The commercial drift gillnet season, which began June 21, is off to a slow start. Prices are comparable to this time last year, but so far fish numbers are low.

And the salmon have been small, gillnetter Norm Hughes said. Hughes, who primarily fishes for chum, said he believes in a “sit, stay, make it pay” approach to fishing, but this year his sets have brought in few fish, sometimes none at all.

Hughes estimates he needs to average at least $1,000 a day, over the course of a season, to make fishing worth it. His first weekend gillnetting, he made less than $1,000 over the course of two days, including $250 he earned from diving under another fisherman’s boat to free a net caught in the prop.

He described the start of the season as a “triple whammy” — low fish numbers, unimpressive prices and a two-day gillnetting window mandated by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADFG) to help conserve king salmon returns.

Hughes is not the only fisherman experiencing a slow start to the season.

ADFG conducts a weekly survey of gillnetters in Lynn Canal. This year, fishermen are reporting low harvest numbers.

“Fishermen have reported colder waters and smaller fish,” said Nicole Zeiser, the state’s Haines commercial fisheries biologist. “Based on below average sockeye salmon harvests … and the below average sockeye salmon counts through the Chilkoot and Chilkat River weirs, it is apparent that the runs are late, but too early to deem weak.”

Zeiser said total cumulative sockeye counts are below 10-year averages at both the Chilkoot and Chilkat rivers. As of July 7, ADFG had counted 2,774 sockeye at the Chilkoot River weir since June 8. The 10-year cumulative average for this time of year is 12,700. At the Chilkat Lake weir, ADFG had recorded 1,907 sockeye since June 19, compared to the 10-year average of 11,000.

Fish processor Harry Rietze said his fishermen have been averaging less than 2,000 pounds per boat per week. At run peak, which usually happens sometime in mid-July, boats tend to average 10,000 to 20,000 pounds per week, he said.

Leading up to the season, many in the Alaska seafood industry had been anticipating lower prices as a result of the pandemic’s effects on the restaurant business. Rietze said prices have been better than expected. “(This year) salmon prices started out about the same as last year, which was kind of unexpected.”

In 2019, sockeye started at $1.50 per pound, a middle-of-the-road price. It increased over the course of the season to $1.90, which Rietze said is at the upper end of what he’s seen in recent years. He is hoping prices will rise again this year.

Chum salmon prices are also comparable to the start of last season — 45 cents per pound.

Unlike sockeye and chum, dungeness crab has seen a substantial price drop. Crabbing season opened June 15.

Rietze said last year was a phenomenal year for the area’s crab harvest, and this year looks like it will be good as well. However, prices are down from $2.90 per pound last year to $1.75 this year.

Riettze said he thinks this is because, in a normal year, a lot of crab gets sold to restaurants, which have been operating at reduced capacity, if at all.

Stuart DeWitt, who holds both dungeness crab and gillnet permits, said that despite lackluster starts to both seasons, his summer fishing plans remain unchanged.

“I’ll be out there no matter what. I don’t have a different job,” DeWitt said. “All you can do is go catch fish and hope the price gets better.” But, he added, “It takes a lot of fish to make money at 45 cents a pound.”