July 3rd, 2025: Fisheries Report For The Copper River District

  

Copper River Fishing Report 

Here is this week’s management update on Copper River fisheries.

 

Commercial Fishery:

This week the Copper River District was opened for a 24-hour commercial fishing period on Monday, June 30. A total of 121 king salmon and about 51,000 sockeye salmon were harvested. Bringing the season total commercial harvest to 5,256 king salmon and 515,404 sockeye salmon.

 

The Copper River District is currently open today, Thursday, July 3 for a 36-hour commercial fishing period.

 

Miles Lake SONAR:

Total salmon passage past the sonar is 599,967 salmon through yesterday, July 2. This is about 163,000 more fish than the total management objective for this date. Daily passage is continuing to exceed anticipated passage and yesterday’s count around 16,000 fish was double of what was anticipated. This morning’s count suggests another strong passage day, likely similar or better than yesterday’s, is happening today. You can monitor the sonar counts, and how they compare to the anticipated or expected counts, by CLICKING HERE. Miles Lake sonar counts are also found on the Department’s Fish Counts webpage.

 

 

King salmon cumulative apportionment at the Miles Lake sonar is tracking very similar to 2021and 2024, both of which are years when we didn’t meet the king salmon escapement goal. This apportionment figure below was provided by the Division of Commercial Fisheries on page 4 of their PWS Salmon Fishery Announcement #19.

 

Native Village of Eyak (NVE) Fish Wheels:

As of July 2, the NVE Baird Canyon fish wheels have captured, marked, and released a total of 2,879 king salmon. The NVE fish wheels running at Canyon Creek have captured a total of 407 salmon, of which 66 have been marked. Currently, 16.2% of all king salmon captured at Canyon Creek have been tagged fish. This is a high recapture rate, which is indicative of low abundance. The low sample size of captures at Canyon Creek for most of the season will likely bring a fair amount of uncertainty with the post-season abundance estimate.  Tagged king salmon recaptured at Canyon Creek are averaging about 12.5 days of travel time to get there from Baird Canyon. 

 

Current indices point to a weak king salmon run and currently projections from the NVE data indicate that the final inriver king salmon abundance estimate will be below the lower bound of the SEG without additional restrictions. Another Emergency Order was released yesterday, July 2, further restricting the king salmon sport fishery.

 

Copper River:

The Copper River stage height at the Chitina-McCarthy Bridge has been fluctuating around 13 ft. The river remains lower than last year on this date and is about 1 foot below the average stage height. You can monitor the Copper River stage gauge in Chitina online at this NOAA site.

 

CHITINA SUBDISTRICT PERSONAL USE FISHERY:

The Chitina Subdistrict Personal Use salmon dip net fishery is currently open and will remain open through midnight on Tuesday, July 8 before being closed for a day-and-a-half. It will reopen at noon on Thursday, July 10 and will remain open through midnight Sunday, July 13 .  King salmon retention in the personal use fishery is prohibited this season by Emergency Order. Any king salmon caught must be released immediately and returned to the water unharmed.  Reports from earlier in the week have been that dipnetting has been very good below the bridge and in the canyon. 

 

GLENNALLEN SUBDISTRICT SUBSISTENCE FISHERY:

The Glennallen Subdistrict subsistence salmon fishery is currently open. Reports from the subsistence fish wheels have been slow these past few days. It is anticipated that a large pulse of sockeye that have recently moved through Woods Canyon will begin to materialize above the Chitina-McCarthy bridge and further upriver here over the next coming days.

 

SPORT FISHERIES:

King salmon reports from the Gulkana River has been that it’s slow fishing by Sourdough.  Klutina River sockeye salmon fishing has also slowed down but king salmon fishing opened on the Klutina and Tonsina Rivers two days ago on July 1. Anglers have been reporting some success there with king salmon.  The king salmon annual limit in the sport fishery has been reduced by EO to 1 fish for the entire Copper River drainage and the use of bait and treble hooks are still prohibited in the Gulkana River and this regulation is still in place through the holiday weekend. 

 

Beginning 12:01 AM Monday, July 7, all Upper Copper River drainage king salmon sport fisheries are being restricted to catch-and-release. This EO also prohibits the use of bait and treble hooks in all flowing waters through August 10. King salmon retention will be prohibited and king salmon must be released immediately and may not be removed from the water before being released.

 

On going salmon research in 2025:

The Gulkana counting tower has passed a total of 1,329 king salmon and 3,150 sockeye salmon through July 2. Gulkana River fish counts can be tracked at the ADF&G Fish Counts webpage.

 

Through July 2, a total of 677 sockeye salmon have been radio tagged at Baird Canyon. Unfortunately, I do not have an update this week regarding tag locations but will provide one in next week’s update. If you catch a radio-tagged salmon this season, we ask that you please contact the office at 907-822-3309 so we can collect data on when and where the fish was harvested, and the tag number located on the tag itself. Also, if you can return the tag to us in a timely manner, it can be reused this season and put into another salmon. 

 

WHAT WE ARE WATCHING FOR NOW:

SOCKEYE SALMON:  We will continue to monitor and track daily passage at Miles Lake. As of today, cumulative passage past the sonar is projecting the end the season with around 870,000 salmon inriver.

 

KING SALMON: NVE projections on king salmon continue to point towards a final inriver estimate below the lower bound of the escapement goal and additional restrictions have been placed on the sport fishery. We will continue to monitor NVE capture data to determine if further action is needed to ensure we meet the escapement goal.

 

NEXT DECISION TIME: Commercial managers will be assessing harvest data from the current fishing period over the weekend. On Monday (July 7) I will be reviewing the sonar counts from June 30 – July 6 to determine how many hours the personal use fishery will be open for during the week of June 14. This decision will be announced on Wednesday, July 9.

 

I hope you all have a happy and safe fourth of July.

 

Tracy R. Hansen

Area Management Biologist

Upper Copper/Upper Susitna 

Alaska Department of Fish & Game

Division of Sport Fish – Glennallen

907.822.3309