Kenai River Personal Use Dipnet Fishery

Fifteen years ago the Board of Fisheries Alaska created a personal use dipnet fishery on the Kenai River for Alaska residents in the month of July. The two areas they set aside to do this are from the Warren Ames bridge to the mouth for boat and shore dipnetters, and along the mouth of the Kenai for beach dipnetters. The limit was set at 25 red salmon for the head of the household and an additional 10 per dependent. They also decided that each dipnetter could retain 1 king salmon and 10 flounder.

When the Board of Fishery created the dipnet fishery on the Kenai they thought it would account for an additional 80,000-100,000 red salmon to be harvested. During the first few years that is exactly where it came in at. Today, however, the dipnetting has been averaging a harvest of 300,000 red salmon (the peak has been 400,000). This fills the freezer for over 80,000 Alaskan families.

This winter the Alaska Dept. of Fish and Game released a report about the overall Upper Cook Inlet red salmon fishery. Sportfisherman account for 12% of the harvest, dipnetters 14%, and commercial fisherman 74%. Needless to say commercial fisherman are not too happy with their allocation shrinking year after year. But, as Dylan so eloquently stated, "the time's they are a changin'".

Here's a photo of Phil harvesting with a dipnet from the boat. The man is magic. You can see behind him a back up net just in case there are any problems. It's always good to have a backup because you never know if you'll get snagged on the bottom or have a giant king tear the mesh out of your net.

Here's a photo of a boat not exactly being safe. First of all, it looks like they are overweight with just the four men in the boat. On top of that, could you imagine each getting their individual 25 fish limit? That would be 100 red salmon averaging 8 pounds. That's 8oo extra pounds in their boat! I know for a fact that the Coast Guard rating would not support that load.

Quite a few of our sportfishing guests will see me after a day of dipnetting and pooh-pooh the "sport" of dipnetting. They'll say it can't be any fun compared to fighting a salmon on a rod and reel. I usually tell them it's different fun and it's comparing apples to oranges. The thrill of it all for me is holding the net over the side of the boat and waiting for a fish to hit the web. When you feel the jolt, the adrenaline flows and you can't pull the net in fast enough to see what is in there. Is it a red, a pink, a king, a flounder, or dolly varden?

Can't wait until July.....