Ryan Dukowitz (top) and Sean Boyer manhandle a feisty king salmon into a net from the confines of a holding tank at the Kasilof hatchery on Crooked Creek.
Photo by M. Scott Moon
It doesn’t matter if you’re a local angler on a weekend excursion catching meat to fill the freezer or a tourist from Outside on that once-in-a-lifetime adventure, if you’ve caught an early-run king salmon on the Kasilof River in the last 20 years, you owe Jeff Breakfield a cup of coffee.
Why? Because without Breakfield there’s a good chance you wouldn’t have caught that king, and maybe wouldn’t have had the opportunity to fish for them as much, if at all.
Breakfield is a fisheries biologist with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Sport Fish Division and he oversees the chinook enhancement and research program at the Crooked Creek facility on Johnson Lake Road in Kasilof, the one-time hatchery that now focuses on research and brood stock collection.
Larry Ransom clears eggs from a female king salmon as Jeff Breakfield collects a sample of her eggs for testing. Each fish is tested for traces of disease that could later contaminate the hatchery where the fish will be raised.
Photo by M. Scott Moon
“We’ve been doing this since 1974,” said Breakfield in regard to efforts to enhance the early run of king salmon by stocking the tea-colored water of Crooked Creek with hatchery-produced chinook smolt of Crooked Creek origin.
Over the last 30 years, the facility has produced many species of fish, including sockeye, cohoes and steelheads, but at present the sole fish being worked with are king salmon.
“The research is primarily escapement counting and sampling to obtain biological information,” Breakfield said.
The fertilized eggs are mixed with water before they are shipped to the hatchery. Water hardens the eggs.
Photo by M. Scott Moon
This information includes fish identification, size determination and whether the salmon is unmarked (a naturally produced “wild” fish still having an adipose fin) or marked (a hatchery-produced fish with the adipose fin clipped).
Salmon are also checked for other identification, including radio transmitters on the right side of their dorsal fin, a spaghetti tag on the posterior end of the dorsal fin or a tagging scar, which can be present in both locations.
All of this information is obtained by taking recordings of the fish as they pass through a chute at the weir where an underwater video camera with a motion detector is mounted.
Fisheries biologist Jeff Breakfield sorts king salmon near holding tanks at the Kasilof hatchery. Eggs from three female fish are mixed with the milt of three male fish in a bucket and then packaged in bags for shipment.
Photo by M. Scott Moon
Breakfield said fish also are manually sampled one day a week by taking scales to determine the age and sex of both hatchery-produced and wild king salmon. These sampled fish are then placed in a holding pond for the second part of the Crooked Creek facility’s work brood stock collection.
Mary Krusen and Sarah Glaves pour the fertilized eggs from three king salmon into a heavy plastic bag for shipment to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game's hatchery at Fort Richardson near Anchorage. The young salmon that hatch from the eggs will be released into the Kasilof River and Sport Lake near Soldotna.
Photo by M. Scott Moon
“We spawn the fish there,” Breakfield said, in regard to how the collection takes place.
To do this, Breakfield dons rubber waders and, using a net, crowds the fish into a small section of the pond where he can ensure that only wild kings are caught for collection and that these fish which typically range from 15 to 40 pounds are ready to spawn.
All other salmon hatchery-produced and wild fish not quite at their reproductive peak are passed upstream to spawn naturally. Breakfield said it’s really quite simple to discern which fish are ready for spawning.
“The hens will look ripe. They’ll be colored up with bellies that are sagging and soft to the touch. You’ll also see single eggs coming out of them,” he said.
As to the male fish, Br