The Alaska Federation of Natives has launched an aggressive campaign to fight the Safari Club International's effort to weaken the influence of the federal government on subsistence management in Alaska and restore state authority over its regulation.

Alaska's congressional delegation introduced legislation on Wednesday, Jan. 14 that aims to reduce bycatch in parts of southwest Alaska using better marine data, technology, and gear.

Changes to federal subsistence management are still possible through a newly started regulation review process.

Safari Club leaders and Alaska Native subsistence advocates have long been at odds over rights to hunt and fish in Alaska. But the sport hunting group reached out to help a group of Native hunters, displaced by October's devastating storm, reconnect to their subsistence culture.

From Nov. 5, 2025 to Jan. 15, 2026, hunters in the portion of the Unit 18 management area known as RM617 will be able to harvest one bull moose, excluding male calves.

Storm-impacted communities on the Kuskokwim Delta coast and upriver will have additional opportunity to harvest moose, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

A little over a week after a typhoon remnant slammed Western Alaska, residents and hundreds of evacuees are taking stock of the damage. Many from the villages are grappling with their generations-long connection to the land being floated out from under them.

The council, which manages fisheries in federal waters off Alaska, shifted to an online-only October meeting and now may postpone some of its planned work.

The State of Alaska wants the United States Supreme Court to decide whether rural Alaskans – which includes many Alaska Native people – should maintain subsistence fishing preference in the waterways of federal lands.

A new tech trial on the Salmon-Aniak River involves camera imaging and eventually, AI software.