Hello Ive seen people reaching out on here before about buying salmon from us commercial fisherman here in Alaska. My family and I run a small processor, which is taking pre-orders, on the Alsek river, which produces the highest quality fish in the world. We have fresh headed and gutted product available in the summer and frozen fillet portions with bones removed starting in August. We have a very limited supply, and our prices include shipping to Alaska Airline hubs or we can figure out secondary shipping like fed ex if need be.

Check out Alseksalmon.com for more information.

This business is how we can afford to spend most of the year out in our cabin living the remote lifestyle.

That's a good looking website, let me see if I can fix it so when the mouse is hovered over it the finger comes up:

www.alseksalmon.com

I do want to put a quick plug in for this guy, I know getting salmon shipped from Alaska may sound like a logistical nightmare, but if you have an Alaskan Air Lines close by it would actually be quite simple to get fresh salmon, or freshly frozen salmon delivered, I assume they are sent in 50 pound boxes? Let me tell you it is tough to beat Alaskan Sockeye.

I've been to Yakutat and fished the Situk River for Sockeye several times, and I'm planning on going back this July. Where do the Sockeye spawn in the Alsek River? It looks like there is a lot of ice in the Alsek based on Google Earth!

Best of luck with you business endeavor!!! My wife & I are starting something similar with beef, and let me tell you there are challenges!!!

Thanks for fixing the website to being a link, I couldnt for the life of me haha!

The sockeye Spawn way up in Canada which is why these fish taste so good the distance they have to travel and the coldness of the water creates super fatty fish, and we catch them right away in the river system. And yes I fully agree nothing beats sockeye!

There is always, always, always tons of ice in the river, its part of the fun you tell yourself as you try and roll 5 ton icebergs out of you net.

As for fish boxes we do free shipping on anything over ten pounds and start whole sale price after 20.


Good luck with the beef, if you ever want to trade fish for beef id more then likely be up for it! Also sorry I wont be in town in july, ill be out at camp fishing, or id offer you stuff to use.

are the upstream rivers open water when the salmon run? On google earth about 15 miles up river from the mouth it looks like the river is completely choked full of glacier ice, but maybe that has to do with the time of year the picture was taken??? Salmon have always amazed me, but if they actually swim underneath a few miles of choked up glacier river to get to truly open waters that is even more impressive!

I don't know about the Alsek but USUALLY salmon don't even start into the rivers until late May or early June in my part of the country.

Sockeyes don't spawn in rivers. They spawn in large lakes at the headwaters of river systems.
Some salmon travel late depending on species.
Up on my trapline I have silvers traveling under the ice almost until Christmas................but you wouldn't want to eat them

I havent looked at google earth but im guessing you can blame it on the time of year the picture was taken. We get a lot of glacier ice but the river is open up to the alsek lake where two glaciers spill in and then it continues way into Canada. They spawn way up the Kluane and Tatshashine river areas in canada.

Exactly right!

I just passed on your site and info to a group of potential clients. I wish all the luck in the world in your business and doing something you with family gets no better.

Great looking product!!

Curious how you are getting your product out of there. We looked at buying a fish camp in Dry Bay 25 years ago but the cost of getting fish out was too much. I wish you good luck with this. Seems that self marketing and internet sales are the way to go these days. I will save your site to pass on if I know anyone looking . Most beautiful place in the world when the Fairweather range is clear

Huge thank you to everyone for looking at our site and saying they'll pass it on, it means the world to us! It truly is a family business that we pour our heart and soul into.



25 years ago was the hey day of the fishery, its much much smaller now and until recently the average age was around 65. The cost of moving fish is high but we get a slightly better price in town due to the Alsek fish being of higher quality, but the last year planes were running it was 50 cents a pound to fly it in. Last year Yak coastal crashed their otter, thankfully everyone survived but our good friends will probably never be able to fish again, and have stated that they will not be moving fish this year as the pilot/owner is trying to scale down his work load. Of course it was biggest run the Alsek has had in 15 years, so we resorted to boating it into town which made for long days in the skiff with big waves. We are using a 182 to fly the product into town this year as we focused solely on direct marketing now. We only market the high quality Alsek fish, but it will be interesting to see what happens if the east river goes off again which it has been 4 out of the past 5 years as the plant in town always seems to want that fish because of the huge numbers and their big size.

I also have to fully agree, ive been all over this state and nothing compares to Dry Bay.

Sockeye spawn in rivers. I made a good living fishing for trout, behind spawning sockeye in Alaska

Hate the bead fishing now. Lol

The fry spend time in the lakes before heading out to sea witch makes them unique

Some sockeye spawn on “waves” beaches thou

Sockeyes do spawn in rivers. I have seen plenty doing it. Even adfg is aware. They have arial counts here.

PS These reds probably don’t ever see a lake as they are spawning 30 miles from a lake. They may be able to find an occasional beaver pond closer if they need one.

This is an interesting thread. Thank you for sharing!

Sockeye will spawn in rivers or lakes, but not in just any lake, or anywhere in any lake. They need upwelling water in the gravels to bring oxygen to the eggs. They are a pretty fascinating salmon. Most large sockeye runs are associated with lakes because the fry/smolts usually spend one year in the lake before going out to sea. However, for some reason a very small percentage go straight out to sea, and a few stay in fresh water two years before heading to the ocean.

The diagram below shows the expected runs returning to Bristol Bay this coming season, and their age classes. You'll notice that the largest age class are 1.3 fish (one year freshwater, three years saltwater), 26.66 million of those fish bay-wide are expected to return.

Thanks Waggler. When Dirt posted his info I figured it must be drainage-specific.

I know of a lake on the west side of the Alaska range that is at least a mile long and 3/4 mile wide. The ENTIRE shoreline is made up of salmon bones from reds spawning and dying there. Pretty amazing to see a layer of bones 4-6 inches thick. Nice white beach though

I’ve heard last years sockeye run was big?????


Can any of you Alaska guys confirm this?

Thanks

In Bristol Bay last year was the largest run on record, 79 million fish, (I think they started keeping track in the late 1800's). I actually wish the runs would return to healthy, normal size, maybe 34 million or so.

I'm afraid the other shoe is going to drop pretty soon if we keep having these huge runs, also, the market can't really absorb all these fish, and the processors have a hard time with quality control when the runs are as big as they have been the past couple of years or so.

Expecting a drop in price this year. Even with no real King crab or snow crab season this year, dungeness crab prices in Washington and Oregon are off nearly half this winter of what they were last winter. The stimulus money has dried up; people aren't splurging on non-essential food items like they were the past two years. Not good.

Ive heard the same fear for bristol bay. Its amazing to me that buyers are having to resort to not buying fish that hasnt been bleed or iced to bring up quality controll. Then again I wish I saw 1/2 the numbers those guys do.

Just want to say thanks to people who have looked at this and shared it, weve gotten several orders! Really means a lot to us