The popular 24 Mile boat launch could be shut down, Alaska Department of Fish and Game officials say, after an inspection showed the launch area and its access road run through salmon spawning habitat.
The area has been used as a boat launch for decades — at least 40 years, local sportsmen say. It’s not clear, however, that it was always an active spawning habitat. Since the access was created, the river course has shifted significantly, and the Northern Southeast Regional Aquaculture Association dug an artificial spawning channel next to the launch area, likely drawing far more spawning fish, Fish and Game habitat biologist Greg Albrecht said.
But under the current conditions, the impact of the launch on spawning is “pretty bad,” Albrecht said, calling it “sort of egregious,” that vehicles drive on a daily basis through the spawning stream itself. During the recent inspection, Albrecht reported seeing sockeye and chum moving through and digging in water covering the actual road to the launch area. Albrecht also reported spawning activity in the gravel bank where boats are put into the main channel. Cars driving through crush fish and redds (salmon spawning nests), Albrecht said, and also degrade gravel banks and create sediment that lowers survival rates of fish spawning in the gravel.
Fish and Game, which is responsible under state law for regulating activities in freshwater fish habitats, requires permits for even recreational vehicle crossing of streams and rivers. Albrecht said no permits have been issued for the stream crossing necessary to reach the boat launch.
Given the long history of the launch site and lack of recent permit enforcement, Fish and Game is not planning on immediately shutting down use, without first finding another area to build a replacement boat launch, Albrecht said.
Options for replacements include building a gravel ramp around 900 feet upriver at the Wells Bridge, where the work could be folded into already-planned DOT work and heavy-equipment usage.
Albrecht also pointed to a nearby stretch of federal land that could host a boat launch if granted a Bureau of Land Management easement. Albrecht said he has been in contact with those agencies, and also private landowners in the area. But there isn’t a definitive process, or timeline laid out, for how a replacement site will be decided.
“My hope right now is to re-alert everyone, say, ‘hey let’s find a solution,’” Albrecht said.
Haines DOT foreman Matt Boron said this week that adding boat launch infrastructure to the existing Wells Bridge work is not on his radar, but that residents have long been using the bridge area for river access, even without an official access point.
A whole other range of solutions would remove the spawning habitat rather than the cars. Fish and Game could still build a bridge and culvert, or some sort of hardened crossing of some sort, but Albrecht said he didn’t favor it.
“The problem still remains that the bar where boats launch has spawning fish,” Albrecht said. “Even if you get across the creek, when you get to the Chilkat you’re driving over fish and fish redds in the main stem. I just don’t think it’s an ideal place for that activity.”
Besides Albrecht, the Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve Advisory Council also plans to discuss possible solutions, mayor Tom Morphet said.
Even without a specific deadline, there is general time pressure. If there is significant resistance from the community to a replacement and no replacement option materializes, Albrecht said, the department could still close down the site even without opening an alternative.