and I think DW captures the problem and how do solve the problem? The vast majority of Coho harvest takes place in the last of Sept and Oct and is mainstem Chehalis with the Rec numbers supported by the Satsop fishery also. We fish the aggregate of the entire basin for the entire run but harvest the Oct portion based upon the aggregate of the run and the upper basin fish come back a bit later and it is about Nov rains. Simply put the the harvest rate being applied to the tide water tribs is to high, dangerously to high for the fish.

One could safely say that the Late Coho and tidewater tribs situation is much different than Steelhead and it is. That said the mind set of the harvesters and managers IS NOT. Recs / NT / Commercial tribal all want harvest and continuously argue for regardless of the overall health of the stock. This is exactly how Steelhead were driven to the dire straights the fish are in and you still have many Recs bitching about no season.

Oh we will use C&R to compensate is the thought. Well when a natural run is 40% to 50% of escapement is that enough to support a release mortality? If not just what is the number or standard we should use? C&R originally was about harvesting abundant hatchery fish and releasing less abundant wild fish. What about the QIN Dec / Jan Steelhead fishery when few Steelhead are present Late Coho are present?

Simply put harvesters be it tribal or NT fishers have been unwilling to face the facts that if it continues one fish stock at a time we will fall into crisis and it is not if this happens but when. I want to kill a fish is at all cost a very difficult mindset to remove and frankly seldom happens until the damage is done and sometimes the run ceases to exist.