State cuts Craig and Klawock herring harvest limit 28% as forecast drops

Commercial herring fishermen around Craig and Klawock have a 28% smaller harvest limit this season after the Alaska Department of Fish and Game set it at 5,135 tons on Tuesday, down from 7,095 tons last season.

The department expects fewer herring. It forecasts 34,230 tons of mature spawning herring in the Craig and Klawock area this year, down from 47,302 tons last season, and allows fishermen 15% of that.

The catch is split between two fisheries. A winter fishery for herring sold as food and bait gets 60%, or 3,081 tons. It's already open and runs until the limit is expected to be reached, or Feb. 28 at the latest. The other 40%, or 2,054 tons, goes to the spring spawn-on-kelp fishery, where herring are held in floating pens called pounds, hung with kelp, and the kelp is harvested once the fish spawn on it. Any part of the winter limit left unused shifts to the spring fishery.

Nearly half the forecast comes from one group of fish. The 3-year-olds that joined the stock in 2025 were the second-largest such group in the area since the department's records began in 1988, and that group "continues to be strong," the department says. Those fish are now 5 years old.

Last spring's spawn near Craig was spread across less shoreline than average, 21.2 nautical miles compared with a 10-year average of 27.7, but it lasted 16 days instead of the seven or eight typical in recent years, with multiple days of spawning over the same shoreline, according to a June department summary. In the spring fishery, 124 permits landed 152 tons of spawn-on-kelp from 69 pounds.

The winter fishery opened in October before the limit was set, with the department saying then that the limit was "expected to be more than adequate" for fishing to begin. Last season's limit came Dec. 19.

Elsewhere in Southeast, Ernest Sound, Hobart Bay and Port Houghton, and Tenakee Inlet are closed to the winter fishery this season. The department didn't survey Hobart Bay and Port Houghton this year, citing budget constraints.