scotty,

As I pointed out in my last post. yes, they do return to the small tribs to spawn. Hatchery fish are no longer planted in the Satsop so when they get them in the trap at the hatchery they are put above and allowed to do their thing. It is to bad that we have to clip these guys. it has to do with the indians, they say that any steelhead that is in a hatchery after a certain size must be fin clipped. We would love to release them with all their fins. The small tribs that we put these fish in don't get runs. they did at one time but no long do. by hatching out the eggs in a hatchery we get a better survival then they do in the wild. now we put them back into the system and when they return to spawn we allow them to. now we have established runs where we had none for many years. when their young return they have all fins. yes, we do lose some to harvest because of the clipped fins but we still get a better return.

dcrzfitter