Auntie:

I think "distinct posibility" probably overstates the case. But I have never said, and WT has never said, that hatcheries could NEVER work. What we have said is that they are not working currently, that so far attempts to make them work have been woefully inadequate, and that we would be much better off with no hatchery programs than with what we've got.

Having said that, there are some isolated experimental programs out there that deserve to be played out, and we're not trying to keep that "important work" from going forward. (Having said THAT, I will adimit that we remain skeptical, given the record, but programs designed along the lines of what the ISAB and other scientists have recommended, deserve their chance.)

But no one should try to use the tiny percentage of programs that are designed well to justify continuing the overwhelming majority of poorly designed and executed programs that currently exist. In other words, a good program on HC does nothing to justify a program on say the Snohomish that results in stray rates of highly domesticated hatchery stocks as high as 50%, with no serious monitoring or attempt to control the resultant harmful impacts to wild stocks. Or put another way, keep the HC summer chum program and lose the rest until we know for sure if the HC approach does work and would be applicable to other basins and stocks? Sure!

And again, preliminary results that show promise are no justification for rushing forward and declaring the problem solved so that we can base an entire region-wide recovery strategy on hatchery supplementation, as this proposal does. Dave has the right idea, look who's all for this, and decide how much you trust them.

Ramon Vanden Brulle
Washington Trout