Originally Posted By: Carcassman
The State and tribes can fall back on agreements and orders that came out of Boldt that made it clear that any fish in excess of the escapement goal is wastage.

Precisely why the point-escapement does NOT work.

The mindset of managers is that anything above it is WASTE.

BY redefining the target goal, and let's be clear that I am advocating for a range here, the potential for over-escapement "waste" is diminished.

For example a BEG range on the Kenai was once 7200-14400. The range of acceptable escapements was equal to the lower bounds of the goal. In this case, managers could craft a season using conservative models to harvest for an escapement of 7200. Let's say post-season that the actual harvest ended up considerably more conservative than the pre-season estimate and the actual escapement was 10492.

Management failure?

With a point escapement of 7200… yes! The bastards let 3292 fish swim by the fleet unharvested! The next year, you can bet the harvest model would be adjusted to make sure those surplus fish WOULD be harvested. Repeated again and again with each passing year to ensure that every last fish beyond the 7200 would eventually be harvested… even if it meant "occasionally" harvesting too many. Isn't this EXACTLY what we are doing in GH?

With a BEG of 7200-14400… an escapement of 10492 is absolutely NOT a failure. So what… a couple extra thousand fish made it to the gravel. Just the cost of doing business to do right by the fish.
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"Let every angler who loves to fish think what it would mean to him to find the fish were gone." (Zane Grey)

"If you don't kill them, they will spawn." (Carcassman)


The Keen Eye MD
Long Live the Kings!