Online forum allows outdoorsmen to track fisheries information

DAVE CANNON

June 12, 2008 at 10:40AM AKST

Management of aquatic resources has never been easy.

Fisheries managers and fishermen will face greater challenges in the coming years.

In testimony before the U.S. Congress, Gordon Kruse — president’s professor of Fisheries and Oceanography at the School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences at UAF and past Marine Fisheries Scientist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game — highlighted potential changes to Alaska’s marine and freshwater ecosystems due to climate change. Of particular note were several likely scenarios that have the potential to drastically affect the Bering Sea’s food chain, influencing a wide variety of organisms in one way or another.

Kruse noted that there will likely be dramatic shifts in species distribution and abundance and predicted that increased water temperatures will negatively affect some species while benefiting others.

Besides the affects of temperature change on native species distributions, there is also the concern for invasive species to either expand their current distribution or new invasive species to be introduced.

With the likelihood of future commercial travel through an ice-free Northwest Passage, the potential for additional invasive species to take hold through ballast water discharge and other mechanisms only increases.

The European green crab is found in British Columbia, near Vancouver, and seems to be moving slowly northward. So the Bering Sea could possibly experience a squeeze by invasives from the north and south.

Yet there are other issues to deal with besides the unknowns of climate change.

Mineral resource exploration and development are rapidly increasing into relatively pristine areas, especially the more remote areas of the state.

While these projects can provide valuable economic development and jobs in cash-strapped regions, such development could potentially negatively affect habitat and organisms. Unfortunately there is relatively little or no scientifically or locally documented biological information available to determine if negative impacts were to occur.

To better manage valuable resources of the Bering Sea ecosystem for commercial, subsistence, aesthetic and ecological reasons, it will take a good working relationship between all interested parties and a highly effective method of disseminating information.

The Bering Sea Fishermen’s Association has a program called Fisheries Awareness, Information and Responsibility, or FAIR, that is intended to foster better relationships among stakeholders through the sharing of information across regions.

The FAIR program has two venues to share information. The first is a discussion forum that allows the public to post interesting and newsworthy observations and activities on the association’s Website, at fair.bsfaak.org.

Who better to note subtle changes or interesting happenings than those who spend most of their lives outdoors while berry picking; hunting moose, caribou and waterfowl; fishing for salmon, pike, blackfish, whitefish, halibut or Pacific cod; hunting seals and whales; or commercial fishing offshore for king and snow crab, walleye pollock or other species. Such observations can easily be posted on the Website, and other people can add additional information or comments by replying to a post.

Topics of interest could include updates on herring or salmon fisheries, the return of smelt or other anadromous species into a river system, unusual fish sightings or catches — anything of interest that has to do with the Bering Sea ecosystem.

The FAIR Forum is also a place for researchers to inform the public as to what projects are occurring in the region. For example, go to fair.bsfaak.org to find out about ongoing Dolly Varden research in the Togiak, Goodnews and Kanektok Rivers or a sheefish study in the Kuskokwim drainage, from the Johnson River to McGrath and beyond.  

You can visit the forum at fair.bsfaak.org/cfforumsexpress/. To post or start a new topic, you must register and sign in, which takes only a few minutes.

The other venue is an observation network that will soon be available that will allow individuals to note more elaborate information. Through this network, the association would like to help document and highlight many of the regional changes that are occurring due to climate change, as well as contribute to the efficient collection of biological baseline information.

Please take advantage of this valuable resource. For additional information call BSFA at (907) 279-6519 or (888) 927-2732 or e-mail Dave Cannon at dcannon4fish@earthlink.net.

Dave Cannon was the fisheries biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Yukon Delta National Wildlife Refuge in Bethel, the Kuskokwim Native Association in Aniak and has worked for the U.S. Forest Service in Idaho and Wyoming. He owns Kuskokwim Aquatics Consulting based in Aniak and is working under contract for the Bering Sea Fishermen's Association.