Ruling Leaves Anglers On Hook Alaskan Commercial Trollers Scramble To Survive Ban On Fishing For Chinook Salmon

Aggravated anglers in America’s prime seafood waters have a lot of fish stories to tell this summer about the ones that got away - say about 50,000 of them.

That’s about how far commercial fishing trollers in southeast Alaska figure they have fallen short this year in their chinook salmon catch, which has been assailed by everything from jellyfish to bad weather to critics who say overfishing in Alaska endangers salmon stocks throughout the Pacific Northwest.

As the season winds down, this vibrant fishing industry that has enjoyed record runs of other salmon species in recent years has been reeling from bad publicity and a court-ordered halt to commercial chinook fishing.

Rough weather kept many boats off the water, and jellyfish that fouled the lines further hurt the catch. With the court intervention thrown in, chinook fishermen say they face their most abysmal season in years.

“I’d call it close to disastrous,” said Doug Ogilvy, a commercial troller in Gustavus, northwest of Juneau. “The Alaska fleet in general is going to have a lousy season, and there’s fear it’s going to perpetuate into next year.”

Though chinook salmon accounted for only about 1 percent of the $1.3 billion Alaska fishermen took in for seafood last year, criticism of the state’s conservation efforts for that lone species has had a ripple effect. Seafood buyers in the lower 48 states, hearing Alaska rebuked for fishing species to near extinction, start casting about for other suppliers.

“They’re calling up and saying, ‘We’re not going to buy any more Alaska seafood or Alaska salmon,”’ said Kristin Schultz, spokeswoman for the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute. “They tell us they don’t want to buy the last salmon, they don’t want to further endanger any species.”

Last year, Alaska provided virtually all of the U.S. market’s domestically produced salmon, she said.

“What we have to tell them is that Alaska’s having record harvests,” Schultz said. “It’s definitely not an endangered species.”

A different story comes out of Canada. Canadian biologists say mackerel that prey on young salmon swallowed up a huge number of chinook in British Columbia waters in 1992 and 1993, devastating the stocks that spawn along the west coast of Vancouver Island just south of Alaska.

The more fish that Alaska catches, the fewer will make it back to Canada to breed and rebuild the stock, said Brian Riddell, a researcher for Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

While Canada, Washington and Oregon cut their chinook catch this year, Alaska decided in July to stick with its quota of 230,000 fish, 92,000 more than the number Canada pushed for.

The dispute landed in U.S. District Court in Seattle this month after Indian tribal groups in Washington and Oregon, along with the Canadian government, sued to stop chinook fishing in southeast Alaska.

Judge Barbara Rothstein ordered a temporary halt to the state’s commercial chinook fishery so Alaska’s calculations could be reviewed by the Chinook Technical Committee of the Pacific Salmon Commission, which oversees a 1985 salmon treaty between the United States and Canada.

Rothstein scheduled another hearing today, when Alaska hopes she will lift the ban.