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The Yukon area subsistence and personal use salmon fisheries close for the season on Oct. 15 and the Department of Fish and Game reminds fishermen that permits for both fisheries are due back to ADF&G by Oct. 25.

Fishermen are required to return your permit even if they did not fish or did not catch any fish. Permits should be signed and dated on the back. Failure to return a permit could result in loss of future fishing privileges.

The permits provide management biologists with harvest information for the Tanana River and portions of the Yukon River from the vicinity of Rampart to 21 miles above the Yukon River Bridge and from 22 miles downstream of Circle upriver to the US/Canada border.

The 2008 permit information is combined with subsistence harvest information, collected during the department’s annual postseason survey of households from Yukon River drainage communities, to generate a total estimated subsistence and personal use salmon harvest.

Permits can be mailed to the address on the back of the permit or dropped off at the ADF&G offices in Fairbanks, Delta Junction, or Tok.

Permit holders who have lost or damaged their permits should mail a letter with the following information: name, mailing address, driver license number, 2008 sportfish license number (personal use permits only), list of dates fished, number of salmon and non-salmon fish harvested by species, and gear type used to harvest the fish. If you did not catch any fish, write “did not fish”. The letter should be mailed to:

Alaska Department of Fish and Game

Division of Commercial Fisheries

1300 College Road

Fairbanks, AK 99701-1599

If you have any questions regarding the Yukon Area subsistence and personal use fisheries contact the ADF&G office in Fairbanks at (907) 459-7274.

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Chitina personal-use dip net permits are due back to the Department of Fish and Game by Oct. 15 and subsistence dip net permits for the Glennallen subdistrict are due back on Oct. 31.

Dip-netters are required to return permits even if they did not fish or did not catch any fish.

Permits can be dropped off at the Department of Fish and Game on College Road in Fairbanks or can be mailed in. Anyone who lost a permit can stop by the department and fill out a replacement.

Anyone who doesn’t return a permit will receive two reminder notices, one in November and one in December.

The department uses the permits to estimate the size of the subsistence and personal-use harvest for the Copper River, which in turn are used formulate management strategies for the two fisheries.

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Whether you agree or disagree with Gordon Haber’s stance on wolves, you might want to go to his Web site (www.alaskawolves.org) and check out some cool photos of a family of grizzly bears chasing a pack of wolves.

Haber, the independent wildlife biologist whose work is funded animal-rights group Friends of Animals and who has studied the wolves of Denali National Park and Preserve for more than 40 years, took the photos during a mid-September research flight, according to a narrative posted on his blog.

The series of nine pictures shows a sow grizzly and her twin 3-year-old cubs chasing a pack of three wolves they caught napping on top of a ridge. The bears, led by the mother, charged the wolves about a half dozen times before losing interest. The alpha male of the wolf pack appeared to toy with the bears, stopping when they stopped and then bolting when the bears gave chase again.

While wolf-bear encounters are common in Denali, Haber said this one was unusual because the bears acted aggressively toward the wolves, even though there was no food involved.

“More commonly it is wolves that harass bears, usually in attempting to take over a kill and often with what seems like an element of sport for the wolves,” Haber wrote in his blog. “It is an age-old rivalry that I am convinced includes some genuine dislike for each other, beyond the normal aggression of other competitive and predator-prey relationships.

“The wolves’ bold behavior around bears - often even attempting to bite them in the rear end - always amazes me,” he wrote. “Bears are quick and fast and much more dangerous than wolves, especially with the lightning-fast swats from their powerful, clawed front legs.”

There were no injuries in this case, however, which is typically the case, Haber said. The entire encounter lasted only about 10 minutes.

“The bears left and the wolves resumed their nap as if nothing had ever happened,” he wrote.

Haber also has photos of wolves in the Toklat pack hunting snowshoe hares, a practice they have perfected in the last few years with snowshoe hare populations on the rise.

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The Homer Jackpot Halibut Derby officially ended on Sept. 30 and Jeff Pardi of California won this year’s winner-take-all jackpot, which was worth $45,470.

Pardi caught a 348.2-pound halibut on July 9 and nobody came close to knocking him off the top of the leader board in Alaska’s richest fishing derby .

Robert Warner of Idaho caught the only other 300-plus pound fish, a 310.4-pounder on Aug. 3. The largest fish caught during the month of September was 223.3 pounds.

It was the largest jackpot since 2005 when Jim Corliss of Oregon won $48,504 for his is 310.4-pounder.

The largest jackpot of all time was $51,298 in 2004, won by Don Hanks of Nevada for a 352.6-pound fish.

Ticket sales for the derby were up over the past two years, according to derby organizer Paula Frisinger. A total of about 18,100 tickets were sold this year, up 3,400 from last year and 3,700 in 2006.

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Mark Ross with the Department of Fish and Game counted at least eight flocks of swans flying over Creamer’s Field Migratory Waterfowl Refuge on Tuesday in a four-hour time span.

“I was out looking for moose sign and in a period of 45 minutes four flocks flew over,” said Ross, refuge educator. “You can hear them coming.”

There were about 50 swans in each flock, Ross estimated.

“In past early Octobers I’ve seen and heard a few flocks but never so many in a few hours,” he said.

Keep your eyes and ears open, the first two weeks of October are generally when swans head south, Ross said. They are the last migratory waterfowl to vacate Alaska.