Okay some quick food for thought before I run off to a meeting in town tonight:

Plunker, #1 - you have to assume that the 5900 number is the the correct level for the Quillayute system. Given the track record of MSY models with over 95% failure in this state, please enlighten why it will be any different for the Quillayute system.

#2 - one key word here is "system". These numbers do not reflect the shortages in some parts of the drainage that have been made up for in the total count by other areas, ie Bogey vs. Sol Duc.

#3 - Timing. Does having a bunch of fish at the end of the year to meet a "goal" mean the run is healthy?? Regardless of how earlier returning fish ar doing? I think not ... graphs and such do not reflect the fact that the early component is down.

#4 - Let's put these numbers on a graph:



There, now we see the five straight years of declining returns in a big drop at the end of this chart. Jusdging from what we've seen so far this year, we're well on our way to year 6 in a row of decline. Do we wait until we're at some piss-poor point before we act again?

Lets compare the Quillayute graph to a river you love. Slide the timeline around about ten years and you see a similar trend perhaps?



Looks like the Skagit was doing well for a while before it fell on its tail too! Green and Snohomish charts look pretty similar.

Let's show one that never seems to be brought up by the opposition to mandatory C&R:



2003 was the lowest escapement on record in over 25 years.

6 out of the past 11 years the river failed to meet escapement. Probably would have been more save for two years of closures / C&R restrictions on the couple of years that it made it (barely).

Would be even more than that if original goal for the river is used. How come WDFW escapement goals always seem to drop when most other fisheries on the west coast have seen the goals bumped in the past 10 years?

Ah heck, I give up, let's kill the last ones in here too