Fritz Funk

Backwater Research

The patterns of habitat utilization in the littoral zone fish community of two small southern Michigan lakes were examined. Abundance and habitat use of the fish were quantified by underwatertransect censuses. The sunfishes (Centrarchidae) dominated the communities numerically and by weight, with two species, the bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus) and...

The short-tailed albatross (Diomedea albatrus) has been listed as endangered since 1970. Although the species range includes the North Pacific and Bering Sea coasts of Alaska, its seasonal abundance in nearshore waters has not been well known. Because short-tailed albatross may number less than 1,000, concerns have been raised about potential entan...

Spectacled eiders breeding in Alaska were listed as threatened in 1993, followed by the listing of the Alaska-breeding population of Steller’s eider in 1997. Primary reasons for concern for both eider species were the near disappearance of the species from the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta and the low numbers of breeding birds on the North Slope. Causes of...

Hulson, P-J. F., Miller, S. E., Quinn, T. J. II, Marty, G. D., Moffitt, S. D., and Funk, F. 2008. Data conflicts in fishery models: incorporating hydroacoustic data into the Prince William Sound Pacific herring assessment model. – ICES Journal of Marine Science, 65: 25–43. Data conflicts present difficulties in running integrated assessment models...

In the southeastern Bering Sea, Pacific herring (Clupea pallasii) migrate from the Pribilof Islands region where they overwinter, to the Alaska coast where they spawn in spring. The migration sustains a nearshore commercial fishery that targets roe-bearing females just prior to spawning. Herring also are taken as bycatch in groundfish trawl fisheri...

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Environment Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) provides synthetic aperture radar (SAR) derived products under a demonstration project named the Alaska SAR Demonstration (AKDEMO) to the US government community. The AKDEMO near real-time data and products include SAR w...

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Southwest stock of sea otters Enhydra lutris has been declining over the last two decades. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) is currently reviewing the status of sea otters and contemplating listing the species under the Endangered Species Act. This purpose of this report is to provide background information to the FWS...

The historic commercial hook and line fishery for Pacific cod in Alaska, 1865-1990 is reviewed. A historical catch time series is provided, annotated by fishing power increases due to geographic and technology transfers from other fisheries. An unexpected increase in cod weight was discovered. The long observation time series spans regime shifts. I...

The historic commercial hook and line fishery for Pacific cod in Alaska, 1865-1990 is reviewed. A historical catch time series is provided, annotated by fishing power increases due to geographic and technology transfers from other fisheries. An unexpected increase in cod weight was discovered. The long observation time series spans regime shifts. I...

The National Oeanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)/National Environmental Satellite, Data, And Information Service (NESDIS) is in the second year of a two-year demonstration of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) derived products called the Alaska SAR Demonstration (AKDEMO). This demonstration provides near real-time SAR data and derived products...

Low stock status of red king crabs Paralithodes camtschaticus in Bristol Bay prompted an industry initiative to reduce the minimum size limit for the commercial fishery from 165 mm in carapace width (CW) to 152 mm in CW. In terms of carapace length (CL), which is the metric used in data collection programs, this is equivalent to a reduction from 13...

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Environmental, Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) is conducting a two-year demonstration of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) derived products called the Alaska SAR Demonstration (AKDEMO). This demonstration provides near real-time SAR data and derived products to the U...

The weathervane scallop Patinopecten caurinus is a large, long- lived pectinid distributed from California to Alaska. A commercial dredge fishery from northern Southeast Alaska to the Bering Sea targets the species. The fishery developed rapidly in the late 1960s, declined sharply in the mid 1970s due to local depletion and availability of other fi...

While multispectral digital imagery is commonly used to assess and classify coastal marine habitats, we used a push-broom spectrographic imager to assess fish directly. We acquired spectral signatures of herring schools and adjacent shallow habitats and determined that multispectral frequency bands could easily discriminate nearshore herring school...

The Pacific herring (Clupea pallasi) sac roe harvest in Alaska for 1994 is projected to be 55,105 tons (1 ton = 2,000 lbs). Herring food and bait harvests for 1994 are projected to be 4,393 tons. Herring spawn- on-pound-kelp fisheries are expected to produce 74 tons of product and spawn-on-wild-kelp harvests are expected to produce an additional 22...

The 1994 abundance of Pacific Herring Clupea pallasi in the Kamishak Bay District of Lower Cook Inlet, Alaska, was forecasted for the first time from an age structured analysis model. This model estimates values of survival, maturity, gear selectivity, and initial population abundance that minimize differences between predicted and observed age com...

An age-structured assessment (ASA) model is used to forecast the abundance of herring expected to return to spawn in Prince William Sound in 1993. The ASA model develops 1973-92 biomass estimates by smoothing differences in abundance trends suggested by spawn deposition surveys, aerial milt surveys, and the time series of purse seine, gillnet, and...

The 1992 Togiak District spawning migration consisted of 483 million Pacific herring Clupea pallasi weighing 156,955 tons. A total of 27,756 tons were harvested by the inshore sac roe fishery and Dutch Harbor food and bait fishery. The 1993 forecast represents the first year an age-structured analysis, using fishery and run biomass age compositions...

The Pacific herring Clupea pallasi sac roe harvest in Alaska for 1993 is projected to be 76,063 tons (ton=2,000 pounds). Herring food/bait harvests for 1993 are projected to be 9,938 tons. Herring spawn-on-pound-kelp fisheries are expected to produce 335 tons of product and spawn- on-wild-kelp harvests are expected to produce an additional 443 tons...

An age-structured model is used to assess the abundance of herring spawning at Togiak, Alaska, forecast the abundance for 1993, and recommend harvest levels for the commercial fishery.

Historical and contemporary fisheries for herring bait in Alaska are reviewed and summarized.

This compilation of reports was prepared as a source of information to be used by the Alaska Board of Fisheries during their October 1991 review of proposed modifications to the management of Bering Sea herring fisheries. This report is a synthesis and summary of detailed information that is available in other publications of the Alaska Department...

The Dutch Harbor food and bait fishery harvests migrating herring stocks enroute from spawning grounds to offshore wintering grounds. The following information summarizes what is known about the origin of herring caught in the Dutch Harbor food and bait fishery: 1. Several stock separation studies have indicated that the origins of the herring cau...

This paper examines the ratio of the weight of the herring catch to the total weight of the ground fish catch in observer records from Pacific cod (Gadus macrocephalus) and pollock (Theregra chalcogramma) bottom trawl tows, in order to define an index of herring abundance. The index is used to determine the timing and location of herring stocks dur...

The total herring harvest for 1990 is projected to be about 37,449 tons from sac roe and food/bait fisheries, a decrease from the total 1989 harvest of 48,929 tons. Stock levels are projected to be lower in many areas with substantial reductions at Togiak Bay, Kamishak Bay, Sitka Sound, and Kah Shakes. The 1989 harvest had an estimated ex-vessel va...

ABSTRACT A modified form of catch-age analysis, which used limited observations of absolute abundance as auxiliary information, was applied to Prince William Sound herring (Clupea harengus pctlktsi). Catch-at-age data were from the 1973-88 purse seine and gill net sac roe fisheries in Prince William Sound. Estimates of spawning biomass from spawn...

Foreign fishing records and scale pattern analyses demonstrate that herring stocks that spawn in Bristol Bay migrate clockwise around Bristol Bay, arriving on the wintering grounds north and west of the Pribilofs in September. Herring stocks that spawn north of Bristol Bay appear to move more directly offshore after spawning. It is uncertain whethe...

A herring spawn deposition survey program employing underwater techniques,similar to the survey program in Southeast Alaska (Blankenbeckler,1987), was re-implemented in Prince William Sound in 1988. Surveys of this kind had not been conducted in the Sound since 1983 and 1984, when feasibility studies had been completed. The program was re-initiated...

Although Bristol Bay herring stocks have provided the largest sac-roe herring fishery in Alaska in recent years, stock biomass is declining rapidly because no significant recruitment to the fishery has been observed for seven years. This document describes the available stock assessment information for Bristol Bay herring stocks, reviews the curren...

Available sources of information on sablefish biology and the Gulf of Alaska sablefish fishery are reviewed and harvest recommendations are presented. A U.S. longline fishery for sablefish has existed in the Gulf of Alaska since the early 1900's. Gulf-wide catches escalated rapidly during the 1960's when the Japanese distant water fleet developed....

A yield-per-recruit model is developed for the Alaska troll chinook salmon fishery, incorporating hooking mortality, fishing mortality growth, natural mortality, and maturation rate. The yield-per-recruit model provides a conceptual framework for evaluating the effects of size limits, gear restrictions, and time-area closures. Landed value per recr...

The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) ENVISAT project is focused on a pre-operational demonstration of wind and vessel position products using, predominately, the Wide-Swath Mode of the ENVISAT Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR). The necessary s...

The threshold biomass for fisheries on Pacific herring Clupea pallasi that spawn near Togiak, in Bristol Bay, Alaska, was reviewed based on the data collected in the decade following threshold harvest policy initiation in 1987. The current threshold of 31,752 mt (35,000 tons), below which fishing is precluded, was found to be too low. This threshol...