May 20, 2021 โ The following was released by NOAA Fisheries:
On the Yukon River, Chinook salmon are woven into the fabric of life and culture. They are a resource that indigenous people have harvested for more than 1,000 years. But over the last 20 years or more, the Chinook populations have declined dramatically. Fewer Chinook are returning to the river each year, and those that do are smaller and younger than they have been in the past. This has created hardship for the people who rely on this resource. It is nurturing a strong desire to understand and contribute to solutions to address the dwindling returns.
Ragnar Alstrom, Executive Director of Yukon Delta Fisheries Development Association, explains it this way: โWe want to be a part of figuring out why our Chinook arenโt returning. Instead of standing by and waiting for someone else to figure it out, we want to be engaged in the science.โ
So began a special partnership between NOAA Fisheries, Alaska Department of Fish and Game, and local fishermen from the villages of Emmonak and Alakanuk. Starting in 2014, the Yukon Delta Fisheries Development Association (YDFDA) worked with scientists to identify nine permanent sampling stations on the three main lower Yukon distributaries. Each summer, local fishermen and NOAA Fisheries biologists work together. They set and retrieve salmon sampling nets, identify and count the catch, and measure water temperature and depth. They send salmon samples to the NOAA Fisheries Auke Bay Laboratories where their diet and body condition are analyzed.