CM -

Do you suppose that part of the issue with lake Washington is the complex species array that lives in the lake. At last count more than 40 species are now found in the lake. The stickle backs and long fin smelt as well as the juveniles of nearly all the rest of the species would be direct competitors with the juvenile sockeye for the daphnia and other zooplankton.

I would be surprised if there is another sockeye lake in the world that has such array of species; the majority of which are exotics.

While I have not looked into the LW in depth in a while there where several years when 50 million or more juvenile fry made it to the lake but experienced very poor survival. Suspect that food competition during the first few weeks/months is great and many of the sockeye starve. Those that survival may well find abundant food later in the summer accounting for their larger size. Maybe Sam Wright was right the best hope for consistent sockeye smolt production would delayed release of larger fry in the fall.

The good news is that fewer sockeye is good for the Chinook!

Curt