Federal managers close Chirikof pollock fishing early under a smaller 2026 limit

Federal managers closed directed pollock fishing in the Gulf of Alaska's Statistical Area 620 at noon Alaska time Wednesday, Oct. 21. The Chirikof area, between 154 and 159 degrees west longitude, stays closed to pollock targeting through Dec. 31.

Vessels may still keep pollock caught while fishing for other species, up to federal limits. Jonathan Kurland, regional administrator for the National Marine Fisheries Service, announced the closure in a bulletin posted Oct. 20, saying it is needed to keep the catch under the area's 2026 limit.

That limit is 60,477 metric tons, down about 26 percent from 82,265 tons last year. NMFS set aside 60,277 tons for directed fishing and 200 tons for incidental catch in other groundfish fisheries.

The A season allowance of 46,510 tons was reached by April 1, when NMFS closed the area until Sept. 1. The fall B season, carrying 13,967 tons, was scheduled to run Sept. 1 to Nov. 1, so the closure ends it about 11 days early. Area 620 closed for the year on Oct. 25 in 2025 and Oct. 21 in 2022.

NMFS could not complete stock assessments scheduled for 2025, according to the 2026 and 2027 Gulf of Alaska harvest specifications. The 2026 limits rest on 2024 assessments, which had already projected 60,477 tons for the area. The split among Areas 610, 620 and 630 rests on the 2023 survey.

The combined pollock limit for the Western, Central and West Yakutat areas fell from 176,496 metric tons in 2025 to 129,749 in 2026.

Work on the next assessment is underway. As Alaska News reported Oct. 7, council scientists backed a new Gulf of Alaska pollock model even as the bottom trawl survey still doesn't line up with it.

"We didn't have any Gulf of Alaska bottom trawl survey this year, and these are the results from the winter pollock pre-spawning acoustic trawl surveys," council staff member Sara Cleaver said at the North Pacific Fishery Management Council meeting Oct. 9. She said the rest of the model results are expected at the plan team meeting in November.