BETHEL -- Federal managers of the Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge say they plan to intervene to protect king salmon on the Kuskokwim River this spring and summer.
Neil Lalonde, a Bethel-based refuge manager, on Friday told a salmon working group advising state and federal managers that the special action was needed and justified along the Kuskokwim. The specifics still are being worked out, but the result will be a closure that prevents gear targeting king or chinook salmon, he said.
There could be limited fishing for a small number of kings by special permit "for traditional use," he said. State managers will retain control of the fishing that targets other species of salmon and other kinds of fish, he said.
King salmon numbers have been in decline all over Alaska. The refuge staff expects "little to no harvestable surplus," Lalonde told the Kuskokwim River Salmon Management Working Group.
Last year's Kuskokwim king run was estimated at 130,000 fish, much smaller than the average of more than 240,000. That was enough to meet state goals for spawning but only because the harvest of 12,000 fish was the smallest on record.
State and federal managers say they will work closely together and also will listen to the working group, which includes elders, subsistence users, sport and commercial fishermen, and a fish processor. Refuge staff members also have traveled to villages up and down the river; state managers said they have been able to do only limited village travel.
The Kuskokwim River Salmon Management Working Group had asked for king closures to begin Friday, before a single king salmon swims up the still-thawing Kuskokwim. But federal and state managers said that seemed too early. The river is breaking up around Sleetmute and beyond, and residents there need a chance to get some early fish, managers said.
Closures to protect kings likely will begin around the same day as last year, May 20, managers said. Mark Leary, a working group member who fishes upriver around Napaimute, reminded managers that kings were caught near Bethel last year starting May 11.
The Yukon wildlife refuge -- the biggest refuge in the country -- includes the portion of the Kuskokwim River from the village of Aniak to the river mouth. State managers will retain control outside its boundaries.
State managers also intend to use new tools to help troubled king salmon runs recover, Aaron Poetter, area management biologist for the state Department of Fish and Game, said Friday from Anchorage. This year for the first time, the state can allow limited fishing with small-mesh setnets anchored to the river bottom close to shore or the bank. That gear should allow kings to pass by in the middle of the river or, with the smaller openings, cause kings to bounce off.
Even when fishing for kings is shut down, the state plans to allow village residents to use those setnets during weekly 72-hour openings, Poetter said. The working group had proposed even shorter openings of just 12 hours, enough time to catch a few fresh fish. But managers said those short openings are inefficient. The openings are planned weekly for 6 a.m. Thursday to 6 a.m. Sunday.
Last year, federal managers for the first time shut down targeted fishing for kings at the start of the season, before fishing even got going. Residents of Bethel and villages were allowed to get a combined 1,000 king salmon under a special permit. Some villages refused to participate, saying they couldn't get what they needed.
But even during the closure, federal managers allowed setnets aimed at whitefish or smaller salmon. State managers also restricted the size of nets, but fishermen were able to drift with them in open skiffs and caught lots of kings.