Fraser River Sockeye Fisheries and Fisheries Management - Cohen ...

and Alagnak rivers (to protect Kvichak) and on the Wood River (to protect theNushagak).Allocation of catch among users in Bristol Bay, although a source of heated debated onmany occasions, is simpler to administer than on the Fraser River. Allocation targets areestablished at Board of Fisheries meetings every three years in an open and transparentprocess where all affected parties are given time to speak to allocation plans.Commercial fisheries in the Bay are limited to just two gear types (set and drift gillnet),and catches in subsistence and recreational fisheries rarely exceed more than 1% of theannual sockeye harvest.These features noted above are in stark contrast to Fraser sockeye where the entire run isdestined for a single large river and management goals are set for four run-timing groupscomprised of over 25 distinct indicator stocks (conservation units). Target harvestallocations are set for multiple First Nations, three commercial gear types in Canada, andseveral U.S. fisheries and gear types in Panel Area waters. The Fraser fishery is more ofa gauntlet fishery than the Bristol Bay fishery, with harvesting occurring in places up to200 km from the river mouth as well as along a good portion of the river. Travel timesbetween major marine fishing areas and lower river assessment sites for Fraser sockeyerange from 6-8 days for early run timing groups to 3-6 weeks for Late-run stocks.The magnitude and duration of the two fisheries is substantially different. Daily harvestsat the peak of the annual Bristol Bay fishery exceed 2 million fish on a regular basis andhave been as high as 5.2 million fish on a single day. The Bay fishery occurs over about6 weeks beginning early June and about 65% of the harvest occurs over a 2-week periodcentered on the July 4th. For Fraser sockeye, daily harvests rarely exceed 0.2 million fishand fisheries are typically initiated in marine waters in mid-July and continue infreshwater area into late September. Annual harvests over the last 20 years haveaveraged 26 million sockeye in Bristol Bay compared to 5 million for Fraser sockeye.Finally, the harvesting sector (in the Bristol Bay fishery) benefits from a very diverseportfolio of rivers and stocks of fish. Recently ascribed as the “portfolio effect” bySchindler et al. (2010), the Bristol Bay fishery is made up of many large and productiverivers spread over a large geographic area; each river has a multitude of stocks and lifehistory types (e.g., different freshwater ages, ages at maturity, and spawning eco-type[beach and river spawners]). As a result of diversified portfolio, fishing seasons withlittle or no harvesting are extremely rare in Bristol Bay; the last one occurring in 1973when only 670,000 fish were caught. For Fraser sockeye, returns in 6 of the last 20 yearshave provided little or no commercial harvest. The recent most “disastrous” harvest in164