The whitefish commercial fishery opens Monday on the Yukon River, two weeks ahead of when it usually opens in September. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game calls the timing “experimental" in a press release.
Commercial salmon fishing on the Yukon has been slow, and ADF&G wants to see if fishermen can sell whitefish during lulls in the salmon run. The whitefish are harvested using set nets, and the commercial periods will overlap with subsistence fishing openings but will be closed during commercial salmon openings.
