Chinook Salmon Fisheries Collapsing

WILD FACTS SERIES

Chinook salmon stocks are collapsing. West Coast fisheries managers recommended all commercial and sport salmon fishing in coastal waters off California and most of Oregon be halted to preserve collapsing Chinook salmon stocks.

“This is a disaster for West Coast salmon fisheries,” said Don Hansen, chairman of the Pacific Fishery Management Council.

Between 2000 and 2005, the annual catch for Chinook salmon in California and Oregon fisheries was about 800,000, according to the council.

Chinook Salmon (male) around spawning time. (Photo Credit: USGS)

In 2002, 775,000 Chinook salmon returned to the Sacramento River to spawn; however, the managers project only 54,000 Chinook will return this year even with the fishing restrictions imposed. Report

Additional Information (Source)

Chinook salmon may spend between one to eight years in the ocean before returning to their home rivers to spawn, though the average is three to four years. Chinook prefer larger and deeper water to spawn in than other species of salmon and can be found on the spawning redds (nests) from September through to December. After laying eggs in a redd, adult female Chinook will guard the redd from 4 to 25 days before dying, while males look for additional mates. Chinook salmon eggs will hatch, depending upon water temperatures, 90 to 150 days after deposition. Eggs are deposited at a time to ensure that young salmon fry emerge during appropriate time for juvenile survival and growth.

Chinook salmon range from San Francisco Bay in California to north of the Bering Strait in Alaska, and the arctic waters of Canada and Russia (the Chukchi Sea ), including the entire Pacific coast in between. Populations occur in Asia as far south as the islands of Japan. In Russia, they are found in Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands.

[Update: May 1, 2008]

PORTLAND, Oregon (Reuters) – The U.S. government on Thursday closed almost all of the ocean off the West Coast to salmon fishing, clearing the way for governors of states hard hit by years of declining catches to seek federal relief aid for losses estimated at $290 million. (Source)

Bering Sea Drilling

Government seeks comment on possible Bering Sea drilling

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) – The Interior Department’s Minerals Management Service on Tuesday announced it is launching an environmental review of possible offshore oil and gas drilling in the salmon-rich area of Bristol Bay, where energy exploration was temporarily banned following the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989.

The area is also home to the world’s biggest sockeye salmon runs and a plethora of marine life, including some of the last known eastern Pacific right whales, a critically endangered species. Full report

Satellite image of the Yukon Delta and Bering Sea. This is how the Big Oil and media would like you to see the area: Alien, Icy, lifeless!

The Yukon Delta (Center) and Bering Sea (Left) image taken by NASA’s Aqua satellite March 8, 2004. (REUTERS/MODIS Rapid Responce Team/NASA-GSFC RCS)

Teeming with Life: Closeups of Yukon Delta and Bering Sea

“Rock Sandpipers drop from the air and into a roost along the shores of the Bering Sea, Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska. Shorebirds form roosts as the tide rises. Once the tide drops and foraging sites are once again exposed, the roost disperses.” (Photo Credit: USGS, Alaska Science Center)

They can gain protection from aerial predators by forming large flocks, but they don’t stand a chance against the Big Oil!

“A flock of Dunlin wheels past at Egegik Bay, Alaska. These small shorebirds gain protection from aerial predators by forming large flocks.” (Photo Credit: USGS, Alaska Science Center)

“Recently hatched Rock Sandpiper chicks, St. Matthew Island, Alaska. Most shorebird chicks exit the nest quickly after hatch and begin to feed themselves, relying on parents for frequent brooding. Their coloration allows them to blend into their tundra surroundings, escaping the detection of predators.” (Photo Credit: USGS, Alaska Science Center)

The Pribilof Islands provide breeding grounds for more than two-thirds of the world’s northern fur seals. (Image and caption courtesy of USGS).

The Pribilof Islands are in the Bering Sea, approximately 770 mi west-southwest of Anchorage and 250 mi north of the Aleutian Islands. Approximately 3 million seabirds nest on the islands, and nearly 1 million northern fur seals—about 70 percent of the world’s northern-fur-seal population—migrate there each year to breed. Other animals on the islands include arctic foxes and herds of reindeer. (Photo courtsey of NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration; caption courtesy of USGS.)

Common Murres at breeding sites on Bogoslof Island in 1999. Murres (including Thick-billed Murres) are excellent subjects for studies of food stress: They are numerous, relatively easy to capture and breed widely throughout the Bering Sea. Both species have declined markedly at some colonies in the Bering Sea since the 1970’s. (Photos and captions courtesy of ABSC USGS).

Black-legged and Red-legged Kittiwake breeding colony on Bogoslof Island. The Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge is monitoring breeding success and chick growth rates at nest sites on Bogoslof and the Pribilof islands. (Photo and caption courtesy of ABSC USGS).

The sea otter is the keystone species for the nearshore marine environment. Sea otter populations are in decline both in California and Alaska, and the California population is listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. (Photo and caption courtesy of USGS, Santa Cruz Field Station).