Deshka River king salmon fishery producing good catches

Although I have not been fishing Deshka River much for the past week, I’ve been keeping tabs on how the action is going over there, and each morning for the past several mornings anglers have been landing plenty of king salmon near where the dark-colored Deshka waters mix with the grey Susitna River channel —especially near the 6 a.m. opening time each day.

I’ve also heard of good success near the river mouth in the afternoon and evening as well. Upriver, the number of king salmon swimming past Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s (ADF&G’s) Deshka River salmon counting weir has been lagging behind the number managers would like to see at this time of year. Upriver king salmon took a jump yesterday when more than 300 kings swam past the weir in one 24-hour period; however, those fish represented more than 60 percent of the king salmon that have swam past the weir since it was installed May 24. Looking at Deshka River king salmon counts from past years, it is easy to notice that several daily weir counts top 1,000 king salmon during most years where the Deshka River king salmon escapement goal of 13,000-28,000 was attained.

While sport king salmon angling success has been good on the Deshka in 2011, king salmon numbers passing the weir need to pick up soon or the fishery could face some sort of restriction by ADF&G in order to ensure the spawning escapement goal is met. Last year with a similar lag in escapement numbers the fishery was restricted to artificial lures only while escapement numbers built past the minimum escapement number, then re-opened to bait fishing later in June. The department is evaluating the fishery and weir counts in consideration of such a regulation change. The importance of the Deshka River weir in providing solid king salmon escapement information cannot be over emphasized, and if a regulation change is made ADF&G Area Management Biologist Sam Ivey will be issuing that emergency order backed by solid weir data.

On the other hand, if the fishery continues under regular regulations, that decision, too, will be backed by solid data. That is the value of a weir.

Little Susitna River king salmon fishery

Over on the Little Susitna River, sport king salmon harvests have been much lower, along with lower than normal angling effort as well.

The Little Susitna River king salmon fishery was closed early by emergency order in both 2009 and 2010 with the Little Susinta River king salmon spawning escapement goal attained in 2009, but missed in 2010. On the Little Susitna River, solid king salmon escapement data is much more difficult to obtain, as the current salmon counting weir is not put in the river until after the king salmon run is nearly over, and the weir is currently located so far upstream as to provide very little in-season salmon management capability for any species.

Counting weirs are expensive enough that the department only puts them on a few representative streams in the first place, and in most cases weirs or other counting devises are located where they can provide the best bang for the buck in terms of in-season management ability. For a stream that provides as important of a salmon fishery for both king salmon and silver salmon as the Little Susitna River, the public (you and I) need to let the Department of Fish and Game know we would like to see the weir located at a location where it can provide much better in-season management capability.

No one wants to see Little Susitna River salmon stocks decline to the point that long run rebuilding closures are necessary, yet having as intense a fishery on a small river like the Little Susitna River could do just that without better in-season monitoring and management to ensure the annual salmon spawning escapement goals are met.

Some people might ask whether the sport salmon fisheries could be run on a more conservative basis. Yes, they could, but doing so on years of strong salmon returns would drastically reduce the recreational and economic benefit derived by the community from the valuable salmon resource. To many, it seems the Little Susitna River simply needs to be identified by the public as a stream that salmon resources are important enough to Mat-Su Valley residents that both the king salmon and silver salmon runs should be monitored and managed with the best science available.

Alaska Department of Fish and Game currently does such management in other locations, and the Little Susitna River is simply such an important resource heavily used by the public that it should have the same standard of management. Developing a better management scenario is partly a public process — are you a fisherman willing to be part of the solution?

Andy Couch owns and operates Fishtale River Guides (fish4salmon.com), is a Mat-Su Anglers Club member (matsuanglers.org) and member of the Mat-Su Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Sportsmen’s Committee. Email this column at sports@frontiersman.com if you have Mat-Su fishing questions or information readers may find useful.