The early May, June king run on the Kenai River began with extremely
low water levels during May, as some what reduced numbers of kings
showed up early in the season. Angler numbers were also some what
reduced during the month of May as few attempted to chase kings
when they were legally prevented from using bait. Low water levels and
muddy water conditions also persuaded many anglers to stay at home,
thus saving the alumimium on their propellers for higher water levels
later in the season. As water levels increased, so did angler success.
The Kenai's early run of kings got off to a slow start for many reasons.
Some of the reasons were because of low numbers of fish, a no bait
restriction, a 44-52 inch slot restriction, low water levels and low water
visibility levels.
The run finally began to come up to speed around the end of May
and the first of June. The ADF&G sonar counter went from double digits
of kings per day on May 27 to hundreds per day on May 28 and thousand
per day along with a peak (1,146) movement of fish on June 8th.
We did see some rather turbid / muddy water (4-8 inch. visibility) from
mid May to the first part of June. These conditions came from some
heavy up river rains but the water finally cleared and allowed us a
workable 20 - 30 inches of visibility during June.
The run slowly reduced from the June 8th peak, moving towards a
projected 16,000 early king run return by the end of June. The total
run of early Kenai kings appears to be approaching what we saw with
2001 escapement levels. (20,000 early kings in 2005),
(15,274 early kings in 2004), (13,325 early kings in 2003),
(7,162 early kings in 2002), (16,276 early kings in 2001).
The Kenai River was under a no bait restriction until June 11th and
then was bait legal after that. Angler success dramatically increased
as the bait restriction was removed and water levels increased
along with a healthy increase in the total number of entering king salmon.
Kenai river water visibility reduced again from about 28 inches to
15 inches on 06/21/07 as area warm temperatures raised water levels
close to a foot while Kenai Peninsula ice fields and glaciers experienced
accelerated melting. This visibility loss did reduce catches for about 5 days
and then cleared again to allow the previous 28 inch visibility.
Anglers success appeared to focus on (brighter and hotter) than normal
lure color selection from what had been used in the past. Cooler
(greens and blues) had been more successful in the past but it seemed to
be hard to get a king to chase the cooler colors this year. Bright red and
maybe even a little mix of orange and yellow appeared to be what the
early 2007 kings were turned on by.
The size of the average early king varied from around 30 - 43 inches or
30 - 40 pounds, which was fine by most anglers since they were unable
to retain kings between 44 - 52 inches anyway. The Kenai Rivers 2007
early king run had its ups and downs with regulatory and natural restrictions
but in the end turned out to be about what the river normally produces.
We are just now beginning to see a few of our early July (second run)
kings showing up as the weight of the average king increases daily.
ADF&G king sonar counters appeared to have bottomed out on the first
run king count on June 27 at 195 kings per day. This appears to have
been the cross-over point in the runs where the first and second runs
slide-by each other with the first run fading out and the second run fading in.
The Kenai Rivers daily king count is again on the increase, as second run
kings begin to make-up a larger percentage of daily catches.
With the removal of most of the regulatory and natural restrictions,
Kenai River angler success can be expected to greatly increase as the
rivers really monster 50-80 pound class, second run kings return home in July.