A multi-agency salmon management group on the Kuskokwim River is calling on the federal government to address the impacts of bottom-trawling in the region.
The move comes primarily in response to widespread concerns about bottom-trawling vessels fishing in close proximity to the mouth of the Kuskokwim River earlier this year. The Kuskokwim River Salmon Management Working Group, a longstanding salmon advisory body that meets each week of the salmon season in Bethel, took up the issue on July 10.
In a draft letter to state and federal fisheries managers and Alaska’s congressional delegation, the working group said that groundfish trawlers are destroying critical habitat for not only salmon, but halibut, crab, tomcod, seabirds, and other species.
The letter says that the impacts have “ripple effects to our ecosystem, community well-being, and ways of life.” It calls for the federal government to push trawling activities in the area further offshore, expanding a conservation zone that currently allows the trawl fleet to fish as close as 25 miles from coastal communities near the mouth of the Kuskokwim.
Working group member Kevin Whitworth of McGrath drafted the letter. He also serves as executive director of the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission. Whitworth pushed back on industry claims that trawling does not impact subsistence harvests during the July 10 meeting.
"Trawlers, they pull billions of pounds, literally billions of pounds of biomass out of the Bering Sea every year," Whitworth said. "And when they say 'No, that's not making an effect on subsistence resources,' I don't believe that."
In prior working group meetings, members have raised concerns about the incidental catch of Kuskokwim River salmon by trawlers in the area.
But Chris Woodley, executive director of the trawl industry association that represents the bottom-trawl vessels, told the North Pacific Fishery Management Council at a meeting in June that at that time, zero chum or chinook salmon had been scooped up as bycatch in 2024. However, he also noted at the time that trawlers in the area had generated roughly 7 metric tons of halibut bycatch.
In its July 10 meeting, the Kuskokwim River Salmon Management Working Group moved unanimously to send the letter calling for increased trawling restrictions to state and federal policymakers and fisheries managers.
