Rivrguy,

You know far more about the GH basin than I ever will. Given the outright addiction WDFW and QIN have for harvest, I can't help but think the GH wild salmon populations would fare better if there were no hatchery salmon. Don't get me wrong; I am not anti-hatchery. However, it seems like in GH (and Willapa) that hatchery salmon continue to cover, or provide the excuse, for over-harvesting wild salmon. If there were no hatchery salmon to cover the addiction, it seems like it would force both WDFW and QIN to manage the wild salmon for sustainability, or else they both would be out of the salmon business in GH. At the rate things are going, it looks like WDFW, and QIN too, are trying to prop up a failed commercial fishery on the scraps that remain. I think the only way that salmon conservation can succeed is if the commercial fishery goes away. Absent that, I think the commercial fishery will eventually go away when the available catch no longer covers the gas money for the fishing boats.