WDFW invites public participation in annual salmon season-setting process

North of Falcon process kicks off Feb. 27 with hybrid statewide salmon forecast meeting in Olympia

OLYMPIA – Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) fishery managers have scheduled opportunities for the public to provide input in 2026-2027 state-managed salmon seasons, beginning with a hybrid statewide forecast meeting on Feb. 27 at 9 a.m. in Olympia.

The meeting, part of the season setting process known as North of Falcon, is just one of more than a dozen in-person, hybrid, and virtual meetings scheduled over the next two months to discuss Washington salmon fisheries. North of Falcon refers to waters north of Oregon’s Cape Falcon, which marks the southern border of management of Washington’s salmon stocks, including Puget Sound, Strait of Juan de Fuca, Columbia River, and coastal areas.

WDFW will consider input from recreational and commercial anglers and those interested in salmon fishing, while state fishery managers work with tribal co-managers to craft 2026-2027 fisheries.

“The Washington salmon season-setting process is an important time for us to hear from the public as we develop the upcoming season alongside tribal co-managers,” said WDFW Director Kelly Susewind. "Salmon recovery is our top priority and drives how we implement these sustainable salmon fisheries. We will continue to provide recreational and commercial harvest opportunities where salmon populations are healthy enough to sustain them.”

"Every year the treaty tribes and our co-managers face increasing challenges during the North of Falcon planning process as we divide up diminishing numbers of salmon," said Ed Johnstone, chairman of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission. "We make these tough decisions as we continue the work to restore habitat and increase hatchery production. We have to address the ongoing threats from habitat degradation, climate change and marine mammal predation. Harvest management alone will not rebuild our runs."

WDFW will present initial salmon forecasts developed by WDFW and tribal co-manager fisheries biologists on Feb. 27 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Office Building 2 Auditorium, 1115 Washington Street S.E. in Olympia. The main session of the Feb. 27 meeting will be available to watch via Zoom webinar. Participants must register in advance online.

WDFW and tribal forecasters use a suite of scientific data, including watershed sampling and monitoring, ocean indicators, and previous year returns, to estimate the number of salmon and steelhead that will return to Northwest waters, and how many fish will be available for harvest.

In addition to attending meetings, the public can participate in the state’s process including:

• Online comments: The public can provide general comments on potential 2026-2027 North of Falcon recreational fisheries, coastal commercial fisheries, and Puget Sound commercial fisheries. Additional comment opportunities on specific seasons and fisheries will be available as forecasts and proposed season summaries are made available.

• Virtual meetings and daily briefings: During the final days of negotiations at the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) meeting, WDFW fishery managers plan to hold briefings each day, which will be available via virtual meetings.

For a full timeline of the state’s North of Falcon process, including a public meeting schedule with opportunities to participate in meetings and provide public feedback, refer to the WDFW North of Falcon webpage. WDFW-hosted meetings will be held in-person or in virtual and hybrid formats for the public to watch or listen. For key terms, suggested resources and a North of Falcon overview, refer to the WDFW’s North of Falcon FAQs and Glossary Information.

This process occurs in tandem with PFMC public meetings to establish fishing seasons for salmon in ocean waters three to 200 miles off the Pacific coast. The PFMC will discuss preliminary options for ocean salmon fisheries during its March 4-9 meeting and is expected to adopt final fishing seasons and harvest levels at its April 7-12 meeting. For more information on meetings refer to the PFMC’s website.

All members of the public are invited to share their perspectives and participate in WDFW public feedback opportunities regardless of race, color, sex, age, national origin, language proficiency, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, status as a veteran, or basis of disability.

WDFW works to preserve, protect, and perpetuate fish, wildlife and ecosystems while providing sustainable fish and wildlife recreational and commercial opportunities.



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Request this information in an alternative format or language at wdfw.wa.gov/accessibility/requests-accommodation, 833-885-1012, TTY (711), or CivilRightsTeam@dfw.wa.gov.

FROM BARB REGION 6

Hello,

As you may be aware, the 2026 North of Falcon (NOF) salmon season setting process has begun. The public is invited to join WDFW at various public meetings throughout the NOF process to discuss fishery related issues and provide fishery suggestions or comments to help the Department draft recreational and commercial fishery regulation proposals for the 2026 salmon fisheries throughout the state.

Our 2026 North of Falcon regional fishery discussion public meetings are scheduled as follows; these meetings will include a trend and status review, 2026 Salmon forecasts, management objectives, and time for public input/comment.

February 27: Statewide Salmon Forecast Kickoff Meeting: Hybrid - in person (Olympia) and virtual 9 – 3 PM. This meeting will include a dedicated coastal breakout session with our regional staff who will be available to answer questions and provide valuable insight into coastal fisheries for Willapa Bay, Grays Harbor, and North Coast tributaries. This meeting will be hybrid, giving you the flexibility to join in person or virtually.

March 12: Coastal Fisheries – Willapa Bay, Grays Harbor, and North Coast Joint Fisheries Discussion: Virtual Zoom Meeting 6 – 8 PM

March 26: Strait of Juan de Fuca and Hood Canal Joint Recreational Fisheries Discussion: Virtual Zoom Meeting 6 – 8 PM


The full 2026 North of Falcon public meeting schedule as well as links to register for any public meeting during the North of Falcon process can be found on our website, 2026 North of Falcon public meeting schedule | Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife.

Regional staff created a new NorthCoast@dfw.wa.gov email that we will use to share fisheries related updates for the North Coast areas, similar to the emails we use for Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor. If you know of anyone interested in receiving emails from the Department regarding Willapa Bay, Grays Harbor, or North Coast fisheries, please forward this email and have them to reply to WillapaBay@dfw.wa.gov, GraysHarbor@dfw.wa.gov, or NorthCoast@dfw.wa.gov (depending on your interest) stating they would like to be added to our email distribution list and provide which areas they are interested.

Thank you for your interest in our coastal salmon fisheries.

Just remember to bathe the dog and curry-comb the pony before attending.

02/07/2026

"Just remember to bathe the dog and curry-comb the pony before attending."

No need, I predict 100% of meetings with the public will be "zoom meetings", no chance to "see the whites of the enemy's eyes as you fire questions, while on the phone or computer". If you ask a question, that they don't like... you are probably done asking questions for that zoom meeting.

We'll never really know but I think that most of the "general public salmon season, is pretty much "already done before the 1st meeting, ????"

What the state and the tribes "agree to" is what it will be regardless of public input.

No, think its more of what the Bolt Tribes agree to and the State trys to justify for sports and commercial...

Yep. That was why "agree to" was in quotes.

Again, no surprises in this reality for over twenty + seasons now and counting ? A bit silly to waste sunny daze and spring time with venting old NOF gas here. ( although I just did again...)

Eventually you will just get a notice to cease and desist until further notice.

Control over our resources and all policy has been captured via election fraud... The Banking Cartel owns the entire game board,, all the property,, all the players because they create and issue the money... Jeffrey Epstein did not run a honey pot,, blackmail operation for governments,, he worked for the banks who own and control all governments...

When it comes to fish policy,, the tribes and the states look no further than the banks,,, everything is manipulated,, noting is free market,, nothing happens by the peoples choice... All shortages and scarcities are manufactured via policy administration... The ESA is a tool of manipulation to assist in policy administration of manufactured shortages for the purpose of control and extortion...

If you have not figured it out yet,, environmental controls and policy is fake as well,, based on lies and fake science/math... A method to create shortages and scarcity of naturally abundant resources...

Its like fish passage on creeks that do not have fish,,, you spend lots of money on problems that do not exist to expose shortages that do not have the capacity to exist,, only to spend money and not to produce abundance,, so the shortage perpetually continues,, so that the measure of control and extortion continues...

The only way to achieve abundance of salmon/steelhead is to either stop/curtail commercial fishing or to enhance hatchery production.. ultimately what it comes down to is that the rivers are not cultivating enough fish because not enough fish are planting their seeds on the spawning beds...

Right on SRG! I think forty years of failure for "Recovery" is enough. WDFW science has failed. To cut to the short of it, we need to have strong, healthy hatchery fish spawning with the weakening so-called- wild fish, which there really aren't any. Survival of the fittest and the natural laws of evolution work, and have for many eons. I looked up some numbers for the heck of it. The Skokomish River has miles of prime spawning water upstream of the hatchery. One hundred eighty one (181) were released upstream while about twenty seven thousand (27000) were surplused.

I think it is bit more complex, but only a bit. They gotta put more fish on the grounds.

Given what I have seen about steelhead these pretty much have to be wild fish; certainly not something like Chambers. For pink and chum let them all go and let Darwin sort them out. Chinook, especially Falls incubated and reared on surface water should go up. Springers and coho, who are both reared a year would need some more care. But we need about 10X+ escapements in the wild.

We KNOW what to do, the science has been there for decades but the political will is lacking.

And I seriously doubt that the recs are willing to forgo fishing on immature coho and Chinook anytime soon.

C-man,

Of course it is more complicated, just as you have said. But we have gotten nowhere, really, after forty years. We salmon advocates need to get together and speak LOUDER ! but we don't. Heck, PSA and CCA can't agree. I think those two organizations ought to at least agree and demand the elimination of a lot of sealions and seals. I'm guessing the tribes would agree, too.

A better polltical strategy would be for the organizations to hold WDFW accountable for certain actions, along with attendance of state reps and senators at OUR meeting rather than the home court advanteges held by WDFW at Commission meetings. We need Town Hall style meetings.

I very much agree, Tug. I wish that we, the voting public and tax-paying and license-buying public would hold government to specific goals. If, as you note, in 40 years we haven't put the fish on a significant road to recovery (significantly larger runs than 40 years ago) that we admit defeat and do something radically different.

Same holds for education, infrastructure, mental health, homlessnessness, drugs, whatever. We must demand results at the ballot box.

If the system was managed for a quality recreational experience and natural abundance via both natural and hatchery production... If the rivers were viewed as fish farms to produce recreation/enjoyment for the people and sustainable food for the land and animals we would have no problems and no need to regulate the resource...


open the hatcheries again,, pump up production with mostly wild brood stock... allow private hatcheries and fish farms both small and large scale.. Like Carcassman said make the goal 10x increase in spawner escapement regardless of origin...

No limits,, no seasons,, no regulation and no commercial fishing as an issue of national security...

Abundant food available for the people for self harvest should be the highest priority...

The goal should be that the entire region smells like rotten salmon from September through January.... Until it does we do not have enough fish...

the people must become nose blind to the smell of rotten salmon...

if we have learned nothing else over the past 40 years its that judges are out of control and it was not the intent of the founding fathers for Judges and courts to establish policy via case law... Judges have phucked us and forced us onto this path of fraud and manufactured scarcity instead of common sense...

Tug, I'm surprised that you're giving accolades to RichG. Good ole Rich, always confident, nearly always wrong.

I have had a question about NOF for a few years now. I would ask WDFW, but I'm pretty sure they wouldn't spend the time to run the numbers. I heard a few years ago that from mid-December to mid-April, about 40% of the work in the fish management program is devoted to NOF. That's a lot of resources, which is a lot of tax dollars. My question is: How different would our NT recreational salmon seasons look if WDFW didn't participate at all in NOF? We know the treaty tribes would still attend. And they pretty much call the shots for WA treaty and NT fishing. So how different would fishing be for you and me?

BTW, WDFW science hasn't failed. By my observation, WDFW science has continued to improve. Management has failed. Management has failed taxpayers and license buyers.

We may think we "need" strong healthy hatchery fish. Actually WDFW's hatchery fish are healthy for the most part. Hatchery fish health has improved greatly over the decades. What we don't have is the higher smolt to adult survival rates that were enjoyed when the ocean environment was a friendlier place for them.

You're wrong about wild fish. Although wild fish are missing from a lot of places, they still occur in enough rivers that they should be managed for their continued existence. Why? To preserve options for us and for future generations of managers, who I hope are wiser than the current ones. We still have native wild Chinook in the Snohomish, Skagit, and Nooksack River basins and most of the coastal OP rivers. We still have native wild coho in the Stillaguamish and Skagit River basins. And we still have native wild chum and pink salmon in most of the rivers where they have always occurred. And we have native wild steelhead in most Puget Sound and coastal rivers, even if that was mostly by happy accident.

I'd rather not have hatchery fish spawning with wild fish. For one thing, we don't need to. And for another reason, we know that hatchery fish breeding with wild fish leads to reduced productivity of the wild fish. The science is generally conclusive on this. I don't know why some people choose not to believe it, unless it's because they refuse to believe anything that doesn't fit their chosen narrative. (That would be called stupidity, BTW.)

Regarding your example of the Skokomish River, yes it has miles of spawning water, but it is not prime. Through political dealing, the Simpson Timber Co. was able for 50 years to clear cut that watershed like it was their private property. And they did. And that devastated the S. Fork for spawning and rearing. (You may know that the Skokomish is the most frequent flooding river in WA state.) WDFW responded with George Adams hatchery and managed all of Hood Canal for hatchery Chinook, coho, and chum salmon, wiping out whatever wild fish of those species remained.

Since just before and since the Cushman hydro relicensing around 2009 or so, WDFW, NMFS, USFWS, and tribes have been working to restore (and recover under ESA) natural production of salmon and steelhead to various streams in HC watersheds. The Skokomish Tribe wanted to restore spring Chinook and sockeye to the NF Skok and steelhead to both forks, I think. I retired almost 10 years ago and dropped the ball on following up when Covid hit. I keep meaning to check back in with my tribal and Tacoma Power contacts but keep procrastinating. The Tribe imported sockeye from Baker River and spring Chinook from the Skagit hatchery (Suiattle River stock origin). I don't know how those are working out. I don't know if fall Chinook recovery is feasible because the Tribe and WDFW want their cake and to eat it too. Meaning they want to retain the early timed segment of the fall Chinook run (Green River hatchery origin) while restoring the natural later timed wild fall Chinook run using the later returning individuals from the existing hatchery stock. Maybe it can work, but with the relentless harvest pressure in HC and in the river, I think it's a long shot.

Anyway, the Simpson contract ended a while back, and the SF Skokomish watershed has been recovering, but it will be a long while yet before it resembles "prime" salmon habitat. Fortunately it is becoming "OK" suitable habitat.

Anyway, just thought I'd help you out a bit regarding wild fish and the management intentions for the Skok.

Salmo G,

Thanks for a thoughtful response, however I disagree with much of your points. It sounds to me that you're espousing that we just keep doing what we've done for the last forty years. I suggest a near complete break from most of our failed salmon management, very similar to Rich G suggested. We need salmon on the spawning beds, with healthy hatchery fish. What I keep hearing from upper management at WDFW is similar to what the Biden administration kept telling us: "The border ii secure". We need bold changes. Honestly, I like catching hatchery salmon, and I would like to see an abundance of healthy salmon wild or not, spawning in good habitat just like it was in the '70's. I think the upper Skok is better habitat than a lot of others where we are protecting wild fish.

SG I agree with you but this, harvest has to be drastically reduced and commercial NT done away with tribal harvest reform. Exteme enviromental reform with the sound being target number one or nothing changes. You cannot say one million more folks in 20 years and think the results will be different.

As I believe that will not happen I think I got to go with Tug. Not the best solution but about the only one available.

Simply put first you gotta stop killing the creature from the ocean into the rivers and THAT IS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN WITH WDF&W AND NOAA!

The tribes see a fish is a fish is a fish, except when wild fish can be used to constrain land use or NT fishing. WDFW doesn't, I believe, really know what to do because of the political pressure from above to satisfy the Tribes and go to appreciative uses.

Like Rivrguy says, we have to really reduce fisheries, especially any all mixed stock fisheries, protect the food base, bring predators into balance, and restore habitat and water quality.

As if that isn't enough to consider we have to admit we have too damn many people here now and refuse to deal with that issue at all.

It won't be too many more decades and CA, AZ, and NV will tap the Columbia for water and they will have the political power to do it;.

Tug, disagreement is fine when it comes to opinions, but do we disagree on facts? This reminds me of how complex civil legal cases are laid out. Two lists are made: Facts in Agreement, and Facts in Dispute. Then the parties bring evidence supporting why their version of the facts in dispute is correct. Then the judge and his or her advisors get to wade through the evidence and decide what version of the facts in dispute is legally correct.

I don't want to write a book here, but I think there is a lot of evidence suggesting that WDFW's science has improved over time. That's consistent with the nature of science; it tests that which isn't understood to bring improved understanding to technical issues. Hatchery fish health has improved as a direct result of bringing knowledge gained through science to better methods, diets, and policies that increase fish survival in hatchery environments. Is there something to disagree with here?

You allege regarding wild fish that ". . . there really aren't any." Scientific evidence says that is wrong. First through electrophoresis and then with DNA for the last couple decades or so, we are able to identify the genetic make up of fish populations. And while a lot of native wild populations have disappeared, more than one might expect do continue to exist. They continue to exist because for whatever reasons, they weren't harvested to extinction - like many were - and because some of them spawned in places and at times that separated them from hatchery fish. What, specifically, supports your contention ". . . that there really aren't any?" I don't see how it can be scientific evidence. I've heard that there are people who are "science deniers," who don't believe in science, as if science needs to be believed in. Are you one of those?

Do you disagree with me about having hatchery fish spawn with wild fish? Again, evidence says that is not good for the wild fish. It may or may not affect the hatchery fish, but that is another story. I'm trying to understand what you disagree with.

You refer to "failed salmon management," and I agree that is a good description of management. Part of that problem, IMO, is the legislative requirement that WDFW promote and manage for commercial salmon fishing, and WDFW takes that to mean NT commercial salmon fishing. IMO, the legislative requirement or its interpretation needs to be changed. It is impossible to supply two commercial salmon fishing fleets (T & NT) with a significantly declining resource, but WDFW just keeps trucking along and at this rate will one day find that they have one salmon management biologist for each harvestable salmon. Crazy, ain't it?

Even 30 and more years ago, over half the salmon harvest in WA state consisted of Fraser River sockeye. That's right! Harvest of WA salmon had fallen so low that most of the in state catch consisted of Canadian salmon. That should have been a major wake up call. I think NT commercial salmon fishing should be ended. It is no longer a productive industry; it costs more in resource harm and management costs than it is worth to the state's economy. On average, the treaty fishery is large enough to harvest most surplus salmon, when there are any. And the number of "surplus" salmon is a legitimate topic for debate. More fish on the spawning grounds is environmentally beneficial.

I'm not going to argue about the quality of the upper Skokomish as salmon habitat. I think we both agree that we should allow fish to make whatever use of it that they can.

Rivrguy, I think we pretty much agree. While development pressure in the Puget Sound region will continue to be relentless, I think it is possible to retain quite a bit of the remaining productive capacity of many basin river systems. I look at the Skagit system over the last 30 to 40 years - we've lost a little, and we've gained a little, but I think overall it's capacity for salmonid productivity hasn't changed much. Look at the Nisqually, at the southern end. It's one of the most intact river systems in Puget Sound. It's major liability is that its salmon and steelhead have to run the longest predation gauntlet of any of the rivers, but its freshwater productivity is quite good.

We could give salmon a better chance by letting more of the wild fish survive to spawn. And WDFW is on the wrong side of that equation. Hence, you see me posting in your Chehalis River thread and others: "Defund WDFW." Truly, I do think we should have a fish and wildlife agency, but we should have an agency that is more responsive to the resource and to the constituents who fund the agency.

Somewhere in Briton they have a sardine ( or some fish ) that was harvested for several hundred years then collapsed so restrictions to rebuild. Did not happen because you can drive any living thing to the brink and then stop but the damage is done it does not recover. Good habitat is great but if you do not address what the root cause is, harvest for salmon, then it is window dressing. I think that is Tug's point. We have had the knowledge for some time for habitat and harvest.

Rule number one to stop exstintion of anything............ you have to stop killing it!!!

From observation and tribal hatchery operations here on the Green River, the wild spawned Chum and the hatchery plants seem to mingle and spawn quite nicely together, and the runs have grown and remain pretty strong.

Although this winter the HH dam’s huge water releases at the start of the flooding events likely pushed a lot of them into the weeds and fields until the water dropped.


Too bad the Wild Pinks took it in the shorts however. We’ll see how they fared in a couple years. Too bad They have no safe hatchery Creek to run up and hide from the deluge.


Now it looks like the stream based Steelhead brooder collection begins in earnest , with floats and boats starting to poke about. The late timed run has begun.

In looking at the impacts of hatchery fish genetics on wild fish I believe there is a continuom from least culture to most. Simply collecting eggs, incubating on surface water, and releasing the fry should have the least impact. Next step up is short term feeding. Beyond that is holding and feeding for a year or more. Another big impact is incubating and rearing on (generally) warmer ground and spring water.

So, the hatchery chum and pink should show the least impact while steelhead should show the most. Kinda like what we see...........

28 gage, are you saying the WDFW is doing a brood stock program for the green river fish (steelhead) ?
If so YES ! Need more of that where it can be done. Works in Oregon and elsewhere.

Salmo,
Thanks for the thoughtful reply. There is much of what you said that I agree with. I think that too much of salmon management is governed by values and not science. The value side says that we must do everything to conserve the wild fish. The science side says we can rebuild our fish runs so that we can fish more. The history of our salmon abundance is hidden from a lack of historical research. Many years ago Fisheries had a director named Milo Moore. It was said of him that if he found a mud puddle he would plant fish in it and WDF did that. I believe that this was a foundation, including ensuing years of evolution and survival of the fittest,that has formed the base for what we now call most of our wild fish. They are wild because they spawn in the wild and have adapted genetically to succeed in their specific habitat. I would really like to see a comprehensive list of streams that have hatchery salmon and wild salmon and their specific genetic differences.

The Green River did not have a pure strain of wild Chinook in it prior to ESA. Hatchery fish plants had been plentiful. I think the tribe planted too. There was a head-scratching meeting at WDF to wonder about how to define wild fish. It was decided that anything spawning upstream of a certain point (I believe it was Soos Creek if I remember right) was now considered wild. I was at the meeting (1986?) because salmon management wanted increased enforcement on the upper Green. Those were in the days when bios worked with enforcement.

Tug, I think the values at the Washington Department of Salmon are that there must be commercial salmon fishing at all costs, even to the detriment of the salmon resource.

I remember Milo Moore; quite a character. He hated fish biologists. His interest in fisheries science was limited to the science that supported his personal narrative for salmon hatcheries. It should be noted that Milo was a principal in Moore - Clark, the company that manufactured fish food and sold it to state, federal, and private fish hatcheries. To say that Milo has a conflict of interest would be putting it mildly. But this is a side story.

Hatchery coho and Chinook were planted extensively, especially coho. Just because the hatchery fish were stocked nearly any place reachable with a hatchery truck doesn't mean that hatchery genetics mingled with the local wild stock. The reason is natural selection. In those habitats where the genetics of the hatchery fish were not well suited, they survived poorly or not at all. Consequently and not surprisingly, the genetic material of the wild stock dominated and persisted, even in the face of stocking hatchery fish. Most of this type of stocking was with coho fry that had been fed at the hatchery for only a couple weeks. So the exposure of those coho fry to hatchery culture was mostly artificial spawning and egg incubation.

I like to call coho the "plastic, elastic salmonid" because they are quite adaptable. The usual reason for low survival of these hatchery plants was because too many fry were stocked in too small a place for them to disperse well. Ten or 20 thousand fry can't all live in one small pool in a creek. The second reason is that wild coho fry already lived there, and the wild fish could out compete the hatchery fish. Nonetheless, many of those hatchery coho fry did survive and contribute to the "natural" outmigrating smolt population the following spring. This method was practiced at many hatcheries and was particularly intense in the Chehalis River basin where it was moderately successful. In those cases, there is no genetic difference between the wild and hatchery coho. In others, like parts of the Skagit basin - up the Suiattle drainage, where many coho smolt at age 2 instead of age 1 - the hatchery coho didn't survive and are not present in the wild coho genetic profile.

Oh, and about how those hatchery genetics are tracked. The Green River hatchery at Soos Creek was the first state salmon hatchery in Puget Sound, dating to around 1905 if memory serves. (No, I wasn't there; I just read about it in Dept. literature.) Consequently, when WDF built another hatchery, rather than go to the hard work of collecting local broodstock and taking the time to develop a locally adapted hatchery strain of fish, they would just drive to Soos Creek and get a gunny sack of fertilized eyed eggs at the existing hatchery and take them back to their new hatchery. And that is why Green River Chinook, and GR coho to a similar extent, are the universal hatchery donor stock throughout Puget Sound and Hood Canal hatcheries.

All this is to say that, while we don't have a comprehensive list of streams that have ever been stocked with hatchery fish, because record keeping was sloppy at times, we can identify where hatchery fish have been stocked - and survived - through DNA sampling and analysis.

For ESA purposes, after consulting with the state and tribes, NMFS defined wild salmonids at those fish whose parents spawned naturally in the natural environment, without regard to whether those parents were of natural or hatchery origin. Whether that's a good definition or not can be argued until the cows come home, but for now it is the legal standard defining wild fish. Not native fish, but wild (naturally produced) fish.

Regarding when bios worked with enforcement, prior to WDF and WDG (WDW) merger in 1995, many of the WDG biologists were both science and enforcement. A lot of them were card (and gun) carrying LEs. So yeah, I guess they worked together. At WDF they were always segregated. Just agency cultural differences I guess. That and WDG wasn't as well funded (no general fund money), so having a biologist who could do fish sampling one day and hunter success checking and enforcement the next day was an advantage.

Skyrise,

Yes, IMO Green R. broodstocking has been the go to / pointy end of the adjustable run timing stick used to slide winter run Steelhead returns beyond the open fishing seasons of the recreational or the smaller tribal commercial seasons. Back in the 60’s , 70’s and very early 80’s, December and January were the big months generating large monthly winter returns and catch rates.

This was mostly hatchery based early timing. Wilds always started to show up in late January, then a few more in March, and April was shut down to all.

Now February, March, and April are the go to months for Green River Winter run Steelhead, even with good late run returns, not many get to play...