So 2W (MA 9) and 2E (MA 8-1 and 8-2) were opened 1 Oct and closed for the season (hopefully) on 23 March.

The rec season in those areas has been two months in the summer and then starting again in October and running through December with relatively low activity during those months.

The 2015 season's Staff presentation (required annually by the new policy) shows commercial versus rec harvests in 2W at approximately the same at roughly 200,000 pounds each. In 2E the rec harvest was about 1.1 million versus 650,000 for commercials. Hopefully I was able to read the bar graphs reasonably accurately: http://wdfw.wa.gov/commission/meetings/2016/04/apr0816_20_presentation.pdf.

My point is that 2W and 2E were intended to have an emphasis on recreational harvest. There seems to be no need to close those areas for the month of Sept to enable the State to assess rec harvest given the amount of commercial harvest with the NT commercial season opening before the rec winter season (the rationale there continues to be lost on me).

A couple of other observations are that:

1. The combined all areas Puget Sound NT commercial harvest still exceeds the all areas combined recreational harvest.

2. The presentation does not break out the recreational harvest within management areas by summer/winter; it might be illuminating to see how little rec activity occurs in that Oct-Dec fishery.

Maybe the new shellfish manager whomever that is will embrace some new ideas to improve recreational opportunity and especially in those two areas.