Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Jason Pawluk said today’s Russian River Opener has seen catch rates dwindling as the day moves along.
Pawluk: “Fish have moved up into the closed area and it’s slow right now but we didn’t see very many fish yesterday when we walked the river, we saw about a thousand from the power lines down to the confluence and only about 500 in the sanctuary. We expect slow fishing over the next few days but we do expect it to improve.”
The department installed the Russian River Fish weir for the season last Thursday and Pawluk said initial numbers are indicating a good-sized red run.
Pawluk: “Yesterday’s red counts was about 476 fish for a cumulative of 743 reds so far in a week so they’re trickling in and we anticipate the counts to continue to increase.”
Good numbers of sockeye sized Early Run Russian Red salmon are passing that Kenai River sonar and it usually takes 10 – 14 days for the fish to travel from the sonar to the weir.
