Alaska’s overall statewide harvest of all wild salmon species through July 1 stood at a preliminary total of nearly 20 million fish. The good news for fishermen is that prices were holding steady through July 5 in Anchorage at $6.95 a pound for headed and gutted whole sockeye, with those omega-3 oil packed fillets going for $10.95 at one popular retail seafood outlet. Bristol Bay’s total harvest through July 1 stood at 9.5 million salmon of all species, including 9.3 million sockeye, 188,000 chum and 28,000 kings. For Prince William Sound, the total harvest was 3.3 million salmon, including more than 2 million reds, 1.9 million chum, 19,000 kings, some 4,000 silvers and 3,000 pink salmon. For the Copper River alone, the total run was 1.3 million fish, 1,338,000 reds, 18,000 kings, 11,000 chum, 3,000 silvers and fewer than 1,000 pinks.
Southeast Alaska fisheries reached a harvest of 798,000 salmon of all species through July 1, including some 409,000 chum, 158,000 pinks, 118,000 reds, 75,000 kings and 38,000 silvers.
The westward region showed a total harvest of 5.8 million salmon of all species. That included 1.9 million fish at Chignik – of which 1.8 million were reds, some 61,000 chum and 25,000 pinks, and 973,000 salmon of all species at Kodiak, including 804,000 reds, 142,000 chum, 25,000 pinks, 2,000 kinds and few than 1,000 silvers.
The struggling Yukon River fisheries continued to be weak, with a total harvest of 95,000 chum. For the entire Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim region, the harvest through July 1 stood at 139,000 salmon, including some 123,000 chum, 10,000 kings and 6,000 reds.
