Fish flap at False Pass.

• Author: Gerhart, Clifford
• Position: Clamor to close down fishery in Western Alaska

Two groups of Native fishermen fight over fish going through False Pass

Alvin Osterback, captain of the fishing vessel Evening Star, points to his 23-year-old son and says, "I'm teaching him the fishing business. I don't know why. There's not much left of it."

With the exception of a 10-year period working for the federal government, Osterback has spent his whole life fishing. "Up until about four years ago I drift gill-netted. My father wanted to retire so I took over his seining operation. Last year I bought my boat. The bank owns the boat."

Osterback fishes from Sand Point in the Shumagin Islands off the Aleutian Peninsula, seining for salmon, cod and halibut, depending on the season. Fishing is the mainstay of the economy for the Aleutians East Borough, and the annual June False Pass fishery brings the most revenue into the community. But the fishery (actually two fisheries conducted in June in the South Unimak and Shumagin islands) has been targeted for elimination since the early 1980s by Native groups of Western Alaska.

The Arguments

Western Alaska subsistence fishermen sought a preliminary injunction to limit the incidental chum catch at False Pass, calling it a "renegade fishery." Norton Sound subsistence fishers say chum salmon intercepted some 700 miles south eventually would have returned to Norton Sound to spawn, and that low chum stocks have forced the closing of Norton Sound's subsistence and commercial salmon seasons in the past four years.

Norton Sound Native groups contend that False Pass fishery should be closed because the Aleutian commercial fishermen are taking salmon away from Yukon-Kuskokwim area subsistence fishermen.

The False Pass fishermen reply that no evidence exists that salmon passing through the Aleutian fishery are bound for Norton Sound. And, they say, fishing is more than a business in the Aleutians, and closing down False Pass would be the end of a way of life.

Osterback believes Norton Sound fishermen's problems result from over-fishing in Western Alaska, not the Aleutians. "There were few permits on the Yukon River until 18 years ago. There are more than 800 permits now. Eighteen years ago there were 70 or 80 permits. There has been a 10-fold increase, and now they have all this nice commercial equipment to increase the amount of fish they catch, too. When you do that to a fishery in a river system, there's only so much fish to catch," he explains.

Osterback points out that a 1987 Alaska Department of...