Glacier near
Juneau.
The U.S. Forest Service, which placed the camera (at right),
says the sockeye are likely to be visible from mid-July through
August. If you’re lucky, you may see the sockeye pairing up and
possibly even digging redds for their eggs.
Adult sockeye tend to average 24 inches long in Steep Creek.
Besides sockeye, you may see cutthroat and Dolly Varden trout in
the creek. You may also see young coho salmon swimming by. The
camera is managed by Forest Service officials in Tongass National
Forest.
If you recall, I listed several wildlife cams in a
June 17 entry in Water Ways. At the time, a pair of ospreys was
raising three young chicks. Take a look now at the ospreycam;
the babies are almost as big as their parents.
As for the Mendenhahl sockeye, additional information was
provided in a news release issued by the Forest Service:
This will be my last update on this year’s Fraser River sockeye
run, as the run has begun to tail off and increases in the
estimates have been slight the past two weeks.
Latest numbers
from the Fraser River Panel (PDF 28 kb): Early-summer-run
sockeye, 3.8 million; summer-run, 5.2 million; and late-run 25.4
million. The late-run is now more than three times higher than the
preseason prediction, and the total runsize estimate now stands at
34.5 million.
Please read the rest of this blog entry for how this situation
developed.
—–
The entire Fraser River run is now estimated at 34 million, the
highest run size since 1913, when experts estimated the run to
total about 39 million. The late-run Shuswap/Weaver sockeye, which
are in their dominant year, are now three times the preseason
estimate.
—– UPDATE; Friday, Aug. 27
The entire Fraser River run is now estimated at 30 million, the
highest run size since 1913, when experts estimated the run to
total about 39 million.
—–
The total run of Fraser River sockeye is now predicted to be 25
million fish, which compares to 1.9 million total for last year.
This year’s run is the largest since 1913, according to the news
release.
By the way, Seattle Times reporter Hal Bernton does a nice
job reporting on the personal and economic effects of the big
sockeye run.
—–
UPDATE: Friday, Aug. 20
The Fraser River Panel today released new runsize estimates for
sockeye. See news release (PDF 198 kb). The latest numbers
have increased from 2.6 million to 2.9 million for early-summer-run
sockeye; from 3.3 million to 4.0 million for summer-run; and from 8
million to 12.1 million for late-run. We are now seeing predictions
that far exceed preseason estimates.
—–
When it comes to Fraser River sockeye, a single year can make
all the difference in the world.
Lummi tribal fishermen use
a purse seine to catch Fraser River sockeye salmon in the San Juan
Islands.
Photo courtesy of Northwest Indian Fisheries
Commission
Last year at this time, I commented in
Water Ways about the mystery of the missing Fraser River
sockeye and the economic disaster wrought by the abysmally poor
runs. Preseason forecasts of 10 million sockeye washed out with a
return around 1.9 million.
This year, all kinds of fishermen seem overwhelmed with
excitement as large sockeye runs return to the Fraser, the longest
river in British Columbia.
Kelly Sinoski, a reporter for the
Vancouver Sun, described how fishermen were laughing with joy.
She quoted Julius Boudreau, a commercial fisherman in Port
McNeill:
“It’s out of the ordinary. The catches have been way more than
the quota. It’s crazy. We’re seeing thousands and thousands of
fish.”
I placed a call to Tim Tynan of the National Marine Fisheries
Service, who works with the Pacific Salmon Commission as the U.S.
representative on the Fraser Panel. He reminded me that we are
seeing the Adams-dominant cycle this year, a typically strong
return that comes around every four years and is associated with
Adams River and Lake Shuswap, which is located in the middle of the
Fraser River watershed near Kamloops. Continue reading →
