Commercial openings

No wonder sockeye fishing has started in earnest, check out the Salmon Indices for large sockeye http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/northcoast/webdocs/Tyee%20Test/QDailyIndices.htm

The last three days the Index numbers have shot off the scale:
2008....................... 10 YR AVG
July 12- 99.60.......... 38.89
July 13- 130.11........ 32.19
July 14- 168.29....... 29.98

Looks like a few sox around that's for sure, but whether it stays sustained or is just a blip is yet to be seen. Have to watch the DFO fishery managers as they might take this as an excuse to veer away from the conservation path they've been talking about.

**Just to clarify for some readers, the numbers above come from a statistical model to estimate sockeye run sizes. The Tyee Test boat operates in the lower Skeena river on slack tides and gets 2-3 sets in per day. Each fish is caught is counted and worked into the statistical model to extrapolate an estimate of how many went upstream that day. An Index point is equal to a set number of fish....so these numbers presented dont mean 168 sockeye went by on July 14.
Anyway, what the Index shows was a huge bump of fish, not seen in many years, is going by the Test Fishery these last few days.