(Glennallen) - The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is closing the Chitina Subdistrict personal use fishery for the week of July 6 – 12 to provide more sockeye salmon towards the escapement goal.

The Copper River personal use fishery is managed under the Copper River Personal Use Dip Net Salmon Fishery Management Plan (5 AAC 77.591) and directs the department to establish weekly fishing periods based on Miles Lake sonar counts. As of June 28, a total of 317,769 salmon were counted past the Miles Lake sonar, which is the lowest cumulative count on record for this date in 40 years. The preseason projection for June 28 was 401,963 salmon, which results in a deficit of approximately 84,000 salmon or 21% below expected (see Figure 1 below). Daily sonar passage at Miles Lake has been below the daily management objective for all but eight days this season, and daily salmon passage from June 22 – 28 was below anticipated for five of the seven days, even with no commercial fishing occurring in the Copper River District over the previous two weeks. Therefore, closure of the Chitina Subdistrict personal use salmon dip net fishery for the week of July 6 – 12 is necessary to reduce harvest and increase the likelihood of achieving the Copper River sockeye salmon escapement goal.

The department will continue to evaluate inseason run strength and will reopen the personal use fishery if sonar counts improve and adequate numbers of salmon become available to allow for additional harvest.

Figure 1 – This season’s total salmon passage (red line) past Miles Lake sonar compared to the target management objective range (gray shaded area).

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