I have seen 95% of the female steelhead that went upstream come back down. Males are much lower as they essetially spawn till they die. been records of a few of them getting stuck in low water and spending the whole summer in the creek.

An interesting piece of information coming out of the acoustic tagging is that a steelhead my spawn in river A and come back the next year in river B. Up in BC they saw a male spawn in two separate rivers the same year.

The strongest steelhead populations appear to have 20-30 and p to about 70% repeats.

As to pinks on the Green, or other places, the carcasses need to be where the target fish rears. If the steelhead rear in the upper watershed tribs, the 10 kazillion in the middle/lower mainstem doesn't help them.

There were some recent papers that looked at the relationship of N Pacific pinks and Chinook. The relationship was essentially inverse. More pinks, fewer Chinook. As I recall, the mechanism was unknown. Could be the pinks cleaning out the larder when the leave. Could be that the estuary/ocean conditions favor one over the other.