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An albacore tuna is hooked on a bait pole on Oct. 9, 2012, in waters off Oregon. Tuna are normally found along the U.S. West Coast but occasionally stray into Alaska waters if temperatures are high enough. Sport anglers catch them with gear similar to that used to hook salmon. (Photo provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration/West Coast Fisheries Management and Marine Life Protection)

Sports

Brief tuna bounty in Southeast Alaska spurs excitement about new fishing opportunity

Waters off Sitka were warm enough to lure fish from the south, and local anglers took advantage of…

Salmon caught on the opening day of the spring Chinook salmon run in 2020 in Washougal, Washington. (Grant Hindsley/The New York Times)

News

Another bust year for Yukon River king salmon returns, sonar counters show

Fish counters show 2025 returns have again failed to meet that target after missing in 2024 as well.

People dance in celebration of the Fisherman’s Honor Totem Pole in Hoonah on Friday, May 30, 2025. (Jasz Garrett / Juneau Empire)

News

Hoonah’s rich fishing history remembered through totem pole

The story of fishermen carved — “all of us in the past, all of us in the future,…

Butch Laiti is president of the Douglas Indian Association, a tribal government in Juneau. The association has purchased a fishing boat and wants to buy a commercial fishing permit for its members to share, but a state law bars it from doing so. (Nathaniel Herz/Northern Journal)

News

Coastal Alaskans see commercial fishing limits as a ‘crisis.’ Lawmakers don’t.

Legislature adjourned without addressing expanding access to commercial fishing careers.

Workers process pollock. (Photo provided by Thompson and Co. PR on behalf of the Alaska Pollock Fishery Alliance)

News

Murkowski and other US lawmakers seek guest worker visa exception for seafood industry

Legislation would exempt seafood companies from a cap on the number of H-2B visa workers.

NOAA Fisheries Alaska region, hit hard by staffing losses, helps oversee the harvests off Alaska, which produce about half the fish caught in U.S. waters. Here, a trawl net full of pollock — the largest volume fishery off Alaska — comes aboard the Northern Hawk during the summer 2023 harvest. (Photo by Hal Bernton)

News

Internal memo outlines stark impacts of federal downsizing on Alaska regional fishery agency

Understaffed federal offices supporting fishing regulators cut even further, as NOAA Fisheries works ‘to keep the lights on’

A mother and baby sperm whale swim together in a photo taken in 2013. (Photo by Gabriel Barathieu, under a Creative Commons license)

News

Southeast fisherman sentenced to six months in prison for falsifying records and attempting to kill sperm whale

The case is a “first of its kind” and sends a message to the larger fishing community.

The author’s hopper and stonefly tying days are behind him. (Photo by Jeff Lund)

Sports

I Went to the Woods: Tie one on

As a kid I threw spinners and spoons, and didn’t bother to learn the impact of bugs in…

Destination angling often creates an unhealthy feeling of incompleteness and desperation. Fishing goals I knew what it was going to be, but I clicked anyway. “What are your fishing goals for 2025” was an advertisement for a lodge in an area I have longed to fish but I’m priced out, have priced myself out or however you write “it’s expensive and probably won’t happen.” (Photo by Jeff Lund)

Sports

I Went to the Woods: Angling for goals to appreciate in 2025

This is somewhat devastating because saying you might not do something at 23-years old is just youth speaking.…

Commercial fishing boats are lined up at the dock at Seward’s harbor on June 22, 2024. A legislative task force has come up with preliminary recommendations to help the ailing Alaska seafood industry. (Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon)

News

Legislative task force offers possible actions to rescue troubled Alaska seafood industry

Boosting international marketing, developing new products, more support for workers, other steps.

Commercial fishing boats are lined up at the dock at Seward’s harbor on June 22. Numerous economic forces combined last year to create a $1.8 billion loss for the Alaska seafood industry, and related losses affected other states, according to a new report. (Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon)

News

Alaska’s seafood industry lost $1.8 billion last year, NOAA report says

A variety of market forces combined with fishery collapses occurring in a rapidly changing environment caused Alaska’s seafood…

The author with a brown trout caught on the Frying Pan river in Colorado, a favorite river of writer John Gierach who passed away Oct. 3. (Photo by Jeff Lund)

Sports

I Went to the Woods: A tribute to The Trout Bum

I never met John Gierach, but I feel like I know him as well as you can know…

The F/V Liberty, captained by Trenton Clark, fishes the Pacific near Metlakatla on Aug. 20, 2024. Over the last few years, the $6 billion Alaskan wild seafood market has been ensnared in a mix of geopolitics, macroeconomics, changing ocean temperatures and post-Covid whiplash that piled on top of long-building vulnerabilities in the business model. (Ash Adams/The New York Times)

News

For generations of Alaskans, a livelihood is under threat

Something is broken in the economics of state’s fishing industry. Can Washington come to the rescue?

A king salmon during the 67th annual Golden North Salmon Derby at the Don D. Statter Memorial Boat Harbor in August 2013. (Michael Penn / Juneau Empire file photo)

News

Sportfishers can’t keep king salmon caught in Southeast waters under emergency order starting Monday

Ban in effect until Oct. 1 unlikely to affect fishing tours since few kings being caught, operators say.

A large primnoid coral loaded with brittle stars, a marine relative of sea stars. The underwater image was captured on the Dickins Seamount during a 2004 research cruise in the Gulf of Alaska. A new lawsuit claims fishery managers have failed to adequately protect Gulf of Alaska corals and sponges. (Photo provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)

News

Lawsuit claims fishery managers have failed to adequately protect Alaska’s coral gardens

Environmental group seeks stronger limits to bottom trawling in the Gulf of Alaska.

The Douglas Harbor weighing station is quiet on Saturday morning as the 78th Golden North Salmon Derby begins its second day. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Empire)

News

78th Golden North Salmon Derby starts slow due to flood cleanup, fishing conditions

23.3-pound king leads after first day; weekend weather forecast is for a chance of rain.

Alysha Reeves, a nine-year Golden North Salmon Derby official, validates a fisherman’s ticket at the Auke Nu weigh station on Friday morning, the first day of the three-day derby. (Laurie Craig / Juneau Empire)

News

78th annual Golden North Salmon Derby offers a nibble of normalcy in wake of record flood

Occasional rain, a few stray trees in the waters near Juneau expected as three-day event begins.

Trawlers are seen in Unalaska on Sept. 24, 2013. Trawlers use nets to harvest pollock and other groundfish species in the Bering Sea; the ships’ incidental catch of river-bound salmon puts the pollock industry in conflict with commercial and subsistence fishermen in Western Alaska. (James Brooks/Alaska Beacon)

News

Biden administration rejects top Inslee choice for Alaska fish commission, reappoints trawl ally

The Biden administration has rejected a nominee for a key Alaska fisheries management post who could have tipped…

Fly fishing for salmon in the saltwater might reduce the opportunity to get quick limits, but there’s nothing like it. (Photo by Jeff Lund)

Sports

I Went to the Woods: Silvers on the fly

A school of a few dozen fish moved slowly through the teal water in front of the skiff.…

Commercial fishing boats are lined up at the dock at Seward’s harbor on June 22. Federal grants totaling a bit over $5 million have been awarded to the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute to help Alaskans sell more fish to more diverse groups of consumers. (Yereth Rosen/Alaska Beacon)

News

Federal grants to state agency aim to expand markets for Alaska seafood

More than $5M to help ASMI comes after Gov. Dunleavy vetoed $10M for agency.