Postmark: Dec 16,94 8:04 AM Delivered: Dec 16,94 10:01 AM
Status: Previously read
Subject: Subsistence News-12/16/94
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Message:
*Preliminary research by Brian Bigler and Jack Helle suggest weight measurements from 45 separate runs of King, coho, sockeye, chum, and pink salmon indicate a 10% to 30% weight decline over a 20 year period.
*Favorable weather conditions, better management of wild stocks, and huge increases in hatchery salmon have pushed North Pacific salmon populations to the highest levels in at least 50 years.
*These abundant populations of salmon may be straining the limits of North Pacific grazing areas_mid-ocean pastures where both Asian and Pacific American salmon spend most of their lives foraging on zooplankton and other feed.
*These researchers believe that since the salmon can’t find as much to eat as they used to, they are smaller in size at maturity.
*These smaller fish could mean less successful spawning, fewer eggs and weaker offspring, and perhaps drastically smaller salmon runs.
*What this means to Alaska subsistence is not yet clear. Researchers estimate it will take 10 years to complete their studies. What they hint is that we have reached the carry capacity of the oceans. Obviously, there are those who disagree with their suggested conclusion.
Postmark: Dec 15,94 2:49 PM Delivered: Dec 16,94 10:00 AM
Status: Previously read
Subject: Subsistence News-12/16/94
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Message:
*The Federal Subsistence Board (FSB) makes rural determinations based on communities or areas that are economically and socially integrated.
*The FSB initially adopted the State of Alaska’s “customary and traditional use” (C&T) determinations as they existed in 1990. Not long afterwards, the FSB concluded that some of the state’s determinations should be reconsidered based on more recent information.
*By 1994, the FSB began refining the C&T criteria and identifying areas to reconsider. The first of these areas to be reconsidered: the Kenai Peninsula, and Upper Tanana-Copper River Region.
*Several interim C&T determinations have been made by the FSB, and several have been denied.
*Historically, the state of Alaska interpreted ANILCA 804 as providing necessary differentiation among subsistence users based on dependence, local residence or proximity, and alternative resources.
*Some hold that the ANILCA 804 process would not apply until there was a shortage among subsistence users.
Postmark: Dec 15,94 8:20 AM Delivered: Dec 16,94 10:00 AM
Status: Previously read
Subject: Subsistence News-12/16/94
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Message:
*Proposal booklets for the 1995-96 Federal Subsistence season and bag limit regs are currently at the printers and should be delivered to Alaska federal, state, and local offices this week. Five of the proposals deal with southeast Alaska: proxy deer hunting; Yakutat proxy moose hunt; Prince of Wales area doe hunt; and a Chichagof Island marten trapping proposal.
*Keith Goltz, DOI Solicitor, has reviewed the FS draft subsistence philosophy which reflects a broader interpretation of Customary and Traditional (C&T) use eligibility for rural residents. He feels the FS position closely follows the intent of ANILCA Title VIII.
*Goltz appears to believe that C&T is not meant to limit subsistence among subsistence users, or even between communities as the State of Alaska has done in the past, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes at present.
*Presently, the FS position on C&T centers on previous FSB determinations for “rural”, and that these rural communities would have some level of C&T use associated with such a determination (Tier 1). Annual season and bag limit regs allow the FSB to allocate resources to rural communities. Therefore, the ANILCA 804 process would not apply until a shortage among subsistence users (Tier II).
