using the chehalis as an example.
kings were first planted in the chehalis in the 1890's and are still planted in the hump i believe. the nooch satsop hump all used to and still get coho. all chehalis basin rivers and some creeks have had steelhead planted in them at some time. so is there a true native salmon or steelhead or even cutthoat in the chehalis system?
most if not all river in the state have received plants of some kind sense the 1900's so is there true native fish?
just wondering. thanks

Chehalis spring chinook in the upper basin should more or less be original native stock as they separated temporally from the fal chinook. One of the last places where you can say that about springers. Lots of streams above barriers in the upper Chehalis basin and all over W WA also support cutthroat populations that have never been compromised. So there are a few places left out there, but not many. I can remember when the Clearwater (Queets) received the first steelhead hatchery plants. And Forks Creek on the Willapa more recently. Prior to that they were managed for wild steelhead production, but may have seen a few strays.

I guess it depends on your definition of native. After 100 years of hatchery plants I would guess very few or any of the “native” fish don’t have some hatchery genes in them. However, with that being said, since hatchery fish have been proven to have a much lower spawning success than wild fish it would seem that it would only take a few generations to successfully breed out most of the negative hatchery traits thereby returning you to a fish that is genetically adapted to its specific stream and could therefore be called native.

BINGO!

That's how all native strains of salmonids were created over the eons..... by re-colonizing and reclaiming habitats lost and gained with the advance and retreat of glaciers, wiped out by volcanic lahars, or rearranged by massive shifts in the land mass.

When that critter is subjected to the full adversity of relentless selection pressures... and made to survive all manner of natural perils... at every life stage of its natural history.... from gravel to gravel.... it is a WILD fish through and through. Its progeny, genetically perpetuated over several generations become defacto native fish to that basin.

In reality, wild salmon are like parasites that you just can't get rid of.... they simply keep coming back to reclaim any suitable spawning/rearing habitat available to them. It's what they have done for millennia. They just require free passage from the riverine nursery to the ocean pasture and a way back to the spawning grounds as adults.

Oh yeah, it helps when we don't kill them off along the way.

As a VERY wise man once said, "If you don't kill them, they WILL spawn!"

I've caught what I believe to be true native coastal cutts up high in the upper Chehalis system. I'm not sure if they've ever planted cutts in the Chehalis system. Does anyone know for sure?
Here is a pic of a fish I caught earlier this year. I don't see any inbreeding with steelhead or rainbows in this fish. Due to the coloration, this cutt looks like it has spent its entire life in the river rather then migrating to the salt. I'm no biologist, just my opinion.

Larry,

Despite the many actions that would seem to have eliminated native wild fish species throughout the state, many have persisted. It's a happy accident.

In the case of the Chehalis it would seem that all or nearly all fall chinook and coho are now a mix of fish due to relentless hatchery stocking, mostly from within the Chehalis basin, but also out of basin stocks.

Sg

Sooo, Doc. It almost sounds like you are one of them evolution flakes.

Jesus handpicks which survive.

There were a LOt of cutthroat planted in the Chehalis basin for many years. ast I heard they were still trying to find a truly genetic native fish run in the CRB. Comparing original gentics and the things they do.

There are established runs of cuts in a ot of rivers now and could very well be the survival of the fittest from hatchery plants. I don't kow of any cutthroat planintg that happens in the system now.

In the case of normal timed coho it is a mix of East Fork Satsop and the natural stock trib by trib as fry plants in the many millions from Bingham supported the system. Chinook mixed bag as EFS stock went to the old upper Chehalis Hatchery / Hump to EFS, things moved around. Spring Chinook have had ZERO impact from supplementation. Chum, heaven knows as many eggs came in off the books / out of the watershed. As you purest are screaming one should remember this was in response to massive over harvest that brought on trying to reestablish the stock. Searun Cutthroat were planted all over but nothing like the Coho supplementation. Even the late Coho have been maintained with hatchery stocks.

So about the only true natural spawner is the Spring Chinook. The difference between the Chehalis and other systems is that the hatchery stocks were HSRG before it even was thought of. To much to go go into but through a series of mistakes and local visionaries drive, Chehalis hatchery and wild genetics are the same. Even the EFS stock was as much natural spawning as hatchery all about a short weir and high water.

Just because fish were planted, just because they spawned, does not mean that they have been successful at introgressing into the native stock. Chambers Creek steelhead is a good example. In many rivers they are simply not successful at surviving. They may compete as fry, which is not good, but they eventually die.

The habitat and environment are not the same now as it was 200 years ago. A "True Native" might not be able to survive, now. What I would like to see is systems with purely wild fish; let what can survive make up the run.