From the images shared, these appear to be Philemona, a freshwater parasite. Philomena is a food quality concern but is Not considered a human health concern. With proper preparation, the salmon is safe to eat.
Just over a year ago, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game applied the pesticide rotenone to two lakes and a stream in the remote Miller Creek drainage on the northern Kenai Peninsula to eradicate the last known population of invasive northern pike on the Kenai Peninsula.
An approximate 69% of adult razor clams at Ninilchik beaches and 84% at Clam Gulch beaches have died. The department said the cause of the high natural mortality rate of the clams remains unknown, but may be due to a combination of heavy surf, habitat changes, environmental stressor and predation.
About 10% of our catch during dip net fishing at mouth of Kenai River was harboring these worms.
Strong winds might have blown sea cucumbers (Cucumaria miniata) up on to the beach, exposing them to the cold at low tide.
Sea Nettle (Chrysaora melanaster) jellyfish washed up on the beach.
Sea Star Wasting Disease has caused sea stars to die off since 2013. As of 2018, there are still no sea stars on Bishops Beach in Homer.
Sea star wasting syndrome, or disease as it has become known, hit Kachemak Bay hard in 2016, killing about 90 percent of sunflower and true star populations.
Sea star wasting syndrome was first documented in Kachemak Bay in 2014, but it wasn’t until last summer that the mysterious infection began killing sea stars in large numbers.
A winter storm lashed the sandy beaches at the mouth of the Ninilchik River with ferocious waves, powerful enough to uproot thousands of razor clams.
Of all of the aquatic animals that could be collected in a gillnet on the Kenai River, crawfish are some of the least likely. Why? Because they do not naturally occur in the Kenai River or any other river in Alaska. Unfortunately, crawfish have been collected from the lower Kenai River twice in the last four years, and both times they were leftovers from someone’s dinner.
The Alaska Department of Fish and Game found an unexpectedly low number of clams during final surveying, but the agency still plans to monitor them in support of perhaps opening the fishery in years to come.
The European black slug was first introduced into Alaska in the 1980s in Cordova, Slowik said. It eventually made its way to Juneau and Ketchikan, likely hitching a ride on fishing gear, and is now prevalent across Southeast. A few years ago, people started seeing the slug in Whittier and Girdwood.
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