The MSR construct I described was presented from a recreational fisherman's point of view to allow readers of this board to digest it in familiar terms. Labelling it MSR was simply a way to differentiate it from the harvest oriented management of the day. I could have just as easily called it MSA or Maximum Sustainable Abundance. The idea being that abundance is what is required to support high-quality recreational fisheries.

MSY could just as easily be called MSH or Maximal Sustainable Harvest. It's just a name.

The implications of managing by either set of principles remains unchanged. Only one of them will set us back on a path of recovery. The other can at best maintain things the way they are. More likely, things will only get worse as we continue to manage for maximal harvest of ever-declining stocks of salmon.

I refrained from posting this earlier because I knew somebody would raise the question of how the tribal harvest fits into this whole scheme. I doubt the tribes would buy into it. The only way it would work in WA is if the nontribal share of the harvestable surplus were manged for MSR with a guarantee that any forgone harvest would not be forfeited to the tribal allocation. Without that assurance, we're toast!