Wrangell Sentinel -

Dan Rudy/ Wrangell Sentinel

A fisherman offloads his catch at Trident Seafoods last Friday, following the end of the season's first commercial gillnet fishery opening. Along with the start of the Dungeness crabbing fishery on June 15, it marks the start-up of the seafood production season in Wrangell. "We're ready and we're anticipating a pretty good, robust year for pinks and chums," reported John Webby, Trident Seafoods' regional manager for Southeast Alaska. He was in Petersburg earlier this month reviewing Trident's facilities there. With the cod, lingcod and other groundfish fisheries already underway, Petersburg's season has already begun. Wrangell plants for Trident and Sea Level Seafoods are expected to start getting into the swing of things starting next week. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is anticipating an overall increase in commercial volume across the state this season, projecting 204 million salmon to be harvested. While sockeye are expected to take a slight hit over last year's harvest, pink salmon may see 102.7 million more according to the forecast. For Southeast, 55.7 million salmon are projected to return to the region. The majority of these are pink salmon, which at 43 million constitutes a little more than three-fourths of the run. The next largest number is to be chum at 8.55 million, 85 percent of which may be through hatchery production. Coho follow at 2.8 million, and sockeye are projected at 1.3 million.