Yukon/
Transboundary Rivers Area
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Fish Management
Counting Facilities
One of the foundations of both fisheries management and stock
assessment is a count of adult salmon returning to their natal
streams to spawn. Given the long migration (in excess of
2800km for some stocks) of Yukon salmon and their passage
through active in-river fisheries, it becomes important for
fishery managers to estimate run size prior to fish arriving
in fishery areas and on the spawning grounds. Most migration
corridors in the Yukon are large, silt laden rivers that do
not allow for visual counts of migrating salmon.
The mark and recapture technique is the most widely used
method of determining in-season salmon escapement. Fishwheels
or attended gillnets are most often used to tag salmon
migrating upstream. These fish are then recaptured in other
fishwheels, test or commercial fisheries, First Nations
fisheries, fish weirs or on the spawning grounds. The ratio
of tagged to untagged fish recovered allows managers to
estimate the total escapement.
In addition to the mark and recapture programs, weirs are
located on selected (indexed) streams and enumerate salmon
migrating upstream to spawn. These indexes are used to
describe annual variation in stock size and composition (age,
size, and sex composition). Aerial surveys, using helicopters,
are also performed during peak spawning periods in indexed
areas to verify spawning escapement.
The following counting facilities are just a few that guide
fish management and
stock assessment in the Yukon Transboundary Rivers area:
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Lower Stikine River
(Excel files)
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May 14,
2010
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May
21, 2010
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May 28,
2010
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June 4,
2010
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June 11,
2010
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June 18,
2010
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June 28,
2010
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July 9,
2010
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July 16,
2010
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July 23,
2010
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Alsek River weekly updates (Excel files)
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Tahltan Lake Sockeye Weir
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Little Tahltan Lake Chinook Weir
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Yukon
River – Chinook and Chum Updates (PDF)
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Taku River Lower
Fishwheel
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