Saturday, May 14, 2011

1st Copper River Opener of 2011!

This is a PSA.  Due to technical difficulties (my blog host was down yesterday) this blog is a day late and a dollar short.  Must be a Friday the 13th thang.  My apologies for any inconvenience.  With that said, let's get started.

It's here!! It's here! It's almost here!  The 1st commercial fishing opener is Monday, May 16th at 7:00 AM!  The whole town is a buzz.  Everyone is scurrying around (or running around like a chicken with it's head cut off, depends how you look at it) gearing up for the season.  Last minute things like fixing broken valves on hydro's, repairing nets,  attaching out-drives, launching boats, or, simply even just arriving town. It's all gotta get done.  It seems every year this date sneaks up on us and there is never enough time to pull it all together. But, we usually all manage anyway and usually make it out there on Monday.  Though I already heard of two guys that just aren't going to make it.  One guy, his boat sat for a few years before he bought it.  A unused boat is not a good thing.  Things seize up, rust, break, etc.  In his case, I think it's a prudent move to wait.  The Copper River Flats is no place for a shake down cruise to find faulty equipment.  It's too dangerous for that type of thing.  But, I digress.  The other guy, and this has got to be frustrating, a store clerk dropped the ball on ordering his part and that delayed its arrival by 5 days..........so he'll miss the opener.  Sometime, its just not up to us.  Me?  I'll be heading out on this one.  It will be nice to get out on the water again.  I ran my raingear and survival suit down to the boat yesterday.  A strange familiarity came back the instant I stepped aboard.  I'll go fish and report back next week.

A good place to keep up with the excitement is Copper River Salmon on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/CopperRiverSalmon. They even have a count down 'til the opener.  If you want to keep up with the official news you can check out the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) at http://www.adfg.alaska.gov/index.cfm?adfg=commercialbyareacopperriver.salmon.  More info here: http://aprn.org/2011/05/12/first-salmon-opening-of-the-year-starts-monday/.  And, if you are looking for ways to cook your fresh Copper River Salmon, check out this site.  I think the King Salmon with Lemon Caper Butter looks divine.   http://start.tastespotting.com/tag/wild+salmon.


The sun is shining here in Cordova for three whole days now The sunrise is 5:17 and sunset is 10:37 giving us tons of daylight (sorry to make you do your own math there, it's about 17+ hours of day). And...........SHOREBIRDS!  Shorebirds are here.  These little critters land here every year on their migration from some place like Chili to the Arctic Circle.  I think its the longest migration on earth.  Anywho, they land out at Hartney Bay and gobble up some bugs before taking off again.  I was lucky to catch them on a nice evening and got a few pics.

Shorebirds at Hartney Bay

Shorebirds





Until next week, eat fish!!



5 comments:

Robin Blue said...

Nice photos and good luck on the opener!

Jen Pickett said...

Thanks Robin!

Anonymous said...

thanks for the interesting information

Guides in Alaska said...

Thanks for the first hand story about Copper River salmon. While looking up information all you hear is marketing garble. It was refreshing to come across something different.

Jen Pickett said...

@GiA,

Thanks! I'm glad you like it and there's more to come!