Our Commitment to Quality

Taking salmon fishing seriously and sending you home with the best!

Salmon thrive in Alaska’s pristine waters. Our job is to make sure your fish retains the best possible quality. We at Alaska Saltwater Charters come from commercial fishing backgrounds and have stringent quality controls, so your fish will taste super fresh when you enjoy it at home.

The first step is to remove the fish from the water gently. Once the fish is landed, it is not allowed to hit the deck. A fish flopping on the deck will cause the meat to bruise. We hit the fish on the head to dispatch it quickly. We always lift a fish by the head, never the tail. Lifting or hanging fish by the tail stretches the backbone, breaking blood vessels along the spine and flesh quality is lost.

Next, we cut the gills to ensure the fish bleeds out sufficiently. It is important to get the blood out of the fish as quickly as possible. This is a critical factor as blood can seep into the surrounding tissue and form a bruise that cannot be seen until the salmon is filleted or split. Once the fish is bled, we rinse the gill area again to remove any access blood. Then your fish is put into our saltwater slush ice tank to rapidly chill.

Temperature is the single most important factor affecting the quality of fish preservation. Quickly reducing the fish’s body temperature will limit the rate of bacterial growth and the speed at which the fish spoils. This is minimized significantly by chilling the fish to a temperature close to freezing. We utilize a chilling technique known as Chilled Sea Water (CSW), sometimes referred to as "slush ice," which is a mixture of sea water and ice. Our saltwater slush ice rapidly chills your fish to 33 degrees.