Grilled salmon. (Henry Leasia / KHNS)

For over a decade, Lynn Canal gillnetters have hosted a king salmon barbecue each summer to celebrate local fishermen and the start of the fishing season. Since it started, the event has become a way to showcase Southeast Alaska’s local bounty. This year, however, a shortage of kings has pushed organizers to change the menu to sockeye and rockfish.

Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute offered a grant to Southeast Alaska fishermen 11 years ago to promote the first fish runs of the year. That is when Hugh Rietze of Ocean Beauty Seafood Processing and Distribution first came up with the idea to throw a salmon barbecue for the community. Since then it has become an annual tradition and a part of the Southeast Alaska State Fair.

Jessica Edwards, the fair’s executive director, says stakeholders throughout the fishing industry get involved to make sure it happens every year.

“From fishing supply stores to grocery stores that supply fishermen, outfitting businesses, fuel suppliers, and everything in between. Just to kind of show that this is an industry that has a long reach in our community,” Edwards says.

The event takes place right after the conclusion of the Kluane Chilkat International Bike Relay, which draws thousands of people to Haines each year. The barbecue is a great opportunity to expose visitors to some of the best wild Alaskan seafood around.

In the past, organizers have served King Salmon.

“It’s definitely the creme de la creme. I think King Salmon is pretty special and so that was the real main reason. The other is that in Southeast it’s one of our first runs, so it’s just the availability was there,” Edwards says.

However, low king salmon returns in recent years have prompted the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to enact strict fishing regulations throughout Southeast. Research on the declining number of kings is still in its infancy, but regulations prompted by low harvests are hitting commercial fishermen hard.

Recreation has also been impacted by the decline of kings. The Haines King Salmon Derby, an annual event that started 40 years ago, has not been hosted for the past three years due to low returns.

This year the barbecue’s organizers decided against serving kings.

“At this point, it doesn’t make sense to continue until those stocks are sound again,” Edwards says.

Instead, they will grill sockeye salmon and rockfish.

Ocean Beauty has helped provide fish for the event every year since its inception. This year they are donating 1,000 pounds of sockeye salmon filets. Organizers have also bought 500 pounds of rockfish fillets from Haines Packing Company.

Alaska Glacier Seafoods out of Auke Bay and Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute will be contributing fish as well.

The menu is not the only thing that is changing this year. There is also a new event for fishermen and their families.

Many crews have had a difficult time attending the barbecue in previous years because the gillnet fishing season begins the following day. This year there will be a Friday evening barbecue just for fishermen and their families at the Letnikof cannery. Gregg Bigsby has been involved with the barbecue since its inception. He says this will be a good way for fishermen to spend some time together off the boat.

“It’s an opportunity at the beginning of the season to get together and have a party and then go to work. It’s a good thing because everybody gets to hang out in one spot at the same time. Otherwise we’re just a bunch of workers who are busy producing lots of fish,” Bigsby says.

The community fishermen’s barbecue is on Saturday from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the fairgrounds.