In collaboration with the Native Village of Napaimute, Donlin Gold initiated a multi-year salmon smolt monitoring program on the middle Kuskokwim River in June. The Kuskokwim River Fisheries Project (“Fisheries Project”) aims to monitor and support the Yukon-Kuskokwim region’s salmon.
The Fisheries Project’s goal is to generate information about out-migrating salmon smolt at the George River. The data collected will inform fisheries management groups about salmon productivity and could provide the basis for future initiatives to strengthen salmon populations on the Kuskokwim River.
“This project is the first study of its kind in the middle Kuskokwim River and will provide valuable information on the productivity of freshwater habitats for Chinook salmon,” said Dan Gillikin, environmental director for the Native Village of Napaimute. “Napaimute is grateful for this opportunity to build on our current capacity and participate in this Project.”
The monitoring of the salmon smolt is done using a rotary screw trap, which is a large cone suspended between two floating pontoons. Using the flow of the George River, the cone rotates and funnels a portion of the migrating fish into an underwater holding tank at the back of the trap, where smolt can be counted, measured and released.
“We have good information on salmon swimming up the middle Kuskokwim River but very little on what the salmon smolt are doing,” said Donlin Gold Environmental Field Coordinator Danny Twitchell. “With the salmon numbers being low, it’s been a concern for everyone that lives in the region. This study will be another piece to the puzzle that helps us understand the patterns and what is going on with our salmon.”
The installation of the rotary screw trap was completed on June 3, 2024, followed by a period of testing and training from June 4 to June 16, 2024. Active salmon smolt monitoring began on June 1, and continued until June 14, 2024, demonstrating that the program was fully operational and ready for full scale study implementation next year. The success of the project is largely attributed to the invaluable local expertise and resourcefulness from the Native Village of Napaimute team, which included The Kuskokwim Corporation’s summer intern, Sean Levi.
Results from the multi-year study will be released later and made publicly available.
