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New research project hopes to save AKY salmon with research
10/28/03 by Ted Horner
A common cry from fisheries managers when called upon to take effective action against dwindling salmon resources in Western Alaska is that there simply isn’t enough scientific research. At the head of the choir is Dr. John White, of Bethel. White, a rural dentist and commercial fisherman for over 20 years, has brought his scientific mind to the Alaska Board of Fish as a past member and chairman and now chairs the Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim Sustainable Salmon Initiative (SSI). After these many years serving on various boards, White now has a chance to get coordinated research done and hopefully preserve the future of wild Alaskan salmon. "We have depressed stocks and we don’t know why," White said. "To predict their health we need to understand why they fail and lessen the impact, so that 20 – 30 years from now we can provide for the cultural needs of people out here." White states there is little information about factors such as salmon mortality at sea, and the effects of human harvest, weather patterns and ocean conditions. "We need to know where salmon are dying," he said. "The only way they are counted is by the amount harvested. We don’t have an accurate assessment of the number returning to the rivers." Having lived so many years in the region, White understands the meaningful role of salmon to the people. "Salmon are an engrained part of this culture," he said. "Native Alaskans have very deep roots with the fishery, but with any culture when the fish disappear their advocates disappear. The people just give up." With the help of federal funding made available to the AYK Sustainable Salmon Initiative, a coordinated research effort is being attempted after years of fragmented information collected by universities, state and federal agencies. "We hope to create a central clearinghouse of information and attempt to coordinate the warehousing of this information," White said. An important first step in the research process began last month when a group of scientists from the National Research Council visited Bethel, St. Mary’s and Aniak to gather testimony about the area’s fishery crisis from managers and users. In the fishery research business, these biologists are heavy-hitters who completed a massive research program on the Northwest Pacific Salmon on the Columbia River affecting millions of people along the drainage. "I was impressed personally that people came from enormous distances and expense to testify before the committee," said Dr. David Policansky, Associate Director of the National Research Council. David Bill had traveled in from Toksook Bay and Ragnor Alstrom came up from Alakanuk to St. Mary’s in his boat. "The testimony was high quality both by agency people and local residents; they provided us with helpful insights," Policansky said. "A general comment from people is that they feel they are unable to continue their subsistence fishing as they used to by regulation and by population growth in the area." Compared to the Columbia River, the YK Delta has a unique opportunity to protect the salmon resources. "Here is a relatively unaffected river system," Policansky said. "It is a much better place to start. It is so much less expensive to not degrade a river system in the first place than to repair an environment that has been degraded." He also found that the people here were easy to speak with. "There was a lot of good will and a willingness to work with each other," he said. "I am happy to say that there weren’t people who seemed without hope, that is very heartening. I hope that their hope is justified." In the upcoming months the National Research Council Committee will be developing a report by July 2004 which will outline the major issues to be included in the AYK research plan and will later review and make comments on the research plan itself.
Blueprint for Moose 10/1/03 by Roger Seavoy I attended a meeting yesterday in Tuntutuliak with the Tribal Council, the public, the Dept. of Public Safety/Bureau of Wildlife Enforcement, and Fish and Wildlife Service enforcement personnel. The concern there was more related to enforcement matters than the biological information I hoped to present, but one comment I heard from a Tuntutuliak resident made me think about wildlife management in general and why we need it. The man said, "Hunting regulations are like a blueprint." He used the building we were in as an example of how following a blueprint works to get you a useful structure. For wildlife, the structure built would be a healthy population capable of providing continual harvests, and even better, continual large harvests. Following the regulations is the blueprint for an individual hunter to build this healthy population. In another conversation earlier in the week a teacher from Quinhagak called and I don't recall exactly how, but we considered the definition of wildlife management. I told him that one definition of wildlife management includes "strategies for harvesting animals that result in the greatest reward" with reward being measured by harvest. These strategies are laid out in regulations and we already said that these regulations are our blueprints so following them gives us the greatest possible harvest. In most cases for moose management this means we can harvest more moose if we don't shoot cows. Strategy is an important word in this discussion because it implies a deliberate, calculated course of action designed to achieve a positive result. The Lower Kuskokwim Advisory Committee and the agencies developed a strategy that includes a 5-year moose hunting moratorium, which is likely to be implemented next year. One appeal of this strategy is that it's the fastest way to get a healthy moose population and it is worth remembering that the better we follow the blueprint, the faster we get this population built. The LKAC recognized that so the strategy includes an achievable target number – 1000 moose. If we get there before 5 years are up, we'll reopen the season early. Following the blueprint to the letter is the best strategy to build a healthy moose population on the Kuskokwim.
Why do moose drop their antlers? 9/24/03 by Roger Seavoy
During the Russian Mission school moose hunt I overheard one of the students ask his teacher, "Why do moose lose their antlers?" They were in a canoe a bit behind me and I didn't hear the answer, but I mulled over the reasons in my mind as I paddled up the slough. It's a good question. God obviously didn't have to make them that way since sheep, muskoxen, and other ungulates don't loose their horns and horns and antlers serve similar functions. So why do antlers fall off every year only to be regrown each year? I thought about the various changes in hormones that moose go through during the year that eventually leads to the rut and reproduction and the role antlers play. I thought about how expensive it is nutritionally to grow the fastest growing tissue there is so antlers must be important since "they sure ain't cheap." I considered that big moose do most of the breeding and if little moose didn't drop their little antlers, they couldn't grow big antlers later on and become competitive for cows during the rut. I thought about the size of the knob on a moose's head and how that changes through life as they continue to grow. I even thought about what "why" really means in this context. From a biologist's perspective, the reason animals are successful and things like antler drop happen is because they lead to successful reproduction and the offspring carry the traits of their parents. A successful reproductive strategy leads to higher fitness and the traits carried by the animal with the highest fitness are passed along to the next generation. Antlers are what work for the family of ungulates called cervids (or animals belonging to the deer family which carry antlers). I'm reminded of a field trip to Onion Portage where we were deploying radio collars on swimming caribou and as part of this project, we caught them in the water and held on until we could get the collar screwed on, get a blood sample, and let them go. It's a good way to do such work since the water makes handling the animals quite safe. On one occasion, we grabbed what we thought was a large cow, which didn't have antlers (a trait not uncommon in female caribou). The wrestling match became a bit intense and we eventually were able to complete our task but as we worked "her" up, we discovered that this animal wasn't a "she" but rather, was a bull without antlers! This animal had little chance of successfully competing for females during the rut and this unfortunate trait, which hampers reproduction, will not be passed on to the next generation. If you're a male caribou, or moose, or deer, or other cervid, you need antlers to breed and traits that fail in ways that hamper reproduction, disappear. So what was the answer that I came up with? It wound up being simply, "Because it works." That's why! (Now if someone can only come up with a reason for antlers on female caribou…!) Tunucellek Pacific Loon 9/10/03 by Frank J. Keim
Go to your bird books and take a good look at this magnificent bird. Observe the shape of the neck and you will understand why the bird's Yup'ik name is Tunucellek, which loosely translated means "the one that has the (occipital) bump in the back of its head." This is the name I learned in Hooper Bay. In Scammon Bay and the Yukon, the variation Tunutellek is used. In other parts of the Delta, Yaqulekpak, meaning "big thing with wings," is heard. The English name loon has an equally interesting root. It is thought to have derived from an old Scandinavian term, lom, meaning a lame or bumbling person, in reference to the loon's clumsiness on land. Its legs are located so far back on its body that it virtually has to drag itself across the ground. When the loon is in the water, however, it is all grace. Under the water, it is a miracle of nature, flying as well there as it does in the air. Among diving birds it is one of the best divers, and has been known to dive as deep as 240 feet below the surface. It can remain underwater for several minutes, and is able to swim for many hundreds of yards without surfacing for air. For that reason one of the other common names of the loon is diver, in this case, Pacific diver. Like other loons, Tunucellek can't fly from land, and when it flies from water it needs a long running start before it becomes airborne. Once aloft, however, it is a swift, powerful flier with speeds clocked at more than 60 mph. In flight, it thrusts its neck forward and down, making it look like it's flying upside down. The Pacific loon is one of the most beautiful of loons, having a black and white striped chin strap and necklace, deep purple throat patch, ruby red eyes (adapted for both above and below water vision), and a striking gray mane. Part of its beauty is in its wonderful repertoire of calls, which include a guttural kwuk-kwuk-kwuk-kwuk, a rapid qua-qua-qua like the quack of a duck, growls and croaks, plaintive wails, as well as falsetto shrieks, squeals and yelps. I remember well listening to these calls for most of the night as I camped in the fall of the year at Castle Rocks near Scammon Bay back in the early and mid-eighties. While listening to this wild, almost maniacal, "laughter" of the loons, I could easily relate to the expressions, "crazy as a loon," and "loony." Another fascinating aspect of this loon is its courting behavior. If you are very lucky, you will see the mated pair facing off and dipping their bills at each other, then with a lot of commotion splashing the water and diving under its surface. If you happen to be diving yourself, you might see the pair rushing at each other underwater. Reminds me of modern dance. I'll bet that sometime over the thousands of years of Yup'ik song and dance there was at least one song dedicated to Tunucellek courting behavior. While all of this courting is taking place, both the male and female are building their nest, which they usually locate on aquatic vegetation at the edge of a shallow freshwater lake. It is composed of a wet mass of roots, stems and accompanying mud torn from the ground. The nest varies from only a scrape or depression to a mound of earth and plants. It is not completed until after the first egg is laid. Only two eggs are laid, and they vary in color from greenish olive to dark brown with some black spots or blotches. Both male and female share incubation duty, which lasts for almost a month. The chicks hatch asynchronously, or at intervals of a day or two, and shortly after the second chick has hatched they both slip over the edge of the nest into the water and follow their parents who at first feed and protect them, then teach them to feed and fend for themselves. When they are very young the chicks stay close to their parents, sometimes even climbing atop their mother's back for protection from predators such as northern pike. I remember seeing this near Emmonak while teaching there in the late 80's. It was one of the most heart-warming vignettes of bird behavior I guess I've ever seen. By the end of two more long months the young have finally fledged, which for this lom, or stumblebum of a bird, is no mean feat, since it takes such a great distance for it to take-off on water, and only on water. After they learn to fly, at the end of summer the young loons follow their parents to saltwater. Here they continue feeding on small fish, crustaceans, mollusks, and even a few insects. In the fall, when the tundra turns a screaming red and yellow, these loons gather in small screaming flocks and begin their migration south to the northwestern shores of Mexico's Pacific Ocean. When I find them down there, the color of their plumage has changed to a dark gray, and it is hard to distinguish them from other species of loons. The earliest fossils of these and other loons go back to the Paleocene era about 65 million years ago. Their scientific name is Gavia Pacifica, which simply means Pacific sea smew, a form of Old World diving duck. Until recently Pacific and Arctic loons were regarded as one species. After studies of breeding biology in Russia, however, the single species was split into two. Now, bird listers who have the wherewithal and the determination can add yet another bird to their life list. Good luck.
The dream run of Kuskokwim River salmon 9/3/03 by Craig Whitmore The 2003 Kuskokwim River salmon run has been a
fishery manager's dream. The king salmon and chum salmon runs, which
were identified as stocks of concern by the Alaska Board of Fisheries
in 2000, came back at above average levels, significantly stronger than
anyone anticipated. The subsistence fishing schedule served these stocks
well by lowering the exploitation rate during June when everyone was
fishing. A welcome addition to the June fishery was the plentiful sockeye
salmon that rounded out everyone's catch. And the coho run has been
phenomenal; the commercial fishery has not slowed it down one bit, and
the coho keep on coming. A rewarding outcome of the season is the partner's
inseason subsistence fishery monitoring program, conducted by ONC, KNA
and the McGrath Native Associations, reported that fishers interviewed
harvested the amounts they required of each salmon species.
King salmon, while
spread out on their spawning grounds, were counted in portions of 13
drainages of the Kuskokwim River this season by aerial survey. Overall,
the counts in these index areas indicated good spawning abundance except
for in the Tuluksak, which was quite low. Weirs on five other Kuskokwim
River tributaries provided counts of king salmon as well. At all sites
except the George River escapement levels for king salmon looked good. The Aniak sonar and the five weirs evaluated chum salmon spawning escapement. Overall chum salmon escapements looked good with the exception of the Kogrukluk River for which chum passage was 2,300 fish less than the 10,000 fish goal. However, at the Aniak a near record chum salmon passage occurred with over 359,000 fish enumerated. The Kuskokwim River coho salmon run started early and has held up throughout the month of August. It is likely that this may be one of the best coho runs in history. There has been over 16 commercial fishing periods. The coho salmon harvest has totaled more than 275,000 fish and has not slowed the passage down. This is a modest harvest given the historic harvest levels, however, during almost each period processor capacity was achieved. Coho salmon escapements are evaluated at five weir sites. These weirs will be operational into mid September with personnel on site counting coho salmon. Fish passages at these weirs indicate a strong run. Just last week record daily counts were occurring at several weir sites. A single daily count of over 6,000 coho was recorded at the Kwethluk weir with over 4,500 at the Tuluksak River weir. Now is the time to get out there if you want to take advantage of this abundant resource. The Alaska Board of Fisheries will meet during January 2004 to consider modifying Kuskokwim River Area fishing regulations. If you have issues you would like discussed please contact your local Fish and Game Advisory Committee representative or your Kuskokwim River Working Group Member representative. The next meeting of the Kuskokwim River Salmon Management Working Group is scheduled for Friday September 26, 2003 at the USFWS conference Room at 10:00 a.m. The group will review the 2003 season, discuss and if appropriate approve prior meeting minutes, discuss the merits of the Board of Fisheries Agenda Change Requests and Board of Fisheries proposals, and hear and discuss a status report regarding the Kuskokwim River strategic plan. The discussion of the Kuskokwim River Strategic Plan will be quite timely since the National Resource Council is tentatively scheduled to meet Saturday September 27, 2003 in Bethel to discuss and seek public input toward the Regional Strategic Planning process. Announcement and additional details of this meeting will be made when a meeting location and time are established. (For additional fishery information please call the Bethel ADF&G 24-hour recording number 543-2598, and the office number 543-2433).
The age structure of animals 9/3/03 by Roger Seavoy I commented on a request to the Board of Game from the Chair of the Lower Yukon Advisory Committee to generate an emergency regulation to lengthen the fall moose season below Mt. Village from Sept. 5-25 to Sept. 1-30. You may know that we have already submitted a request for a similar change and it will be considered during the November meeting so from a managers perspective, we had no objections to this change, but with good fish runs on the Yukon this year, the Board was unable to find an emergency and the season remains Sept. 5-25 – at least for this year. Responding to this request however, got me thinking about the age structure of the moose population below Mt. Village. The age structure can be thought of as the number of animals in each age group. For example, most schools have about equal numbers of students in all their grades, I heard on the radio recently that Germany has more people over the age of 60 than under 20, the Chisana caribou herd (in eastern Interior Alaska and western Yukon Territory) has had poor reproduction for many years running and many of the caribou in that herd are now old and may die soon creating a certain urgency to bring that herd back, and colonizing populations of animals are frequently made up of young animals just starting out and setting up their own travel patterns and home ranges. Animal populations are subject to varying birth and death rates and they wind up with different sex ratios and age distributions. If we look at the age distribution of bull moose in hunted populations we see that there aren't many old bulls mostly because they have had to endure multiple hunting seasons. Cow moose on the other hand, survive season after season and continue to breed. The age structure of bulls in the population then, is younger than that for cows. Bull moose in their teens are rare, while cows in their teens are more common. For cow moose to have calves, they usually need to be 3 years old, having bred during the fall of their second year. In colonizing populations, made up of young animals that have just moved into an area, it takes a while for these young animals to "come on line" and start producing calves year after year and then it takes a while for the next generation to "come on line" too. The exciting part of this scenario is that for the Yukon River below Mt. Village where there is a moose population approaching 1000 animals, there are also a lot of very young moose that are just "coming on line" with 68% of all the moose seen during recent spring calving surveys being 2 year old cows, yearlings, or calves and if good weather and low predation rates continue, the population will soon be producing calves faster than ever. When I present information to extend the moose season below Mt. Village to the Board of Game, part of my argument will be that this population is growing at an accelerated rate. That regulatory change is up to the Board, but if we can get them to adopt a longer season, we can simplify the regulations, help people there who are anxious to get their meat, and most importantly, better utilize this moose population which is capable of supporting the additional harvest we would get during a longer season. I've said it before but that won't stop me from saying it again; the Lowest Yukon is a good model and predictor of what is likely to happen along the Lower Kuskokwim if we get good participation in a moose hunting moratorium. Lower Kuskokwim residents interested in more moose should be encouraged by what they see below Mt. Village.
Wings of Magic Buff-breasted Sandpiper 8/20/03 by Frank J. Keim
(I thought this little story about the Buff-breasted sandpiper might interest readers of The Delta Discovery. Although the bird does not nest in the Lower Y-K Delta, it has been seen there. Not enough to acquire a Yup'ik name or lore, but it has some behavior I think you'll find fascinating. Tua-i-llu....) In June of 2002, my friend Don Ross and I trekked from the Arctic Refuge coastal plain across the Brooks Range to the headwaters of the Sheenjek River. From there we canoed down to Fort Yukon. Among our many encounters with wildlife, one of my memorable ones was with three Buff-breasted sandpipers along the Okerokovik River on the coastal plain. The best way to tell this story is to quote from my journal. June 10 — Once again we decided to camp a little early, at 3:00 p.m., on the west fork of the Okerokovik. Right away we encountered Ruddy turnstones, four of them, in action. One we saw giving chase to a jaeger, and three others pursuing a pair of gyrfalcons. They are some macho birds! A while later three buff-breasted sandpipers showed up on the tundra, the male raising one wing then both wings, hoping in this courtship display to entice the two females watching nearby to mate with him! He was so busy doing his thing that I was able to snap a good close-up of him. Later, I learned more of the details behind the courtship display of Buff-breasted sandpipers. We had inadvertently located our camp on the lekking site of these long-distance migrants who travel each year all the way from Argentina to the Arctic Refuge coastal plain to nest and raise their young. Unbeknownst to us, there were probably other competing males not far away showing their own finely marbled underwings to the same females. For it is on the lekking ground that the females examine their potential mates, then select one for copulation. The silver-white flash of underwing lining is apparently what first brings in the females and is the primary focus of their attention. Up to six females may gather around the lekking court of a single male, perhaps swapping notes about the relative qualities of his wing feathers. At first, the male makes almost no sound. In his article about these sandpipers, J.P. Myers describes what happens next: As the females approach, he first hulks over, ruffling his back feathers and starting a quickened tread. Abruptly he rears back, thrusting his head up and wings out, keeping his bill parallel to the ground while marching in place. Only now does he vocalize, a subtle tic-tic-tic timed to match the slow footsteps taken in place. As a crowning gesture he draws his neck in and throws his bill back, gazing catatonically toward the Arctic sky. The females crowd forward, inspecting minute details of his underwing. Then one of three things happens. Either the females in concert decide the male is a worthy suitor and they all stay to mate with him. Or they may steal away while he is still in full display to check out the underwing qualities of another male on an adjoining part of the lek. This is apparently what happens most until finally the females make their decision. Frequently, however, something happens that totally disrupts the best nuptial efforts of the displaying male. Suddenly a neighboring male may burst down upon his competitor, mounting and viciously pecking him on neck and head, thereby breaking up the courtship. The interloper then flies back to his own lekking territory followed post haste by all of the female inspectors. There the same display pattern begins again until it too may be interrupted by the original male or by yet another competitor lurking nearby. The females move back and forth from one exhibiting male to another as their wedding parties are crashed. Finally, at some point a balance is struck and the females all mate by turn with the excited male. So it is that at least one male's heroic efforts will not go unrequited. Male "buffies," as some people refer to them, may work awfully hard to curry the favor of the females, but when it comes to post copulation responsibilities, they have it real easy compared to Spotted sandpipers, for example, who have to do serious incubation duty after the eggs are laid. In fact, buff-breasted males do none of this work. Neither do they help build the nest or rear their progeny. By the time the eggs hatch they are well on their way back to their wintering grounds in the marshes and grasslands of southern South America. In any case, within only hours after the four precocial young break through their egg casings they are on their feet and away from the nest. Having been built on the ground in a shallow depression in dry mossy or grassy tundra, their nest is too much of a liability for them to remain there for any longer period of time. In just a few more short days the young are on their own and picking insects and spiders off the surface of the tundra. Only during the very first days are they completely dependent upon their mother, and then just for warmth and protection from predators. Even before they learn to fly with complete competence their mother has departed for southern climes. This means that when they finally do master flight and build up their fat reserves the scarcely month old juvenile sandpipers must migrate south on their own, negotiating the direction, distance and dangers of the long journey without parental guidance. Buffies may have a simple nickname, but their scientific name is anything but simple. Tryngites subruficollis means "somewhat reddish-necked sandpiper-like bird." The Nunamiut Eskimo people who are its nearest human neighbors simply call it, Aklaktaq, or "spotted bird." Unfortunately, buffies have a tiny world population — only about 15,000 birds. Their numbers were drastically reduced in the late 1800's by market hunters, and today conversion of their upland winter habitat to agriculture is a continuing problem. In addition, their nesting habitat in the Arctic is on the drier coastal terrain where oil facilities tend to be constructed. For these reasons, they have been placed on the Alaska Audubon WatchList, which includes birds that have declining populations and serves to alert landowners, industry, resource managers, and the public to take steps to prevent populations from becoming threatened or endangered with extinction. They have been identified as one of the top five species at greatest risk if there is oil development on the Arctic Refuge coastal plain. |
