If they changed the method of managment 8 years ago and there are fewer fish now than ten years ago, it doesn't seem all that successful to me. I don't disagree that this year could just have a bad return unrelated to management, but numbers have not increased overall during those 8 years.

I know they somehow count more fish in the river system, but I have no idea how they come up with that number. I see it first hand everyday and I know for a fact that no matter how they count em and tally the number, there are actually fewer of them. Are they counting fish returning to the Wallace, are they counting fish on the beds, maybe a fly over and estimate? I think Twodogs mentioned a 1% per year increase, if you put in 20% more effort to count them, and only count 1% more fish, I can see how on paper it looks like an net increase (no pun intended).

If the run was as predicted, then one scenario is that during the Coho run when the river was up, a few early chums came in, as the coho tailed off and the chums should have been coming in in very good numbers, there was no rain and the river was low and clear again. This was when the netting started and no fish were entering the river, they were just hanging out in the salt, as a result they got scooped up and never made it upstream.

I don't normally get involved in these conversations, I leave it to those that know much more and are better connected, but this is a river and fishery that I know very well. I know when the numbers reported aren't in line with what's actually going on in the system.