With a relatively strong run of red and king salmon projected in the Cook Inlet this year, management biologist Pat Shields with the Department of Fish & Game says sports and commercial fishermen should see a “normal” start to the season.
Shields: “We have a pretty good forecast for sockeye of 7.1 million total run and more, about 4.7 million of that we expect to come back to the Kenai. That puts commercial fisheries management into the upper tier, which provides for a lot of hours for the east side set net fishery, two regular 12 hour periods per week and up to 84 additional hours per week that could be fished beginning on or after July 8th to harvest sockeye salmon.”
The pre-season forecast for late run kings is also encouraging, at 30,000 total return to the Kenai River.
Shields: “If that forecast is exactly correct, it looks like we’re going to start both fisheries, the commercial fishery and the in-river sport fishery, under normal management, meaning bait in the river and harvest in the river and as many hours as I just alluded to.”
Sheilds specified that those rules apply to the late run Kenai River king salmon fishery opening July 31st, 2016.
Shields said he’ll be watching the season cautiously, keeping in mind that another warmer than average year could mean another late run of reds.