My thought is that any of those studies are pretty specific to the watershed they were conducted in.

The "hatchery fish don't hurt" studies tend to actually be "don't hurt much, and we want hatchery fish really bad" conclusions...and that's ok, just need to be straight on what they are saying, and who is saying it.

In SW Washington, Keith is spot on, at least in regards to two rivers I have spent considerable time on...the EFL and the Toutle.

When Mt. St. Helens blew up the Toutle, it didn't take much time at all for significant runs of wild winter runs to return...my understanding is that lots of the Toutle wild fish used the Kalama, Lewis, and Cowlitz after the eruption, and then re-colonized the Toutle rather well in the years to follow.

We then put a zillion hatchery summer runs in the Toutle, which made for a successful and enjoyable summer run harvest fishery, but immediately turned the wild winters right around and depressed their numbers.

Keith's chat above about the EFL is spot on, as well.

That being said...steelhead in Puget Sound are a completely different situation...Puget Sound itself seems to be crushing all the outgoing smolts, hatchery or wild, and add in the Hood Canal Bridge on the streams there, and almost none even make it out, much less return as adults.

Hatchery fish probably played/plays little or no part in that, at least not at the level they are being planted now.

Fish on...

Todd