Kenai’s second annual silver salmon derby continues this weekend. It’s put on by the Kenai Chamber of Commerce.
Chamber Director Johna Beech says the first weekend saw a decent turnout and good fishing.
“I think the first night we had 13 fish brought in. Saturday the 15th our city manager spun the wheels that day and he said 40 or 45 fish were brought in and then a pretty good group of fish brought it on Sunday, so people are fishing.”
Unlike most derbies, where size matters, winners in Kenai’s silver derby are based on a random spin of the wheel.
“This is based on a magic weight. (After) the weigh in times officially close, we spin the two wheels and that decides what our magic weight is. And we plug that into a really great document that city of Kenai put together and then voila, our winners pop up and you wait for a phone call to say you won. This year we had some sponsors come on, First National Bank Alaska, Don Jose’s, Arby’s Peak Oilfield Services and Homer Electric Association. With them, we were able to offer a guaranteed cash prize of $1,000 to our adult overall winner, so that’s kind of exciting.”
She says the kids division is competitive, but mostly among a single family.
“We have a group of kids, the Craig kids, and they fished last year. They were our only two youths who fished last year and one day he wins, the next day she wins. So it’s kind of cute how that works out.”
Tickets for the derby are available at the Kenai Visitor’s Center or at Three Bears. You can find all the details on the Chamber’s Facebook page.