With the 2013 salmon season now about over, the preliminary
harvest totals stand at 309,000 Chinook, 18,182,000 chum, 5,332,000 coho,
215,600,000 pink and 29,539,000 sockeye salmon—a total of 268,962,000 fish.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Division of
Commercial Fisheries estimates that for Bristol Bay alone, the preliminary ex-vessel
value of the 16.6 million salmon of all species harvested is $141 million,
which is 26 percent above the 20-year average and ranks 7th over that
same period.
The approximately 19,000 Chinook salmon harvested in Bristol Bay in 2013 were 71 percent below the average harvest of 64,604 kings for the last 20 years, and the chum harvest of 872,000 fish was 10 percent below the 20-year average of 959,000 fish
The 2013 inshore Bristol Bay sockeye salmon run of 23
million fish ranked 15th over the last 20 years, and was 36 percent
below the 36 million fish average run for the same period. In fact, this year’s
sockeye run was 12 percent below the preseason inshore forecast of 26 million
fish.
A further break-out of that $141 million total shows that
the 15.3 million red salmon weighed an average of 6 pounds and fetched $1.50 a
pound. The 18,616 king salmon weighed an average of 18.6 pounds and paid 77
cents a pound. The 871,558 chum salmon, weighing an average of 6.4 pounds, and
the 1,584 humpies, weighing an average of 3.1 pounds, both fetched 30 cents a
pound, and the 135,000 silver salmon, weighing an average of 6 pounds, were
worth 80 cents a pound.