Sitka sac roe herring season underway

Herring seiners from Petersburg headed to Sitka Sound last week after the sac roe herring fishery went on two-hour notice. The notice was released last Thursday morning at 11 a.m.

Prior to the notice, Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) was busy sampling herring and conducting aerial surveys of the area waiting for the sac roe to reach the right maturity to open the fishery.

The guideline harvest level (GHL) for the fishery this year is over 14,500 tons, which is a significantly larger target than last year’s GHL of 8,712 tons. In 2014, seiners worked within a GHL of over 16,000 tons.

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