I hadn't looked at this thread earlier but had a few comments .
1. Koalas and Pandas are not bears, they are slothes.
2. A hatchery manager at the Garrison creek hatchery (flows into Chambers Bay by Steilacoom ) did in fact raise a bunch of chinook a few years ago to remain in Puget Sound and not migrate out. Not wanting to get him into trouble if it was not for publication I will not mention his name but I do have it and discussed this with him at length. He would hold the fish until they dropped thier freshwater scales and got the salt water scales. Then hold them through another cycle until they had salt water scales again. His claim was that the fish would not leave the sound, but were also sterile so would live and eat and grow until they died about 8-9 years later. This talk came about when I was questioning him as to why the hatcheries dumped the excess smolts that were hatched. The hatcheries do this only because of the amount of feed they are allocated for the year due to thier budget.He claimed that he had done this before (holding over) on a coast river with another manager years before. The last I talked to him he was no longer doing this as he had been told to stop.
I know this is off thread but felt the need to answer that point.
3. I am somewhat appauled that someone would seriously mention or even consider mutilating a fish no matter what the origin. This smacks of genicide and where do you draw the line in the sand that enough is enough? I too feel the hatcheries and felt need to put as many fish into a system is the wrong approach. If we eliminated the hatcheries and went to all "wild" fish we could buy our fish at Safeway and practice C&R for the remainder of our time.
I for one like to bring home one of these inferior fish for the table or smoker.
Enough said.