Oceans

Some fish, like certain populations of herring, are rebounding more rapidly. But taken altogether, the data paints the picture of an ecosystem still reeling from a warming ocean.

Federal managers are warning that there may not be enough sockeye salmon to allow a full season of subsistence fishing on the Stikine River.

While the Fairweather spends much of its time at sea mapping the seafloor, studying fisheries and searching for shipwrecks in Alaska, the research vessel hasn’t had a home in the state since at least 2008.

State management of the herring fishery has been the subject of ongoing litigation in the courts for two years now, with the Sitka Tribe arguing that subsistence harvests of herring roe are not being properly addressed.

Hilcorp said the leak was first reported Thursday evening by a company helicopter pilot who spotted bubbles on the water’s surface.

Blizzards and winter storms battered the Seward Peninsula and surrounding region throughout the month of March, but the sea ice has proved more resilient than in recent years.

In the Nushagak District, managing harvest is tough because chinook and sockeye runs overlap, so when the sockeye harvests increase, so does incidental chinook bycatch.

A federal permit allowing Hilcorp to drill in Cook Inlet does not account for the harm vessel noise could pose to endangered belugas there, according to a decision yesterday from a District Court judge.

Even with a more relaxed fishery, there was one accident on the water over the weekend when a seine boat capsized during Saturday’s opener.

A group of Bering Sea crabbers say they want more time to catch their quota before the state shuts down their season next week.