i couldn't find the whole study but here is a synopsis..

"Catch and release has become a major management tool to deal with low productivity streams and the cumulative effect on such waters for competing habitat uses, heavy sport fishing pressure and/or high exploitation by commercial and Indian food fisheries. Among the 336 steelhead angled and released at the Keogh River from 1985 and 1986, mortality was 5.1%. The survival through spawning of angled and release Keogh River steelhead was similar to that of steelhead which were captured at the fish fence 400 m upstream from the ocean. The number of steelhead caught immediately downstream from the fence, tagged, released immediately upstream, and later trapped as emigrating post-spawners represented 27.5% of the available population. This was only 5.4% lower than the recovery rate for fish which were not angled. Comparison of the degree of hooking injury with mortality rates revealed, not unexpectedly, that mortality was highest among fish that sustained severe blood loss when the hook pierced or tore a major blood vessel. However, 47% of the most seriously injured fish recovered, and were released in what appeared to be a healthy condition. These results refute claims that caught and released steelhead were effectively lost from the population."

my notes...
so fish that are caught and released nearly always survive the experience unless there is major blood loss.. nearly half of even fish with major blood loss survive.. so.. most of the fish that are caught and released that die die from excessive blood loss.. Of the hundreds of steelhead that I have seen caught and released there was exactly 1 fish that had any blood loss at all let alone major blood loss.. if nearly half the fish with major injuries survive how many with no injury survive??

Here is the truth guys nearly every steelhed caught and released in catch and release fisheries does not suffer blood loss.. so very few of them die.. Of the very few that are injured half survive... that leaves very few fish that die from catch and release fisheries.
Wild steelhead almost never die as the result of being caught and released any way you slice it...

arguments against catch and release fisheries are totally bogus in my opinion and in most cases based less on science of knowledge than on bitterness and anger caused by feeling excluded from a fishery because the person feels he must kill what he catches..
Catch and release allows sport fishing to continue at no threat to the fish population even in areas where steelhead runs are depressed.... you may not like it but thats the truth..

Amen, brother, amen!

Nice post Rob, complete with real facts and data to back it up. Much more effective without the emotion that seems to just inflame the other camp.

I'm sure good handling had a lot to do with these impeccable survival stats as well. Just shows you what can be achieved with WSR and "Sparkey's Law" I'm convinced mortality will be negigible as long as fish are handled with care.

It is like hunters saying we don't "kill" the animals. We "harvest" them for food. "There is a big difference". Well, not to the animal

The bottom line is that we are having fun at the fish expense. I am not saying we shouldn't fish or hunt but lets get down off our high horse

"impeccable stats"??.....really? Personally, I'd like to know more.....like was this a study to "prove" that C&R works? If so, I suspect that many special considerations were employed. Perhaps, barbless, baitless, netless, gloveless, etc???

Does it seem like an oddly high post-spawn survival rate...even for fish who are never caught? From what I've seen posted here previously, it is.

Does the implication that all the fish caught were tracked, hence the precise percentage seem reasonable? ..... hmmmmm, just how does one accomplish that?

I'm an advocate of C&R, and a believer that it promotes healthier runs, but I'm skeptical concerning the accuracy of this data.

http://www.fish.bc.ca/html/fish2199.htm
http://www.fisheries.org/cars/l_show4.htm
http://members.shaw.ca/adsaclub/fishing%20study.htm

Some good reading here

F5A

The study was conducted by the BC Ministry of the Environment Lands and Parks and it was specific to hooking mortality. In 1985 and 1986 they studied hooking mortality using barbed hooks with bait, barbed no bait, barbless hooks with bait, and barbless no bait. The total number of fish caught, released, and tracked was 336; of these 17 died or 5.1 percent. Use of natural bait produced higher mortality (5.6%) than artificials (3.8%). Mortality was higher with barbed hooks (7.3%) than for barbless hooks (2.9%) regardless of whether bait or artifical lure was employed.

In addition, the study also listed results from collecting steelhead for the BC brood stock program. BC collects their brood stock by hook and line and takes them to collection facilities for spawning. From 1981 to 1987, a total of 4,051 fish were caught on 11 different BC streams and 177 died for a hooking mortality of 3.6%.

As to your comment regarding the high post-spawn survival, you're probably correct in comparison to many WA streams. The Keogh River is a small coastal stream only a few miles in length. This may contribute to higher post-spawn survival. The streams small size makes it particularly useful for research. The Ministry has a weir across then entire stream at about river mile 0.5 and counts every fish that enters the stream and every fish that exits. The study conducted in 85 and 86 were not estimates or calculated results, but actual counts of survival/mortality.

A few other remarks:

The study was conducted by fisheries biologists who were likely more adept at handling fish, so were likely easier on the fish than a lot of sporties (although they also tagged the fish before release, which sporties don't do!). They were using standard steelhead gear, so I imagine they were playing fish sufficiently so that they could be handled and tagged (particularly since half the fish were caught barbless), but not until exhaustion. I would say most sporties do this. They were catching the fish very low in the stream, so energy and fat content were probably pretty high; this probably differs from where many sporties catch their fish and may cause different levels of hooking mortality. Its also worth pointing out though, that super newby fish caught very low or those that race upstream lose their scales very easily, making them more vulnerable to handling stress, much more so than a fish thats been in freshwater even a couple of days.

Given potential differences between bios and sporties catching fish and where fish are caught in basins, the hooking mortalities experienced in the BC studies could be viewed as conservative, but the data are as hard as they come. Which is why most biologists assume a hooking mortality for winter steelhead of 10 percent or less. This seems pretty reasonable.

Ive heard Peta say the same thing.. I think some agendas are not what is good/bad for the fish, it what they want to see. As soon as we start treating fish like they have the same emotions/feelings as people, its over....the way I see it, if the steelhead has the same feelings as me he gets just as much a thrill jumping up and spitting my hook back at me....

Yeah....now THAT'S a report I can believe!! Thanks, Obsessed! Great Job and good news to boot!!

Jerry G. I enjoyed your links. I thought it was cool how they can "fertilize" the river and get the rapid growth of the youngsters that increases their survival rate. Now we need another non-treaty net ban and we might have a few more fish.

DJ,
I am a PETA member but if my wife read this, she would wonder where the stuff in the freezer came from

Seriously it didn't come out right. I wanted to say that some try to justify fishing by saying we let them go and it won't hurt them so it (fishing) is ok. Dangerous stance! you don't want to go there.

Good Point Smalma, it does make you think:

336 fish over two years for two guys--thats 84 fish per guy per season. Multiply by 30 fishermen total for 2,520 C&Red fish (30 damn fine fishermen!) Given 5.1% lost to hooking mortality, you end up with a loss of about 130 fish. This makes it clear that C&R is not a no impact use of the resource. But it's not likely that C&R fishing effort would get this high because as you said, the total escapement for the river is around 1,100; every fish would not only have to be landed but would have to be C&Red more than twice, which is not very likely (unless those were some real aggressive fish). Come to think of it, wouldn't this likely provide a reasonable buffer against overfishing in any C&R situation?

In a C&K scenario, if each of the 30 guys could keep 5 wild fish per season, that would be a loss of an additional 150 fish (or 900 fish with a 30 fish limit). Even if regs stated you had to stop fishing after you bonked your limit, there would still be a larger loss, compared to C&R, only now with substantially less fishing opportunity.

That's was a great report. I believe a few people should see this, expecially the people that believe that almost every fish released dies, I've always thought that that was BS. I've even had people on the river say that I should have kepted that fish because it will die when I did everything correctly and let the fish swim away on it's own. Now if we could just get everybody to release fish correctly. I can't stand watching people kick salmon back into streams. I always let a fish swim out of my cradled hands to make sure it is not hurt.

I'd like to know a little more about the conditions and time of year.. Perhaps it was mentioned but I didn't see it.

I know that I fish a small stream in SW WA that gets a great run of hatchery and wild summer steelhead. During this fishery when most fish come back (April-August) river temps rise as the season progresses. It's not uncommon in June-August to have river temps touching 60+ degrees. A friend of mine and myself are extreme egg/bait/lightline fisherman that catch and release 125-175 summerruns a season in this (creek)...

The river usually runs on average180-300 cfs and naturally with low water runs extremely clear. In all the years I've fished I can't remember a single time I've ever seen a dead summerrun in the river. One would think even if you had a 5% mortality ratio you'd have to see dead fish occasionally, but I honestly haven't... Of the 125-175 fish a year with bait many of them are hooked deep in the gills etc and with light line larger fish are played to some bit of exaustion. We have hundreds and hundreds of pictures of fish that we had taken out of the water for 30-45 seconds and I still have never seen a dead fish...

I also know that there aren't many predators along the river due to private property and many of houses. But if predators were a issue you'd still see remains of fish somewhere..

Perhaps someone could help explain these results...

Oh and I'm not a biologist but am a fish freak that's done nothing but study fish and lifecycles of them. I care a ton about our fisheries and so do all that I fish with.
Keith

Don't lecture stlhdr1 about some of the things he said (like 45 seconds out of the water) He may be doing a little trolling at the same time he's asking a good question.

Dead fish in a stream have a way of getting lost pretty quick. Often mortality due hooking or exhaustion injury is delayed with the fish being alive but swept downstream before it dies. It should be pointed out that the above hooking mortality study was for winter-run fish, which don't expend as much energy in the fight, relative to summer-runs and live in waters where temperatures are not a problem.

I'm not aware of any hooking mortality studies for summer-run steelhead, but studies on fall chinook and Atlantic salmon conducted during the late summer and into the fall suggest that higher temperatures increase hooking mortality. I would expect the same with summer-run steelhead as well. But on the other hand, the fish isn't throwing a bunch of its remaining energy into reproduction yet. As I recall, there was a temperature threshold in the lower 60s for the Atlantics, above which mortality increased significantly.

You're very likely causing some level of hooking mortality that is similar to, or higher than winter-run and probably temperature driven. Come late Aug./Sept, if temps in your stream climb well into the 60s, you should keep this in mind.

I think winter fish are much tougher than many folks think. I fished one day years ago with Carson Walker, who at the time was employed by B.C. fisheries to catch wild fish for their hatchery brood stock program. On the day we fished, we caught only one small buck. We landed him in an area far from any road access. Carson put the fish in a collapsible tube and towed it down river about a mile. He then tied the tube to a brush pile and we continued to fish. Later that day the fish was put in water filled backpack and hauled about 200 yards to a waiting truck, with a 300-gallon tank. The truck then drove about 50 miles with our fish, netted it and placed it in a hatchery holding area, where it remained for about 60 days until it was spawned. Carson told me their overall mortality was less than 3 %. Yes, they are top-notch anglers, but the fish often had to make long arduous journeys to the hatchery and then were held for many days. In addition, Carson used bait whenever he felt he had to, to get a fish when the fishing was tough. Winter steelhead are tough critters. I suspect actual C&R mortality on winter fish is well under 5 %.

Keith,

I think your observations and not seeing any dead fish in the river may be a testament to you and your friend's fish handling skill. Steelhead are hardy, within reason. You might pay a little closer attention to water temperature. I don't have enough information to be conclusive, but I think you're pretty safe up to 68 degrees F. Beyond that, I'm not certain. I've personally had some bad experience not being able to revive trout in 72 degree water, so I stopped fishing.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

Salmo-
I agree and that was a point that I was making it certainly is obvious that water temps carry a huge impact on all salmonids. I'm certain that with the higher water temps and lower oxygen levels that the statistics "should" be much higher than that of the conclusion they came to on the Kelogh sp? river...

We need to watch what we're doing or we won't have a fishery in the future....

ie. the Columbia typically runs 70-73 degrees in the fall (August-September).. It's one of the largest fisheries we have on the lower Columbia basin. We now cannot keep native fish in this system so you have a high catch and release ratio all the way down to the estuary. I know I put 2 days in last year and CandR'd nearly a dozen native silvers... It's hard to stomach the fact that someday down the road once the game department does some studies that it too will be a fishery that will likely be closed... Or perhaps the game department recognizes the issue and will just stick their nose up and look past it do to the revenue it creates...
Keith