Renewable Revolution

February 26, 2022 By Yereth Rosen



SNIPPETS:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska, Feb 25 (Reuters) – With marine heat waves helping to wipe out some of Alaska’s storied salmon runs in recent years, officials have resorted to sending emergency food shipments to affected communities while 📢 scientists warn that the industry’s days of traditional harvests may be numbered.

Salmon all but disappeared from the 2,000-mile (3,200-km) Yukon River run last year, as record-high temperatures led to the fish piling up dead in streams and rivers before they were able to spawn. A study published Feb. 15 in the journal Fisheries detailed more than 100 salmon die-offs at freshwater sites around Alaska.

Those losses meant that, even as temperatures were milder in 2021, the Yukon River salmon runs remained so anemic that both Alaska and Canada were forced to halt their salmon harvest to ensure enough fish survived to reproduce for another year.

“Alaska is known for salmon and being cold,” said Vanessa von Biela, a U.S. Geological Survey research biologist and lead author of the study on the 2019 die-offs. Now “we have basically the problems that have been known for a long time at the lower latitudes.”

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Last month, the U.S. commerce secretary declared a disaster for the Yukon River fishery for both years, making federal relief funds available.

The state sent emergency fish shipments last year from the more plentiful salmon in Bristol Bay and elsewhere.

Scientists mostly have blamed ocean warming, with a series of heat waves in the Bering Sea and North Pacific Ocean from 2014 to 2019 affecting salmon living in the sea before their return to spawning grounds.

Full article:
https://gcaptain.com/alaska-worries-salmon-run-as-climate-change-warms-arctic-waters/

Related Article: More Arctic Shipping is Leaving Trash in Its Wake, 📢 Scientists Warn

And now a word from our loyal servants in the 🦖 Hydrocarbon "Industry":