The inner workings of the world’s largest sockeye salmon hatchery

The inner workings of the world’s largest sockeye salmon hatchery EAST FORK OF THE GULKANA RIVER — In late summer, a few months before this mossy valley will feel the sting of 40-below air, bright red salmon dart through a crystal-clear pool amid fragrant green vegetation. The Gulkana Hatchery has a Garden [...]

Salmon are the key to life in Alaska

By Ned Rozell During a good year in Bristol Bay, a surge of more than 100 million pounds of sockeye salmon fights its way upstream, spawns, and dies. In Bristol Bay and elsewhere in Alaska, this incredible pulse of salmon carcasses enriches streams and rivers and makes young salmon hardier. That’s the [...]

Pink salmon — too much of a good thing?

Pink salmon — too much of a good thing? By Ned Rozell Of the five species of salmon that swim Alaska waters, the pink is by far the most plentiful. Some scientists think the fish is an overabundant predator that outcompetes other salmon and some seabirds. In the late 1990s, Japanese researchers noticed an intriguing [...]

What Eats What: A Landlubber’s Guide to Deep Sea Dining

This is a great piece from the NY Times of a study off the coast of California about the eating habits in the deep sea: "You’ll never go to dinner in the deep sea. It’s dark, vast and weird down there. If the pressure alone didn’t destroy your land-bound body, some hungry sea creature would [...]

Ancient Northern Pike Found in Alaska Lake Mud

Ancient Northern Pike Found in Alaska Lake Mud By Ned Rozell [fusion_dropcap]W[/fusion_dropcap]hile slicing a cylinder of mud he pulled from an Interior Alaska lake, Matthew Wooller ran into a snag. The wire he was using to cut the mud stopped when it hit something solid. He grabbed a knife, carved around the obstruction, and made [...]