No Pictures Today

Theres no way a picture could help describe whats going on with the Kenai and the way I feel. Its official, the river is closed to King Salmon fishing until July 1st or we get enough fish over the sonar to merit its reopening. Its quiet here at Mile 14, like a funeral. The first run of salmon has been fickle for years and we've had several occasions when we had a few weeks of closure or a couple weeks of catch and release fishing...but never anything like this. The sonar count two days a go was 15, how did we get to this???

When I first started guiding the early fish were plentiful and easy to catch, even now its my favorite King fishing. Although not as many fish as July we trade that off for less people and a better fishing experience, I've just loved it through the years. But in the early 80's management plans were adopted and minimum escapements (no. 1 priority, fish to escape and spawn) were set. The first goal for this run was around 12,000 as I remember. Through the years that numbered was lowered for a myriad of reasons to the 5500 we have now. I'm no scientist but I do know that the lower you set your goals the easier they are to achieve. And, like a bank account the goal is so tight that there is no savings to fall back on in case things go poorly. That's where we are right now, the shoe leather meets the street.

Like most accidents the situation here is not caused by just one thing I think. Most accidents are a series of poor decisions, this I know all to well. Something is going on in the ocean as King runs are missing all over south central Alaska. It could be deep water trawls or it could be seiners in Shelikof Strait, whatever, it doesn't matter....its us, we've screwed it up. If you ascribe to the notion that over use in-river is to blame it could be State Parks for enabling the guide numbers to grow to 400, or even the guides themselves for harvesting and harvesting with not much promotion of catch and release...it doesn't matter, its us, we've screwed it up.

The good news is that the Kenai River is pristine salmon habitat and that's our ace in the hole. This thing is just sooo fixable. We just have to do what should come naturally from all accidents, learn from it. In my life I've learned a few hard lessons and I don't know everything thats right to do. But I sure do know a few things not to do, lets hope our fisheries managers are like that.

When I started this blog I know I promised to keep it light and fun and please bare with me, I'll get back to that. I promise. But right now I just can't do it. I'm feeling a little financially threatened, I'm feeling kind of rudderless...I'm not fishing!...that's what I do, that's my deal. I'm feeling a little guilt for the fish, like I could have done better advocating for them. I'm just a bit heart broke now...