I have not yet read the court decision.....

However, I'm not seeing a huge downside if the issue is confined to the impacts of hatchery smolts fish on wild smolts. When hatchery smolts are released, they move downstream to the ocean very quickly. The potential for interactions with wild fish is minimal. And once they're in the ocean, it's everyfish for itself. Survival of the fittest. In that case, wild fish will have the advantage every time. So I don't see a huge concern.

But what's going to happen when the hatchery adults return? If the resulting harvest includes an exploitation rate that takes large numbers of hatchery adults, the wild fish will go extinct very quickly. That should be obvious. Wild fish cannot take an exploitation rate of 90+ percent, even though hatchery fish can.

As I see it, stocking of hatchery fish is a concern, but by itself it's not huge. The real threat is the potential for high levels of terminal harvest that usually accompany hatchery stocking. Even modest levels of terminal harvest will likely take too many wild adults. Those adults need to be on the spawning grounds. So the real threat with hatchery fish is not the stocking, it's the subsequent harvest.

I agree with Salmo g. who suggests that allowing natural recolonization would be an experiment, but only to the extent that doing so under current conditions is highly uncertain. The reason Elwha River Chinook grew so large 100+ years ago was that they needed to attain a body size large enough to get over the enormous rapids in Elwha Canyon. And 100 years ago Chinook could grow to 70+lbs because ocean harvest was virtually non-existent. Chinook salmon can no longer grow to a large body size because of the time it takes to do so. They'll get caught and bonked before they reach their terminal body size. Nobody throws back a 50lb Chinook in hopes it will grow to 80+ lbs, even though it might. Every 50lb Chinook that gets caught gets bonked.

So, will there be enough large Chinook (hatchery or wild) returning to the Elwha to recolonize the spawning grounds upstream of the Elwha Canyon rapids? That is the uncertainly that hovers over this experimental restoration project.