Kamchatka, Russia | Where the Salmon Rule, National Geographic Magazine: Anti-Poaching Patrols

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Poaching is the biggest threat to salmon in Russia.  An anti-poaching enforcement trip starts in Sobolevo, the salmon poaching epicenter. Men ride around on tanks and in boats attempting to spot places where poachers would put out a net to fish–where they see sediment on the rocks has been washed away and a net has been dragged. These are very subtle clues, it is confirmed when landing on a bank they find spilled caviar. They follow many paths into the woods eventually finding the poacher camp. It is remote enough that the warden’s boat engines were not heard. The patrols are just outside Soboleva in the heart of the most poached area of Kamchatka. Soboleva is on the Sea of Okhotsk, just off the Kamchatka shelf and is only accessible by MI-8 helicopter.