If freshwater habitat was the primary problem, steelhead stocks would be doing better in Puget Sound streams with less development and degradation. They are not, stocks are down uniformly across all streams. If freshwater habitat was the primary problem, returning hatchery steelhead would fill Puget Sound rivers each year as they used to. They do not, they dont survive the marine environment in numbers to justify the cost of producing them.

That being said, I do think that resposible hatchery supplementation can occur without preventing wild fish recovery. However the speculative arguments that we should maintain hatchery programs simply because the freshwater habitat is incapable of supporting wild populations anymore lack sufficient science to support that conclusion. Clearly, the marine environment is the primary problem affecting both hatchery and wild steelhead in Puget Sound.