BRISTOL BAY
Our sockeye salmon come to you straight from Bristol Bay, Alaska. Spectacular, vast, and thriving, Bristol Bay is home to thousands of fishermen, six major river systems, and millions of salmon.
Every year, an average of 38 million sockeye have returned to Bristol Bay. How many salmon is that? Well, if 38 million sockeye salmon were arranged nose-to-tail, they would stretch from Alaska to Australia and back.
Each summer, wild salmon migrate from the open ocean back up the rivers to the lakes of their birth to lay their eggs, completing the natural life cycle unique to wild salmon. The rivers throb and churn with the vast group of fish swimming upstream to spawn. Biologists closely monitor the amount of salmon being harvested and count the salmon that move through the fishing areas and upstream to protected spawning beds. It is critical to balance Bristol Bay’s biological needs to ensure that there will be a thriving salmon population for generations to come.
Located in southwest Alaska, Bristol Bay is a sprawling watershed of winding streams and rivers, vast wetlands and tundra, forests of alder and spruce, and a vital habitat for fish, birds and terrestrial animals. This breathtaking place is one of the most productive marine ecosystems in the world.
Typical fishing Bristol Bay salmon season dates run June-July in Alaska’s short summer season. The past few years have seen record-breaking numbers of fish returning to Bristol Bay. In July 2019 Bristol Bay fishermen caught the 2 billionth sockeye salmon on record!
SUSTAINABILITY
Sustainability is the driving force in Alaska’s fishing industry. A commitment to sustainable fishing practices requires time, resources, science-based research, and enforcement of rules. Indeed, all of those things are practiced and demonstrated both during the frenetic weeks of the Bristol Bay salmon run, as well as throughout the rest of the year, as data is compiled and analyzed. The size of Bristol Bay’s salmon runs prove the sustainability and success of this approach.
