Two dogs, those guidelines were not developed in isolation but rather as a collaborative effort between the NWIFC, the Puget Sound tribes, WDFW, and NOAA fisheries. There were not only hatchery people that developed those guidelines but harvest managers as well as folks involved with salmon recovery for all the participating agencies. In addition, every person that had any input to the Puget Sound salmon recovery plan that again was jointly developed by the tribes and WDFW had the opportunity to review the section on artificial production. If these guidelines were not appropriate every reviewer of that plan had an opportunity to fix them, or at the least, say they needed fixing.

Also to be clear, I did not say that I was not familiar with work that has gone on since the HGMP's and RMP's were developed. I am very familiar with work done since that time, including your "new" watershed Hatchery Action Implementation Plans (HAIP's). I also happen to agree with you that a coordinated effort across the H's is necessary to lead to any progress in recovering salmon. I just wonder how that is going to happen when there doesn't seem to be any certainty on what the current commitments are in the hatchery "H" and certainly no commitment across at least two of the H's - harvest and hatcheries - that the composition of natural spawners may actually be limiting the productivity of many natural Chinook populations to a degree that is similar to the habitat limitations that the co-managers always mention. This issue certainly was not dealt with in the most current Chinook harvest RMP and that would be the place the most immediate effect could be had.