Bob -
Are you suggesting that substantial numbers of wild fish in the Quillayute spawn prior to March 15th? If so how many? Does that mean that the escapement of wild Quillayute steelhead is actually large than what the State has reported (Have they erred on the side of the wild fish?)?

The Snohomish system is my home turf and I know a little more about it than the Quillayute. It is there that I learned to fish for these additive steelhead. Like you have talked with the old-timers about what their fishing was like. The old gentlemen that taught me to fish in the early 1960s developed their skills prior to World War II. During the Great Depression they would pool their nickels to buy gas so they could make a run to the river. They literally were fishing to feed their families. I had a number of conversation with them and they consistently reported they didn't bother with steelhead fishing until after the first of the year - there was not enough fish in the river to risk their $$ on not getting fish.

What is the difference between the experience of those on the coast on those on the Snohomish. I believe it is related to the hydrographs of the systems. The Quillayute is a rain dominated system with fall flows occurring starting in March. While the North Puget Sound river's hydragraphs are drive by spring run-offs fed by snow melt. Typically they have their highest daily flows in the late May, June and July - the coast streams highest flows are in the late fall/early winter. This influence the timing of the wild spawning. The timing of the spawn is such that the fry emerge from the gravels during periods of favorable survival flows.

On the coast the fry find good conditions in June while in the North Sound the fry don't find similar conditions until late July or early August. As a result the Quillayute fish begin spawning in early February and continue through May. The Puget Sound fish beginning spawning in early to mid-March and continue thorugh June. I have observed that wild fish tend to arrive near their spawning areas typically 6 weeks or so prior to spawning. The would mean the onset of the significan wild runs would be in mid-December on the coastal (a few fish would be even earlier). While in the Puget Sound region the onset in late Janaury/early February.

A common wild fish myth was the Thanksgiving run of wild fish in the Puget Sound region. Until the mid-1980s these early wild fish were common. I remember those fish well. They were in fishable numbers around Thanksgiving, were larger than the hatchery brats (typcially 10 to 14# - some larger) and were fairly mature fish -spwaning in late December/early January. Following "Bolt" scale sample revealed that they were hatchery fish and with the onset of mass marking of the all hatchery plants these early wild fish disappeared. They were of course the 3 salt hatchery fish that tend to return earlier than the 2-salts.

To the Pilchuck -
Much of the above applies to the "Chuck". In the mid-1980s escapement had fallen to just a few hundred fish with the wild catch being mostly in the month of March. With March closures and wild steelhead release required when runs were below escapement goals the numbers of fish rebounded until the escapement was well over a 1,000 fish. When harvest was again allowed (harvest rates in the 10 to 20% range) the wild catches in Janaury and Febraury were larger than the old catches in March. Of course that is due in large part to larger run sizes. The point is with March closures the run size increased and we saw more early fish. If the wild population would there have been more early fish - I think so. For decades the steelhead seasons on most Puget Sound rivers closed the end of February - however beginning in the 1960s and 1970s there were more liberal season resulting in over fishing of the wild populations (note that occurred prior to the tribal fishing).

It is interesting to note on those river system that have been either closed or managed under Wild Steelhead Release all season (Nooksack) have not seen large increases of early fish.

Tight lines
Smalma