Take a look at emergency rules. They have closed the Snoqualmie
and Stilly system for the winter. I did not see any post this so thought
I would pass it along

More fallout from the WFC/WDFW/NOAA steelhead fiasco.

WDFW confirms approx. 30 fish returning to Tokul hatchery this season (from the 2014 smolt breakout).

I guess I must be a little slow but from what I understand the reason stated that the stilly is closed is because there is a low return of hatchery steelhead expected to the hatchery from a run they don't want in the river and didn't plant for the last two seasons ? Really !
Is it just me or are those guys at WDFW eating way to many pot infused cookies?

Not sure what they expect . if you don't plant them but continue to net the crap out of them for a couple seasons that is going to be the result . could this whole thing boil down to the fact that the result of the WFC law suit that dosnt allow for planting of early run steelhead is that they are running out of fish and to avoid the tribes from suing the state over not getting their their half is to shut it down to sportfishers saving what ever is left for the tribes ?

There were, I believe, 2 years when the suits prevented stocking of smolts. Hence, all the stocking into lakes. It is rather difficult for adults to return when nothing is planted. With 2 years blanked out you can hope for older adults (3 salt) and hope to restart the program. It will take lots of 3-salts to finally rebuild the broodyears.

Sooner or later we'll all be buffalo hunters, basically.

Thing is, with those streams that allowed steelhead retention but nothing else, once the steelhead production is cut, then nobody has any business casting a line there, in order to protect the native species, or in this case, protect the hatchery species, which they otherwise want killed, but only one a day, what are you, you who release that wormy summer tube sock, some kind of anti-poacher-anti-environmentalist? And yeah kinda bummed the one day I had to swing a spoon in the Stilly this year was a bust, as river was blown. For that, I think, I purchased a steelhead license? Sheesh.

Frankly, us Stilly catch-and-releasers were booted off the river this Fall so that the tribal and cowboy catch-and-keepers could get their share. That we're now booted off the river because the state hopes to get returns from fish that weren't planted seems about on par with my dream that, once again, the Stilly will be open for fishing in the winter for hatchery steelhead.

Catch-n-release simply does not compute in the MSY equation. We're buffalo hunters, anymore.

My bad I guess . I was not aware that it was only for two years that they were not allowed to plant winter run fish .
From what I have read my understanding was that it applied until they figured out another source of eggs besides the chambers creek hatchery fish (which was the origin of most all the early fish ) and that the only reason that they ever started planting with the chambers creek fish was because of the timing of the return, which was earlier than most of the natives. Allowing an early sport season with out direct impacts to the bulk of the protected fish which return later in the season.
But then what do I know ? I'm just an upriver guy trying to figure out when or if its ever going to get any better . I live on and fish the Skagit but figure what ever applies to the Stilly this year is what's in my future soon.

what i don't understand is how WDFW knows they are in for low escapement year after year, and yet still write seasons in by default in the regs. then, they shut the rivers down when the fish should start showing up. they did this with the nisqually, citing that the return is forecast to be low.

kind of sleazy, if they knew this from the beginning, they should have never had seasons set. better to have an emergency opener than an emergency closure in my opinion. the more cynical side of me says they do this to keep people buying licenses every year(especially you poor saps that live in the north sound).

It is a lot easier to have an emergency closure in a case like this, and keep the season on the books, than it is to close it in the books, and have an emergency opener when the time is right.

In this case, even though everyone should know by now that there won't be an opener this winter there, they could have shared this as an emergency rule a month ago, or six months ago.

Fish on...

Todd

And ER is only good for 90 days. They could have warned folks six months ago (or 3 years ago after not releasing smolts) but that longer timeline is of a permanent (regular) reg.

Please tell us how many net days the tribes have had in recent years on the Stilly and Snohomish systems in recent years for steelhead.

WDFW also confirms 74,000 smolts planted in Tokul/Snoqualmie this year. So guess about 700 something expected to return next year.
74,000 is about half of what they historically plant annually (except for 0 plants last year and the 26,000 escapees in 2014).

Wonder if the plan is to placate WFC etc. by planting a severely reduced number which also serves as an attempt to throw a bone to sportfishers? However, this lesser release will result in a low return and thus a short season or early closure...and then the tribes can get an exclusive shot at all of what does return to appease them (?)