So I went through all that wonderful thread, only to have it end with this posting ?

Well as an old Leopoldian , it’s like having someone jamming a stick in my other eye. First eye went with the Steelhead in Washington...

You won’t catch me again.

I am most of the way through Williams and Lichatowich's new book Managed Extinction. While it kinda centers on the Columbia they do venture up to at least Northen BC and down the Oregon Coast documenting how we consciously destroyed our anadromous fish stocks. Sobering reading. Among other things they talk a lot about shifting baselines and how we have cumulatively forgotten what we've lost.

I imagine you have heard this quote before.... " A curious thing happens when fish stocks decline: People who aren't aware of the old levels accept the new ones as normal. Over generations, societies adjust their expectations downward to match prevailing conditions" Kennedy Warne, Nat. Geo. April 2007.

I was lucky in my management days that I was associated with Fraser Sockeye. One of the perks was that the end of season meeting was held on one of the primary spawning grounds for that year's return. Among other things, we got to helicopter over the spawning grounds. Seeing millions of fish one the grounds doing their thing was impressive. It so happened that one of those years (mid-80s) we had a super bonanza of pinks. I was able to take my staff up in the WDF plane and look at the Skagit, especially, to see the million or more pinks. I wanted staff to see what real escapements looked like.

Even earlier, the small creek I worked on a lot hosted about 4,000 chum in a mile and a half of crik. The plowed the whole thing up. That was actually where the idea that lots of spawners benefit the ecosystem was born. We were sampling the stream regularly and the steelhead and coho in amongst the spawners were plugged with eggs and carcass remnants.

Pokin the behind side with your left hand during the pic really makes that wide body chrome pop! Nice fish from 2012.