I was lucky in my management days that I was associated with Fraser Sockeye. One of the perks was that the end of season meeting was held on one of the primary spawning grounds for that year's return. Among other things, we got to helicopter over the spawning grounds. Seeing millions of fish one the grounds doing their thing was impressive. It so happened that one of those years (mid-80s) we had a super bonanza of pinks. I was able to take my staff up in the WDF plane and look at the Skagit, especially, to see the million or more pinks. I wanted staff to see what real escapements looked like.

Even earlier, the small creek I worked on a lot hosted about 4,000 chum in a mile and a half of crik. The plowed the whole thing up. That was actually where the idea that lots of spawners benefit the ecosystem was born. We were sampling the stream regularly and the steelhead and coho in amongst the spawners were plugged with eggs and carcass remnants.