Salmo G and Jeff

you are both correct.. and goes to prove my opint that more change is needed. people seem to have this impression that hatchery operations have changed a lot here in Washington when infact they have not, at least compared to the amount of change that is needed.

It is my opinion there should be 3 kinds of rivers in Washington.

1. rivers managed mostly for hatchery production. Cowlitz North lewis and other rivers where dams low in the system block the majority of the habitat. These are your put and take plant them full of fish rivers..

2 then there are rivers we can manage for both hatchery and wild steelhead together.
A river that comes to mind is the Kalama (sorry for the regional bias). The Kalama has a reasonably good barrier above which only natives should be passed giving them reletive resproductive isolation while the lower river can be managed as a sport hatchery fishery. ( of course this only addresses the issue for steelhead and not chinook or coho

3 . then there are rivers that should be set aside entirely for wild production and no harvest. These are rivers on which there are no hatchery facilities or where such facilities offer only a marginal fisher.. I understand there would be some serious debate with hard consessions on both sides on this one Some rivers that come to mind here are the Wind and the East Fork Lewis river and South Toutle.. These three could be closed down with the closure of one hatchery , that being Wind river Spring chinook ( i can hear the moaning now) What i would propose is that thoes fish not be taken from production but that they be planted elsewhere so as not to minimize opportunity on a popular sport fishery.. plant them in say the White salmon and the little white salmon. And the steelhead from the East fork and Toutle be planted in the North Lewis and Cowlitz..

These may not be perfect examples but i think you can see where i am going.. Thats the kind of managment we need..