A new way to monitor salmon populations is being tested in the Yukon-Kuskokwim (Y-K) Delta.
Danny Auerbach is a research associate at Washington State University. This summer, Auerbach worked in conjunction with the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission (KRITFC) to pilot a camera monitoring system on the Salmon-Aniak River.
“That camera system is taking continuous video of the river. So as salmon are returning to their spawning grounds, they're passing by the camera and we have flash paneling, or, you know, something along the river bottom that helps us see the fish better,” Auerbach explained. “Then we view those videos to count the fish.”
Auerbach and KRITFC have experimented with new tech before to monitor fish populations. In 2024, they began testing camera imaging alternatives with aerial drones. This year, the project made the pivot to the camera mechanism based on shore.
Auerbach said that he and KRITFC worked with the Native Village of Napaimute and the local salmon weir crew on the Salmon-Aniak River to execute the set up.
Right now, processing the data requires researchers to manually comb through hours of footage, identifying and counting the salmon. But Auerbach said that he’s developing an AI software that would save time and make for a more efficient tally. He said that together, the camera system and data collection software could help gather more consistent readings than the weirs alone, which won’t always get put in the water during certain river conditions.
“Where this project came from was really, we want to find an alternative method that could not necessarily replace, but definitely supplement current methods so that we can have a continuous data set that happens every single year and might not be bound by the limitations of the current methods,” Auerbach said.
Auerbach said that this summer served as a kind of trial run and involved testing just one camera. But in the coming years, Auerbach said that the hope is to have multiple cameras set up along and around the Kuskokwim River and managed locally.
“Because the whole plan is to kind of transfer this technology to the different communities so that they're able to collect their own data,” Auerbach said.
Auerbach said that in the end, the goal is for communities to use that data to contribute to their own population management strategies. He said that he’ll be back in the region this fall to begin to work with communities to lay that groundwork, including visits to Takotna, Quinhagak, Kwethluk, and other communities in the Bethel area.
