Alaska’s Overall Commercial Salmon Harvests Climb to Nearly 50M Fish

Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s 2024 preliminary commercial salmon harvest total rose to nearly 50 million fish over the past week, as the harvest of all five species of Pacific salmon were counted.

As of Monday, July 22, the ADF&G Blue Sheet showed a harvest of 49.7 million salmon overall, including 36.8 million sockeye, 5 million pink, 7.6 million chum 167,000 Chinook and 72,000 coho.

The bulk of the harvest — nearly 40 million fish — is in the Central Region, and includes nearly 30 million Bristol Bay salmon, 8.6 million salmon in Prince William Sound and 1.2 million salmon in Cook Inlet.

Bristol Bay fishermen in the Nushagak District have delivered to processors nearly 12 million sockeyes, plus 197,000 chum, 2,000 Chinook and 1,000 pink salmon. In the Naknek-Kvichak District the catch includes 8.6 million sockeyes and Egegik District had 4.9 million reds.

In the Prince William Sound area, the Copper River drift fishery led with 1.4 million fish, including 1.4 million red salmon, followed by the Eshamy District drift/setnet district with 1.3 million fish, again mostly sockeyes. Cook Inlet harvesters added another 1.2 million salmon delivered to processors.

In the Westward Region of Alaska, the catch to date totals 4.2 million fish, including 2.8 million sockeyes, 899,000 chum, 449,000 pink, 46,000 coho and 8,000 Chinook salmon. Harvesters in the Alaska Peninsula brought in over three million salmon, including 2.2 million sockeyes, 493,000 chum, 342,000 pink,31,000 coho and 6,000 Chinooks.

Kodiak area fishermen had 939,000 fish overall, including 452,000 sockeyes, 390,000 chum, 92,000 pink, 4,000 coho and 1,000 Chinooks and Chignik delivered 165,000 fish, including 122,000 sockeyes, 16,000 chum, 15,000 pink, 11,000 coho and 1,000 Chinooks.

As the season winds down, wild Alaska sockeye fillets are selling for $19.98 a pound and four-pound whole wild Alaska sockeyes for $54.99 at Pike Place Fish Market in Seattle. The famed fish market also has alderwood smoked three-pound wild Alaska salmon jerky for $49.99 a pound and smoked whole Alaska sockeyes for $99.99.

At 10th& M Seafoods in Anchorage fresh sockeye salmon fillets are $12.95 a pound. New Sagaya’s seafood department had whole wild Alaska sockeyes for 46.99 a pound. The online Anchorage retailer FishEx still had portions of Copper River sockeyes for $37.95 a pound.