Just to reinforce that the problem is in the local marine environment the WDFW blackmouth program has seen a significant decrease in contribution rate (that is, how many of those fish end up harvested by recreational fishers as a percentage of releases) over past years (see the State Auditor's performance audit report on the Delayed Release Blackmouth program).

If one were to plot that decrease over time on a graph and then overlay pinniped population increases over the same period you will see a rather dramatic inverse relationship (correlation). Since pinnipeds eat salmonoids the longer those fish are exposed to predation the more likely they are to be eaten; not a profound observation.

Given the ESA issues for Puget Sound Chinook as well as the three listed species of rockfish the Feds are finally generating some seal predation data. One of the more recent study results confirms that seals do eat (listed) rockfish and that that predation may adversely impact recovery of a depleted stock. Really??? Who would have thought???

Is pinniped predation the only adverse impact? Probably not. But it is likely a significant one and, unfortunately, one which managers would like to be able to ignore due to the politics/public relations aspect of controlling/reducing seal numbers. Seals are just so much cuter than cormorants.