Rich--
Why MSY ?
While the answer is complex (are they also) the simple answer is that the managers are forced to establish what the potential harvest numbers are. MSY is the ecscapement level that on the average will produce the highest long term average harvest.

For the Boldt case area the federal courts have set the standard as MSY/MSH. The salmon are covered under the Puget Sound Managed Plan (steelhead have been rolled up with the salmon) which is a federal directed mangement plan and is in effect a court order.

The MSY spawner/recruit point is a mathematical number the success or fail of mangement using that point is dependent how the fisheries are managed. Historically any fish in excess of that "magic number" was considered to be failure. Today the managmers generally adopted the stance that fish above that level (not full harvested) is not a failure. They try incorporate safeguards in the planning (considering and incoorportating such things as current survival conditions and management imprecision) so that long term average escapemetns are above MSY rather than below.

Is this a prefect or even the best way to manage? Probably not however it is the current hand we are dealt and going to total WSR is not going to change it. It could potential dramatically effect the recreational fishery - please comments below. Whether that is good or not is for each of us to decide.

Rob -
What you are suggesting "seed all availaible (sic) habitats to 100%" is managing for carrying capacity. It is something that I hear suggested a lot so lets look more closely at that approach. For now I will assuming we are meaning carry capacity under average conditions (rather than current, historic, poor, or good conditions). Carrying capacity can be defined as that point at wchich adding one more fish to the escapement will not produce any more fish. Or in other words every fish in the run is needed on the spawning grounds. This in turn means there can only be any fishing impacts (dead fish) when the runs are above the carrying capacity - likely due to above average survival conditions. At or below average conditions that means no bonking or other fishing related mortalities; in short no fishing. Also it is not possible to know in advance whether survival conditions are above average even those conditions occur there would be no fishing.

While various conservation groups and some of the public might readily buy into such a management approach I'm not sure than many in the angling community would. Such an approach would result in significant economic lost from the fisheries as well as the potential lose of a passionate user group.

Is that where you really manage scheme that you want?

Tight lines
Smalma