[CINC] Clarification on Alaska's Salmon or Gold?

[paul jr petrich]

Ahoy again,
 The Sockeye Salmon fisheries in the Bristol Bay region is probably the most sustainable wild fisheries in the world, and has been since the late 1950s. It's sustainability is based on gathering yearly scientific data on the Red Salmon while they are in fresh water, both as they leave for the ocean as 2 year old fingerling , and then as they migrate toward spawning grounds after being 2 years in the ocean. The fingerling reside in the many lakes of Bristol Bay's watershed for 2 years, then take multiple river outlets to the sea. They are enumerated at each and every lake outlet, by using funnel nets that cover a mathematically determined portion of each river's measured outlet area, for a given portion of each day. After a given duration of the fingerling outward migration toward the sea, at each river outlet, an estimated escape is mathematically determined. This fingerling migration number toward the sea is used to estimate the return  of these very same fingerling as adult Red Salmon ( Sockeye ) in two more years. This estimate is what the fisheries and scientific community use to determine the number of days of each week the commercial fishermen may fish during the return spawning migration. The licensed fishermen may fish these specified days near where the said many rivers wash into the Bristol Bay.
 The study that Catherine shared with us obviously will, if heeded, supply important scientific data about what could disastrously disrupt the Red Salmon's ability to find their home stream spawning grounds: Specifically the residue from gold and copper mining operations that would be dumped into the watershed that provides the salmon's "homing signal'.    I sari wa,  Paul
P.S. In the summers of 1956, 1957, and 1958 I was fortunate enough to have a summer job as a fisheries aid who helped the pioneering marine biologist from the U of Washington establish the validity of this program of sustainability, which is still used by the State of Alaska ( Alaska was a US Territory then ). We worked at the outlet of Lake Iliamna on the Kvichak River near the native village of Igiugig. See map PP 106-107.  I returned to this Iliamna region for the first time the summer of 2012. The issue of wether to mine for gold and copper, as apposed to continuing their model in sustainable fisheries was huge. Last year a local vote went heavily against the mining operation. However, lobbyist and politicians at the state level are still pushing it big time. 
 
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