A friend who retired from the agency once tried to get his arms around the abundance = success thing and just could not as to many variables. Weather, seasons, effort just could not be complied.

What he did get a real feel for was this. With salmon there is a direct correlation between the numbers taken by sports and abundance well past just numbers. He put it this way LOTS of fish more the average guy / weekender will have great success. Abundance reduced the top fisherman still get their fish but effort drops off as the average guy & weekender success drops dramatically.

This is the rub on the selective fishery. If commercial impacts are reduced on incidental ( or protected species ) they will simply continue to they hit their impact limit. Removing more fish from the pool will reduce the sports angler success ratio. If the goal is to reduce impacts on other stocks other than the targeted one, it will do that to.

For years the commercials called returning hatchery fish surplus, then the wild / hatchery thing magnified it again. Simple fact that no fish returning to a hatchery is surplus or wasted. IT IS THE SPORTS FISHERS OPORTUNITY. The fish not caught are part of the numbers in the pool that make or break the sports season. H once told me that when sports started harping about " surplus " hatchery fish they screwed themselves to death.

Still going on to as you notice the commercials get their fish to harvest for $ and REMOVAL, but the value of the sports effort is not given high priority as they can not remove as many. Track threads here & down South and watch. How you phrase a position is critical. As sportsman often are fishers & conservationist it creates a verbiage issue. Now commercials are very clear they want to catch every fish they can. In short will a successful selective fishery negatively effect sports fishers ............. yes, yes , yes! Will it help non targeted and protected species ............... yes, yes, yes! It is the price sports will pay for disunity and LACK of greed. Stinks but it will happen.