Went to Admiralty with friend Bob B. deer hunting on Sat. A beautiful day in the low 50’s, overcast, and little rain. We did not see any deer, but I did see I am out of shape.

Started my new job last week. Back to being a fishery biologist. Got everything I could ask for – higher start up pay based on experience, 4 day work week, office that looks down Gastineau Channel, and working with a group of friendlies.

First thing I said to Sara and her sister when they picked me up from my last hitch on the North Slope was “I don’t miss it already”. It was an “Alaskan Experience” working up there, and I’d be hard pressed to remember 3+ years where I learned so much on the job about equipment and tools, not to mention the industry that drives Alaska both economically and politically. Best thing I could have heard from my boss he said as we left together on the plane “If your new job doesn’t work out, call me.” Pretty comforting to know I still have a job if I need it.

I picked up my butchered and vacuum packed Chilkat sockeye salmon from my processor. It was the nicest fish I think I’ve seen. Not a drop of blood from the pressure bleeding. That will be good in the freezer for 2 years anyway.
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Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com

Got home from the slope Thurs night and off on the ferry to Haines Friday to net fish for sockeye in the Chilkat River with Ron. His brother Roy lives in Haines, and we use his net and boat and beds.

We arrived Friday evening, and got up on Saturday morning to blue skies and mild temperatures. The river was high due to all the rain in recent weeks, and chocolate brown. We had to launch a hundred yards from the normal launch area, in the flooded road. The outboard didn’t want to fire, either. We tried the usual – check the gas can, squeeze the bulb, make sure the kill switch is off – and still it would not fire. Next, I pulled the cowling and pulled the top spark plug, which looked fine. I replaced it, and pulled the wires on the other two plugs, pulled the middle plug, and put in next to the engine block to check for spark. When Ron cranked the engine, the engine started on the top plug alone – for what reason, I don’t know. He killed the engine, I replaced the middle plug and wires, and we were off.

That stretch of the Chilkat River valley is one of the most spectacular places in Alaska. Mountains rise from nearly sea level not far from the river, with snow and circe glaciers in the mountain tops. The vegetation up the mountainside was beginning fall colors of various shades of red and orange. It’s almost too spectacular to be real. I told Ron I was glad the fishing was fair and the net small so we could catch only a few fish each drift and spend the whole day on the river.

We got to the river, and set what was left of Roy’s 50′ net. About 10 feet on either end was ripped and missing. We caught 2 sockeye our first 2 drifts, and a single fish on the third. We got nothing the next drift, and only one or two more fish in later drifts, so we headed down stream, past Klukwan, to a spot we had luck in last year. We caught 5 the first pass.

I ran the net and Ron drove the boat. After I hauled the net, Ron would run back up to the start of the drift while I pulled fish from the net, broke a gill to bleed them, and put them on a stringer. The stringer went over the side when we set again, as the fish will continue bleeding, rather than have the blood coagulate, if they are in running water. Plus, the water keeps them cool.

You can put about 5 fish on the stringer, and after that the weight of the fish starts to rip their lower jaw. If the jaw rips through, the fish comes off and is lost. So, after bleeding 4 or 5 fish, I would pull them off and put them in our cooler, which had a couple bags of ice. We continued fishing until the cooler was full, and we had full stringers on both sides of the boat.

At the boat haul out, I made sure all the fish had the dorsal fins removed, according to the rules. We then loaded Roy’s boat, did some minor repair to his boat trailer, and then it was back to Roys to pressure bleed, dress, and ice the fish. I had a home pressure bleeding kit. I first cut off the heads, pressure bled the fish, and then dressed them. Ron then rinsed them off and put them on ice.

Roy came in from his Fairbanks moose hunt while we dressed fish. He did not get a moose, but enjoyed good weather and did see some moose. He, Ron and I ordered pizza for dinner, and watched the Michigan-Notre Dame football game, where 3 TD’s were scored in the last 2 minutes, with Michigan pulling it out in the end.

We boarded the ferry with our coolers full of fish on Sunday morning to another bluebird day. It was the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and we reflected on what our country had become as a result of the terrorism. Our nation’s waging of war justified by “God Bless America” after every presidential speech. Raised Catholic, I don’t remember anything in church that encouraged the killing of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis during our invasion of their country. Or the thousands of 19 to 25 year old US soldiers dead in Iraq and Afghanistan. Or the anti-Muslim fervor across the country. One hand holds the cross and the other the drone bomb launch lever.

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Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com

I met Ken Dryden today at my fish processor. His daughter and my fish supplier’s son are married, and he was up here with his wife on vacation….to pouring rain for a week, even by Juneau standards. I told him I grew up between Buffalo and Ithaca, and we talked about where I grew up in Bolivar and the time frame. He talked about how Dave Bing was at Syracuse, Bob Lanier at St. Bonaventure, and Calvin Murphy at Niagara during that era, and that all 3 might now be in the hall of fame. Then I talked to him about going up to the Georgian Bay and how much I liked it there in Canada and how Frank Ganette was from my hometown and he knew of him since he went to college at Cornell (and his wife is from Ithaca). He then said he’d just been through Olean, and stayed there on his way down to Pittsburgh and back…actually it was Cuba he stayed – I told him that was right over the hill from Bolivar. Pretty dry conversation for talking to a hall of fame hockey
player, but Alaska does that to you.
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Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com

Went to our cabin again last evening. Fished for an hour by George’s Rock, and when I was pulling up my downrigger to leave after no coho, a coho hit the green hootchie on the way up. A sucker pass as we called it trolling. I landed the fish, stunned it with the back of the gaff, broke a gill to bleed it, put it on the stringer in the water tied-off to the skiff, and kept fishing for another 1/2 hour with no more fish. I brought the fish on board and laid it on the ice bags in the ice chest. Off to the cabin and blissful sleep.

Up at 420 am, I made coffee, put it in the thermos, and headed back to the back side of Douglas Island. I caught a couple fish not long after setting out the gear, and then nothing for the next hour or so. It was pouring rain, and no others fishing here. I started the little stove inside my canvas covering, and warmed up a bit.

I fished north past outer point, then headed south again angling first 45 degrees towards shore till I got into less than 100 feet of water, then back 45 degrees offshore till I reached 200 feet. I switched from lime green to a yellow and red hootchie. I caught a big fish south of Outer Pt., and stayed in the general area, catching 2 more. That made 5 for the morning, and with the one I caught last evening, I had all I was allowed for the day.

I headed back to town to real life again. I gave away all the fish, and Sara and I had a second night of king salmon steaks on the grill from the fish caught yesterday, with salad from the garden. More and more rain. Never seen it so lush as this year. And continuing the best coho fishing I’ve seen here – and it’s still July. I’m not looking forward to leaving for Prudhoe on Thurs, but we’ll be busy and the 2 weeks should be bearable.
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Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com

Bob Bang and I got fish one on at the can. As we’re trying to get the fish to net, we drift back into the can, and snap off the downrigger still fishing – downrigger, rod, reel, cannonball. I put on a pink lady and kept fishing with my extra rod and reel. When we got back near the can again, we decide to put on some cannon balls and hooks to try to snag it. I hang up on something reef on the rod, and break rod number two (which I should say was broken the other day when we couldn’t get it apart, but I had put together two mismatched top and bottom and it was a good rod again). I start cutting pieces around the break and splice the rod back together, so still fishing. I later get a fish on, set the hook, break the hook at the pink lady, and at the same time the top of the rod comes off, goes in the water, slides down the now line with nothing on it, and it sinks. So now I’m down to a reel and reel seat and handle. There were no more eyes left on
the bottom rod stub. I put on another pink lady and a green spoon, put out 30 pulls, and set the drag real loose so I’ll know I get a hit. The drag starts singing awhile later, and in comes easy as you please about a 17 lb coho. Biggest of the day. We caught 6 keepers, and lost one off the stringer that would have made 7 (I think his mouth split). We lost at least twice that many strikes. And all happy in the end. And a pod of monster humpbacks around us all day bubble net feeding, and still going at it when we left 10 hours later.
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Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com

Went back east for my high school reunion. Took 3 nephews fishing in a tiny pond at the camp of my brother-in-law’s brother. The two youngest caught fish all day – bass and bluegill. They are already good casters, but couldn’t quite get the fish off the hooks so well. I helped, then told them they had to learn. It was fun seeing that not only did they learn to get the hooks out, but also how needle nose pliers work. That night we all slept in a tiny “office” that was to be used for writing. It had windows all around. A lightning storm came through overnight, and the room was lit up all night – a real treat for me since lightning is rare in Alaska. Next morning the boys were up before me, fishing.

We fished a couple ponds the next day at a college friend who moved down to my hometown. He and his wife have no kids, so they open the floodgates, too. Pizza. Wings. All the Mountain Dew you can drink.

Then the high school class reunion party. The five years since the 25th reunion had flown by. I think everyone from 25 was there at 30, with more welcome additions. I have to say many looked better now than at the 25th with lost weight – I did not. Two classmates talked about coming up hunting – the first such talk – and so hope they can make it.

Next up to the Georgian Bay camp of my aunt. My uncle and his brothers bought some islands in the Henvey Inlet in the late 40’s, and then Canada made a park around their inholdings, so the place has not changed since I went there as a kid. My nieces and nephews see the place as I did and still do – a magic place to fish, swim, eat lots of candy, and get a sunburn. We caught quite a few bass and a pike. I’d bought the kids a make-your-own lure kit, and they caught fish on lures they painted themselves. We saw black bears everyday, along with mink, muskrat, beaver, otter, comorants, loons, and blue heron. I told Sara if I had to move out of Alaska, I could move there.

After a week on the slope, I welcomed my cousin and his brother in law today off the cruise ship. Another brother in law won a pile at a casino, and took 26 on a cruise – that’s what you do with that kind of money to be happy, I think. So, three of us went fishing and had the best coho fishing I can remember here. We caught 9 coho – 8 of them large – along with a couple pink salmon. I barbecued a few salmon steaks and deer meat for them before taking them to back to their ship.

Next, I slung the bag of cleaned fish over my back and santa claused my neighbors with a fish each up and down the street. Two sets of octagenarions, a policeman/teacher, florist, and another young couple. Like the guy that won at the casino, that’s how you finish a jackpot day of fishing.

–
Mark Stopha
Alaska Wild Salmon Company
4455 N. Douglas Hwy
Juneau, AK 99801
www.GoodSalmon.com