One thing that was reinforced on Monday was that two pods of SRKW actively feed off the mid to southern WA coast in late winter/spring apparently targeting CR bound salmon so there is a potential for augmenting the food supply for those pods by improving salmon runs - natural origin as well as hatchery. And then there is the impact of predatory mammals and birds on outbound smolt.

Bottom line, Congress needs to provide more general management options under the MMPA to include prioritizing recovery of ESA listed species over the interests of healthy pinnipeds otherwise untouchable under the MMPA.

As to my comment about reducing pinnipeds as being the quickest and easiest way to provide SRKW more salmon.......well, that is my opinion but would require that all of the politicians who have recently jumped on board Orca recovery being willing to lean forward to overcome bureaucratic hurdles in the face of what they describe as an Orca emergency. Or are they just posturing for the votes??