Slab,

With the Boldt Decision (US v WA) in 1974, non-treaty fishing began getting cut in half. So even though hatchery stocking was increasing, non-treaty commercial fishing began its downhill decline. Commercial license buy backs began in 1976 I think, and occurred 2 or 3 more times after that. Even tho hatchery stocking was increasing in the 1970s, it's important to remember that wild salmon and steelhead populations were nose diving at the same time due to habitat degradation and over fishing. The hatchery stocking increases could not keep up with the demands created by US v WA catch allocation sharing and the simultaneous reduction of wild fish availability.

Sg