Mining
Best Practices

A Fish Habitat Permit is generally required for mining activity in fish-bearing water in Alaska regardless of land ownership**. Your fish habitat permit will include requirements to ensure your mining impacts to fish and their habitats are minimized based upon the unique characteristics of your mining location. These may include but are not limited to:

  • Instream work should be avoided during sensitive fish life stages such as spawning and/or migration periods.
  • Depressions created in a stream during material removal must be recontoured to ensure fish are not trapped with fluctuating water levels.
  • Stream diversions must provide a durable channel supplied with enough water to pass all species and life stages of local fish both upstream and downstream.
  • Stream diversions should mimic the shape and instream elements of the stream above and below the diversion (e.g., bends, pools, riffles, large rocks, etc.).
  • Water intakes must be screened to avoid injury to fish.

** A fish habitat permit is NOT required for non-motorized mining activities such as gold panning.