Tribe banking on grant money to save chinook run

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/344800_salmon25.html?source=rss

EVERETT -- Few of the Northwest's struggling salmon runs are as close to extinction as the chinook that spawn in the south fork of the Stillaguamish River.

With only 100 to 200 adult fish returning each year, some fish biologists say the population could die off at any time.

To make a last-ditch effort to save the run, local fish experts plan to tap into $4.5 million in salmon recovery money that Snohomish County recently won from the state..... Continued@URL

http://www.komotv.com/news/local/12804897.html

KOMO Seattle Mon, 24 Dec 2007 2:46 PM PST
The Stillaguamish Tribe plans to use about $634,000 to capture 15 to 20 male and female wild returning salmon each fall, collecting eggs and sperm then fertilizing them and letting them hatch and grow into fry at a tribal hatchery in Arlington.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004090775_websalmonsave24.html?syndication=rss

What is the cost to raise smolt in Wa ? Yes I know overhead $650,000.00 to get 50,000 smolt?

I'm not postive what our exact budget is (I'll find out), but I belive it costs us about $10K to do the same for the Snider project ... and the numbers are about the same for parent adults. That covers everything

Too little, too late?

$634,000, to capture a few of the returns and milk em. What a joke.

Everyone hates bureaucracy, but few will settle for less oversight than bureaucracy provides, and you can't have bureaucracy without the attendant overhead costs. Beyond that, conservation hatchery programs have much higher costs per pound of fish reared than straight production programs. The higher costs are due in large part because the cost efficiency of "economy of scale" are lost, plus the costs of obtaining and handling of broodstock are much higher, presuming you have to hire it done.

Sg

Those numbers aren't that surprising. I was pretty familiar with the Redfish Lake sockeye captive breeding program. 2 million per year to get back anywhere from 6 to 50 adults per year.


Thank you BPA, and the Army Corp of Engineers. Cheap electricity costs more than people realize. But that's a rant for another thread.

VHawk

Sad state of affairs to see this come to crisis status. Perhaps this is the only way things get managed in these times.

At least the tribal folks are attempting to do some good.

DFW Management should be held accountable for the lack of action on thier part. We, the public, entrust our public resources to Staff.
Yet, last year the announcement at the start of the US-Canada Treaty negotiations was to remain at current harvest levels.

If they are serious about it they could take a few hundred million from the casino profits they make and not do their restoration on the taxpayers dime.

Here are the numbers by river

http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20071224/NEWS01/838777999/1059/COMM0618

Very high cost.... and equivocal yield at best.

For this to be a true "conservation" hatchery project, it must yield at the very least 2 recruits for every broodstock fish taken from the wild just to break even. On the surface, most folks just asssume that's a slam dunk. Perhaps, perhaps not.

The real issue that must be considered is the reproductive fitness of those hatchery recruits when they come back as adults. There is nothing I have found in the literature specifically about the reproductive fitness of hatchery salmon derived from wild broodstock, but if the experience with hatchery steelhead is any indicator, then one would expect markedly diminished reproductive fitness in hatchery salmon when they are allowed to spawn naturally in the wild.

My personal belief is that these programs are good for one bolus of artificially-induced abundance for each batch of brood fish taken from the system. As long as you keep mining the depleted run for broodstock and "successfully" produce hatchery returns, everything looks great... but that's just on the surface. If the hatchery recruits turn out to be piss-poor spawners in terms of their reproductive fitness (i.e. will they or won't they eventually produce viable returning adults?), then there is no real mechanism for the population of natural spawners to increase, let alone maintain itself.

The whole "recovery" effort becomes dependent on the continued existence of the hatchery to artificially bolster the numbers of returning fish. It's got a real "feel-good" appeal, but that folks is NOT recovery. That's just dependence on another techno-fix that solves absolutely nothing in terms of genuine fish recovery. What history has shown is that it's a great way to create another useless bureacracy to bring lots of dollars to a privileged local economy at the expense of Joe Q Public.

The best analogy I can think of is DSHS which must continually dole out welfare checks. That's NOT a system promoting financial "recovery" for the poor. For far too many, it's simply a shot in the arm to get them to their next welfare check... and the next.. and the next! A truly successful welfare program should not be measured in terms of how many checks it passes out, but rather the number of recipients that eventually come off the "payroll."

In that sense, the true measure of success for a "conservation" hatchery is how quickly it can work itself out of a job... in other words, recovery happens when the hatchery is no longer needed.

Maybe I'm just getting too cynical in my old age. The future prospects for runs hanging on by a thread are NOT good. For the sake of the fish, I hope I'm wrong... but I doubt it.

Great Lakes sure have no problems with Salmon and Steelhead runs.

What Driftwood said.Good luck,
STRIKE ZONE

Can ANYONE cite an example where a "conservation" hatchery actually fulfilled its intended purpose? Where a depleted wild native run was restored to some semblance of historic abundance? OK I'll even settle for stabilizing a run to a point where it could sustain itself at current abundance?

I would be so much more encouraged to see even one example where it actually worked.

Any run?

Anywhere?

Anyone?

Amen brotha, amen...

I cant seem to understand that lack of self sufficiency by the tribes. If I ever saw anything publically that even so much as slightly promoted any sort of effort to improve anything in the way of the fisheries that are used to support netting habits, I might feel differently. Now I realize that there are things that media doesn't show or doesn't allow us to see, bla bla bla. But come on. Allowing a run of fish to dwindle to amounts of fifty to two hundred fish per year. If that is so important to your lively hood would there not have been something done along time ago to prevent the possiblity of losing that source of income. Here is a thought. Allow the tribes the one time cost of start up for the farming of "Wild Salmon" that are from the local popluations of fish. That way there is no harm caused by escapement, i.e. Atlantic Salmon. I may be ignorant to the facts that may exist in relation to the costs and possible risk vs. gain by doing something like that. But there has to be a way to fix this for good. Maybe through the education of our youth by funding that is being used to supplement the tribes "loss" of productivity from the netting of the rivers and bays.

Just so nobody thinks I am a completely negative hopeless fatalist on these issues, I do believe these depressed fish populations have a way out of their unfortunate lot, but the solution the salmon REALLY need takes far more discipline than our hyper-consumptive fast-paced me-first society has been willing to buck up.

It really boils down to two things...

1) stop fishing them so damned hard
2) give them access to high quality spawning and rearing habitat.

DONE!

These really are the only two requirements the fish need to bounce back. Everything else we have done in the name of "recovery" is a giant multi-billion dollar crock of $hit. Some of it has been pat-on-the-back "feel-good" kind of $hit, but still $hit nonetheless. Most of it has been the run of the mill "bull" type.

The resilience of these critters to bounce back after all manner of natural catastrophe over the millenia is difficult to fathom. They really are like weeds that over the centuries have proven themselves nearly impossible to eradicate... and yet in the span of 150 years, modern society has managed to do just that.

Damn... we suck!

Agreed fishingphysician,

I use this run of fish all the time as an example. But it really is a perfect example. The Johns Creek run of Chums has managed to be self sufficient despite what the DFW thought would happen. They suspected the run of fish would die out in a four five year time frame since they were going to stop stocking it with hatchery fish. What happened was the exact opposite. They actually thrived and were a pretty nice run. I dont know how it is now as I havent fished it in close to ten years. But I do know that it is still there. Fifteen or so years later. Amazing what can happen when you close the tributary for a harvesting. Provide the adequate rearing quarters. Which pretty much means just leave the damn creek alone. Protect the watershed and what do you know. A healthy run of fish. AMAZING!!!
These fish dont need any of our "expertise." What they need is for us to leave them alone for a while and keep the water that they need clean. That means no more clear cutting on 40 degree bank hillsides, no more dumping the crap that goes into the sewer in the rivers and oceans. No commercial harvesting. And sorry to say it, but closing some rivers and tributaries to ALL fishing for a while. Small price to pay for the future of our passions.

the SF of the Stilly has all the same problems the NF has. unstable soils.
the whole drainage is nothing but sand and clay deposits. throw in some bad logging practices, overfishing, floods, too many developments right on the river banks equals poor survival rates for all in river fish populations.
all the decent runs and holes, drifts --- you name it, are filled in on the lower Stilly. and all of the sediment has come from upriver, either the NF or SF. some say the Stilly was harder hit by sediment than the Toutle was from Mt St Helens.
just hope the habitat projects really do some good.
with the amount of damage done already i fear its gonna take alot more money.
will keep my fingers crossed.

Boy, that would be nice. I forgot how much taxes they have to pay out of their profits to the U.S. Government, does anyone know?

OK that's marginally encouraging... but you gotta remember that chum have little reliance on the riverine environment beyond adequate spawning gravel. They leave the stream almost immediately after becoming free-swimming fry. Since they spend so little time in-river, there are few instream selection pressures affecting the natural juveniles beyond surviving chance catastrophes during their incubation in the gravel. Virtually all the selection takes place in the marine phase of their life cycle.

This is one species where the artificial boost in egg-to-fry survival from being coddled in a hatchery actually makes sense.

In contrast, the genetic integrity and fitness of other salmonids which are held in the hatchery's holding ponds for a prolonged period of time prior to release (steelhead, coho, chinook, sockeye) will certainly suffer from the domestication effects of being raised in captivity.

Slabhunter,

WDFW isn’t the culpable party when it comes to the status of Stillaguamish Chinook. WDFW controls harvest, and harvests have been heavily restricted for 30 years. The only additional harvest reduction available would be to totally close the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Puget Sound to Chinook retention year around, and that wouldn’t save many Stilly Chinook, while precluding the harvest of many other hatchery Chinook. Chinook habitat in both the NF and SF Stilly has been trashed beyond usability, mainly from forest practices, and WDFW had zero influence on that during the time period when the damage occurred.

Driftwood,

Why should the Tribe spend its money on restoring the Chinook or the habitat when it wasn’t they who destroyed it? The habitat was legally trashed under both state and federal forest practices in effect at the time.

FNP,

The Stillaguamish Chinook may not be in a recovery mode; perhaps they are simply on life support. It’s too soon to know. What we do know is that without the wild Chinook broodstock program the Tribe has operated on the NF for about the past 25 years, the NF Chinook would very likely be gone by now. This program simply extends an existing practice to the SF Chinook. NF Chinook were returning less than one recruit per spawner when the Tribe began its wild broodstock program in the early 1980s and trending toward extinction. The hatchery offspring most likely are less successful in natural reproduction in the natural habitat. However, those spawners, even with their lower reproductive effectiveness, are more successful than not having any natural spawners at all. All anyone can do for now is to continue the broodstocking program until such time as enough natural habitat recovers so that some naturally spawning Chinook can consistently achieve a greater than one recruit per spawner. As far as I know, this program is the last stand between Stillaguamish Chinook salmon and extinction.

As Aunty mentioned, it appears that ESA listed Hood Canal summer chum have been recovered via short term hatchery intervention. The population initially declined due to a combination of habitat degradation and over-harvest, especially the latter. The short term hatchery programs have been discontinued. The Quillcene population seems to have recovered to the point of producing a harvestable surplus the past 3 or 4 seasons.

Your comments about what salmon really need in order to recover are exactly correct. The first has been in place for 30 years. The only meaningful harvest reduction left would be to totally close Chinook fishing off the coast of BC/Van. Is. and the Gulf of Alaska, and we know that ain’t happening. The second, well, I mentioned above that the habitat is trashed and will take years to recover. When it does, so will the Chinook, if there are any left.

Hatchery intervention probably has less effect on stock genetics than for Chinook, coho, or steelhead due to the limited freshwater rearing phase. The only way to know if it can be successful with these species is to try it. And the techniques for doing so are changing. The folks at Long Live the Kings in Hood Canal, working with people from WDFW and NMFS are re-writing the book as it were, on salmon and steelhead recovery using conservation hatchery techniques.

GBL,

The Great Lakes salmon and steelhead runs simply aren’t relevant to the Stillaguamish Chinook situation, but thanks for reminding us that salmon are abundant elsewhere.

PUG,

The lack of tribal self sufficiency is a complex subject worthy of its own thread. I could contribute some information, but I’m really not qualified to discuss it extensively.

Blue Water Pro,

Yes, the Stilly Chinook might be done. The fact is, we don’t know. What we do know is that if these measures are not undertaken, then the option of preserving them for future generations is definitely lost. Given that choice, I favor the Tribe’s program.

Aunty,

You could very well be right. Maybe that’s what some folks at the policy level think. I don’t know. They don’t share their inner thoughts with me. But I can tell you that many fish biologists with the tribes, state, and federal fish agencies are as committed as humanly possible to recovering salmon and steelhead populations, either with, or sometimes without, the agencies’ support.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

The Dungeness River has had some success in using a captive brood program to put Chinook back into the system. They started with eggs taken from redds with the fish raised in freshwater captivity for their entire life cycle. When ready to spawn, the eggs were taken and the fish were held to yearling status before release from the hatchery environment.

If I remember correctly, the run numbers were in double digits of spawning pairs when the project started. Now the returns are in the low hundreds of spawning pairs. Considering the parents of the releases never saw salt water, I'd suggest that there are some things that don't change the saltwater survival and return "desires" of the fish.

Supplemental egg take is occuring to provide a cushion against egg loss due to winter flooding.

Steve

Thanks for your feedback. If the unsupplemented run's production is hovering at less than replacement level due to the crappy habitat, the priority in restoration efforts should rest on habitat improvement. If what you say is true, it sounds to me that managers have instead opted yet again for a techno-fix during the past 25 years that the tribe's "life support" hatchery program has been in place. That is more than 4 complete chinook life cycles in the intensive care unit!

To expand on that medical analogy, yes, we can keep a patient on artificial life support for 25 years as well.... a ventilator to do the breathing, a pacemaker to keep the heart pumping, pressor drugs to maintain blood pressure, and a surgical feeding tube directly into the stomach to keep the patient nourished while his mouth is stuffed with techno-tubes. But if the underlying systemic cause for the patient's cardiopulmonary failure is not addressed, it's completely futile. Better to just pull the plug than to keep investing $10,000 a day on an effort that will NEVER make the patient better! If we did that for 25 years, that's 10,000 x 365 x 25 = $ 91.25 million dollars!

As far as the genetic and reproductive fitness issues are concerned, they are easily discounted when managers observe a short-term stabilization or rebound in abundance. They see fish coming back, so it's all good. As I think about it, the only way the hatchery makes up for the natural production deficit (recruit ratio less than 1) is by churning out more spawners to make up the difference. But as you'll see, that can be an unsustainable model.

Let me illustrate with an imaginary depleted run on the River Zip which has been trashed by logging. Everyone knows the habitat is crap, but let's pretend that no efforts are made to improve habitat and that habitat-limited production in the river is fixed, neither increasing nor decreasing.

In round numbers, let's say the depleted run has a 500 fish baseline and the $hitty habitat limits productivity to a recruit ratio of 0.8 (4 returning adults for every 5 spawners). That means if we do nothing, the return on those 500 spawners would be 400 recruits. Now let's put a broodstock program in place that takes 50 pairs of fish to artifically boost production. Let's say this hatchery is so good that it's recruit ratio is 2 (two and a half times better than natural).... meaning for every spawner they mine from the wild run, they get two back!

In the first year of operation, the hatchery would take 100 fish and 400 would spawn naturally. The hatchery would bring back 200 fish and natural production would bring back 320 for a total of 520 fish... a marginal gain of 20 fish or 4%. At that fixed rate of "recovery" it would take 18 years to double the run to 1000 fish.

But wait.... you can't assume the overall production will remain constant because as more and more hatchery fish are allowed to spawn naturally, the productivity from natural spawning starts to fall off due to diminished reproductive fitness. In the steelhead studies at Hood River, reproductive fitness is reduced by 15% in the first generation alone! In other words hatchery fish that are one generation removed from their wild brethren are only 85% as productive. So in our little fairy tail, where wild production in the $hitty habitat is only 0.8, the expected "natural" production from the returning hatchery fish would be only 0.68 (0.8 x 0.85).

Now let's go back and apply that misfit decrement in production to the hatchery fish in our hypothetical example. 200 of the 520 recruits arising from the original brood year were hatchery-produced, 320 were naturally produced. If all of them were allowed to spawn, they would bring back (200 x 0.68) plus (320 x 0.8) = 512 fish. In other words, in the second generation the marginal gain in productivity will be only 12 fish or 2.4% more than the baseline population of 500.

But since our hatchery is going to operate for more than just one generation, we need to cull out another 50 pair of wild fish for broodstock. So in that next generation, total production would be as follows:

(and yes Curt and Steve, I realize that I'm simplifying here because the fish actually come back in staggered age classes which makes the real analysis much more complicated, but regardless this exercise is still instructive)

the 100 wild broodstock fish brought into the hatchery would bring back 200, the 200 hatchery fish spawning on the gravel would bring back 136, and
the remaining 220 wild natural spawners would bring back 176.

Total production from that second generation would be 512 fish... in other words the fish just replace themselves.

Run the same analysis in the third generation and you get 200 fish from hatchery production, 136 fish from hatchery spawners, and 170 fish from wild spawners.... for a total of 506 fish.... a net loss of 6 fish or 1.2%.

Run the same analysis for the fourth generation and you get 200 fish from hatchery production, 136 fish from hatchery spawners, and 165 fish from wild spawners... for a total of 501 fish, a net loss of 5 fish or 1.0%.

Run the same analysis in the fifth generation and you get 200 fish from hatchery production, 136 from hatchery spawners, and 161 fish from wild spawners.... for a total of 497 fish, a net loss of 4 fish or 0.8%.

In that fifth generation all the gains from hatchery supplementation have been erased, and even with the wild broodstock hatchery program in place, the entire population is technically no longer self-sustaining. However as you can see in this example, the marginal loss with each generation does diminish, and so by the 10th generation, the losses are down to just one fish per generation at a population of about 485 fish. From there, it's just a downhill slide, albeit at glacial speed, toward extinction where every last fish counts, even the ones that are "inconsequentially" harvested in our non-selective fisheries.

I guess that's better than a baseline 20% loss per generation. If we do nothing in this example the population shrinks down to about 50-60 fish after the 10th generation. Clearly, both strategies lead to extinction... one is just so much slower and more painful to watch. The only way out of that death spiral is an increase in natural productivity. As has been said repeatedly by Lichatowich and others, you just can't have "salmon without rivers". In the end game, it's all about productive habitat... DUH!.... now there's a revelation!

As Steve said, he'd rather see the "conservation" hatchery in place while we grapple with the habitat issues.... last ditch artificial life support for our dying patient until we are willing to address what's really killing him. But let's be honest about it... the hatchery isn't "conserving" jack$hit. It's only delaying the inevitable until genuine conservation.... namely habitat restoration in this example.... can bring some semblance of natural productivity back to the system.

OK... I made an error there. That second generation of hatchery production does NOT break even. That second run thru the hatchery actually results in a net loss 8 fish or 1.5 % of the 520 fish it started with.

For clarity, my hypothetical scenario actually shows how the "conservation" hatchery is no longer self-sustaining as early as the second generation of fish.

Nice summary blue water.

FNP, while I see your point about the numbers of fish, I think that something more to the point is in order. You get there, but in a mapquest kind of way. Someone that is going to hear that argument and have the power to do something about it is probably going to have about as much knowledge about salmon as a nun does about the latest hip hop artist. Maybe a more simple approach like the fish tank for example. The fish can only grow so much based on the size of the tank. And if you dont clean the tank then it gets dirty, if it gets dirty then fish cant survive. If fish cant survive then we lose our population.
Maybe something like that. Kind of being a smartass there but I couldnt pass it up, sorry.

FNP,

I agree that it's only a conservation hatchery if it actually conserves the fish. Given the experience the Stilly Tribe has had with the NF chinook over the years, I'm inclined to think that the Hood River steelhead reproductive effectiveness values don't apply to summer chinook like these. If they did, the run sizes they have achieved would not have occurred, although I can't verify that without the data.

Maybe it would be kinder to just pull the plug. The Stilly most likely will never recover to be premium chinook habitat. However, I think it can recover to the point that it can sustain a chinook run. Considering that, I'm unwilling to tell those folks that they shouldn't try to conserve the population.

BTW, those costs are atypical, and I wouldn't expect that $/fish to be operable over the life of the project. Obviously, the Tribe has been doing it the last 20+ years for a lot less. The project was started on a shoestring by some biologists with a strong "can do" attitude.

Sg

I re-ran that same analysis giving the hatchery the benefit of the doubt that it could achieve a consistent recruit ratio of 3:1.... nearly four times that of natural production. (BTW, even my beloved Kenai River with intact habitat and chinook escapements harvested down to MSY is incapable of that consistent level of production.)

Again the other parameters remained the same... 500 fish baseline population, 100 wild brood fish taken for the hatchery, recruit ratio for wild spawners = 0.8, and recruit ratio for hatchery spawners = 0.68.

The boost the hatchery provides in the first generation is an impressive 24% bumping the return to 620 fish. However, the reduced fitness of hatchery spawners quickly erodes those gains in subsequent generations. The second generation gains are whittled down to just under 10% at a return of 680 fish, and by the fifth generation those gains are down to only 4% with a return of 797 fish.

After 10 generations, returns to our mythical river have only bumped up to 880 fish, and the hatchery's boost to total production has diminished to only 1%.

After 20 generations it more or less reaches a steady state at a return of 915 fish with a marginal gain of 0.1%, or about one fish per generation.

Not much of a gain after 20 generations... and at what cost?

And even if the hatchery were to quit while it was still reasonably ahead... at say, the fifth generation... the production from those 797 fish returning in the next generation would only be 577 fish. That's because the 100 wild fish that are no longer taken for broodstock would only produce 80 natural recruits instead of 300 hatchery recruits.

So even with the benefit of a remarkable recruit ratio of 3:1, running this hypothetical conservation hatchery for a time-limit of five generations would only yield 77 additional fish to the return after the hatchery ceases operations.

That's the nuts and bolts of it folks.

Again it will be up to managers to decide whether that type of investment is really worth it. For me it really all depends.

Getting back to my medical analogy with the critically ill cardiac patient in the ICU. Let's say what he really needs for a cure is a heart transplant. Spending $10,000 bucks a day on extraordinary life support to keep him on the ventilator, pacemaker, pressor drugs, and tube feedings would be reasonable.... but only if you were certain a donor heart was soon on its way.

Pretty pointless if it's not.

Without sounding like a skeptic of your numbers theories and hypothesis, where do all the numbers for the analysis come from? More specifically in regards to the amount of return per spawning fish. All the numbers and what not are a mind boggling brain teaser for a simpleton such as myself. I only ask because I am totally unaware of the source for the information that is provided to form the theory. Being an optimist about the salmon and their recovery has made me want to be skeptical of the grim story your telling.

I may have missed this somewhere in the middle of trying to sort out what you were saying and break it down to my level of understanding. But is there any sort of compensation for the fact that after the first generation of returns come back that the next one is actually a native stock. Thus bringing the number of return per spawn fish up slightly to the .8 from the .68. This may be a mute point since all the numbers are less than 1 which is bad, I am just curious.

Being cautiously optimistic about the whole thing I think that given the oppurtunity to be left alone and not harvested for a while that these, and any other run of fish, could and would make recovery. These fish have a survival tool that has helped them go on as long as they have, and I dont think that they have lost it in the midst of all the hatchery spawning. It may take a little bit but I think they can do it. That is unless their number is just up and we are doing all this in vain. I certainly hope not.

FNP,

I greatly admire your energy to run the calcs. Two other variables that should be included come to mind, and there are no doubt others. First, although the returning hatchery fish that spawn in the wild have reduced fitness, each subsequent generation from them that remains in the natural environment improves in fitness. At least that is the present theory. And it's probably true, given that natural runs have resulted from hatchery stocks in the past, fortunately before we knew so much about their reduced fitness (t.i.c.). Second, with each passing generation of chinook, the habitat suitability improves slightly in productivity. It's not a specific steady trend line, as backsliding occurs, only to be followed by several years of higher quality conditions, etc. We have seen this on Deer Ck, the NF Stilly tributary that hosts the native summer steelhead. But for this habitat phenomenon, native Stilly summer runs might be a thing of the past as well.

Francis, your analysis could well be the most accurate portrayal of the final outcome. However, pulling the plug eliminates future options. The "conservation" program preserves options, even if only for a while. Given that choice, what would you do? If these chinook were your "family" for instance?

Sg

All of the numbers I made up for the River Zip were hypothetical, but were meant to be representative of an ailing chinook run much like the one being discussed in this thread.

I chose 500 fish because that sounds pretty depressed, but yet still enough of a critical mass that some potential recovery is still possible. Reasonable?

I chose a recruit ratio of 0.8 for wild spawning because we are talking about habitat that is so unproductive that it does not even allow what few returning spawners left to even replace themselves in the next generation. That means a number less than one. I did not want to choose a number less than 0.5 or else folks would accuse me of being far too pessimistic. Halfway between 0.5 and 1.0 is 0.75, but I wanted to be just a wee bit more optimistic than middle of the road, so I chose 0.8. Still reasonable?

I gave the rationale for the recruit ratio of 0.68 for hatchery-born spawners... they spawn with less success than wild-born fish. The Hood River project shows that naturally spawning (one-generation-from-wild) hatchery steelhead show only 85% of the reproductive fitness as their wild-born siblings. No data like that is available for salmon, but it seemed reasonable to apply that same percentage of reduced productivity... 0.85 x 0.8 = 0.68. Are you still with me?

I chose 100 fish (50 pairs) for the hatchery broodstock because that's sort of a minimum critical mass to make a hatchery project worthwhile... it would yield about 175,000 eggs (3500 per female). Moreover, I did not think it wise to risk more than 20% of the available wild run to a potential hatchery SNAFU. Sound reasonable?

I assigned the hatchery project a recruit ratio of 2:1 in the first scenario, and then for kicks, a ratio of 3:1 in the second scenario. I thought I was being pretty damned generous. To give you an idea of chinook recruit ratios in a healthy drainage with near-pristine habitat and no directed commercial harvest, recruit ratios for Alaska's early run Kenai kings have ranged from 0.53 to 3.89. For the past 21 years, escapements have averaged 11.4K while returns have averaged 15.9K.... that's a recruit ratio of 1.39.

I gave the returning progeny of hatchery-born parents the benefit of the doubt by assigning them with reproductive fitness equal to wild. In essence, I conveniently erased any negative hatchery-induced effects in the second generation. The recruit ratio of 0.68 was applied only to the fresh crop of hatchery-raised spawners... 200 fish each generation in the first scenario and 300 fish each in the second scenario. All of the naturally-produced spawners were assigned a recruit ratio of 0.8 even though a significant number of them had hatchery-raised parents. Still with me?

So in each of the scenarios I painted, the return from each generation was the total of three components:

1) Hatchery production resulting from 100 wild brood fish. The hatchery production was always constant, either 200 or 300.

2) Production from hatchery-born spawners. This was also constant, either 136 (200 x 0.68) or 204 (300 x 0.68).

3) Production from wild-born spawners. This figure would change with each generation depending on the number of naturally-produced spawners available.

In the first scenario, the combined production from all three components promptly resulted in a net loss that got progressively smaller with each passing generation until hitting a near-steady state at a total return of 485 fish after 10 generations. At that point the run was effectively losing a fish per generation.

In the second scenario, the result was a net gain that got progressively smaller with each passing generation until hitting a near-steady state at a total return of 915 fish in the 20th generation. At that point the run was only gaining one fish per generation.

And yet, one gill net will screw up the worth of the calculation above for generations.

It does make sense to me, more so now than ever. I hope that I am not coming across as an azzhole when I keep asking you for the numbers and what not. Just trying to get an understanding of the situation. I know that sometimes I lack the tact that gets my points or questions across without sounding like a prick sometimes. Thanks for the breakdown. Lets just hope that the outlook is a little more promising huh?

FishFirst.org

Cedar creek. Dead creek. 32 fish.

Add fish boxes
add eggs
add carcass nutients
add root wads
add spawning gravel
add set backs to dairies
remove culverts
remove gillnets


expect up to 17% return
2003 expected return 30,000 native coho. exceeding 28 pounds

cost? ask fishfirst.

LB
That would do it!

Exactly!


The power of production (or lack thereof) rests on the habitat!

Good habitat drives the recruit ratios to something bigger than one... that's what makes the population grow. Quit raping what's left and work on improving the stuff that's been trashed.

Habitat restoration is the ONLY thing that will allow this run to recover. That's where the effort and $$$ needs to be invested.

No rivers... no salmon.

No gillnets, more salmon. Your habitat is worthless when one net set can wipe out that fish run you worked so hard to get back to the river.
Until the nets are gone, you are wasting your time. No matter what you do, it will be wiped out when there is just enough fish to net them out without any regard to what it will do to the run.

GBL,

From your past posts I understand you're obsessed over river gillnetting, so it's probably a waste of bandwidth to remind you that no one gillnets the Stilly for chinook. Gillnets are not now, and never have been, the proximate cause for the declining abundance of Stillaguamish chinook salmon. The condition of the habitat is so poor, it simply doesn't support chinook at a productivity level that allows the fish to even replace themselves. The gillnets you obsess over have nothing to do with it.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

SalmoG & FNP, it is really a pleasure reading your reports and discussions. It has opened my eyes somewhat, but still have hard ... about the nets in the rivers, seem to me they could use traps or fish wheels and pass on what is not wanted or in jepordy. Still remember the Indian on the Solduc taking a dark steelhead maybe headed back to the ocean for another run, tossing it on the bank and saying throwback and walking away. I relilze that the traps would be more work intensive, but what the hey, they should do there part for conservation. I relize they do more than most of us know, but waste will always be a big sore spot. Chuck G

Salmo-
Not sure how long you have lived in this State and I am not talking ONLY river nets. If you go out in the straits, bays and harbors during any run of Fish other than Steelhead, you will find some type of commercial net fishery out there both Indian and non-indian.
Yes I am obsessed with nets as all the talking and habitat restoration is worthless until they are gone.
My 53 years in this State and watching every type of netting has pretty much made my opinion what it is and I bet you anything it will not change until the nets are gone, we have 40 years of data to support it.

I have to say that while I am not trying to be a "tree hugger" or anything of the sort. Plug in your own moniker for whatever you wnat to call it. There definitely has to be some dramatic and maybe even radical changes to the way that business is handled. Like I have said time and time before. We need to eliminate that variables that could change the results. And by that I mean the commercial side of anything. The recreational portions of the fisheries may also have to be added to the list too. Taking the state and dividing it up into sections, zones within a section or what have you and closing that whole area for five to six years just to see what would happen to the runs when left alone and nothing more is done to inhibit the fish or their habitat. The only access that is granted to the area is for the habitat recovery efforts, and that is it.

As for the commercial side of things, the lost income can supplemented by a fund that is set aside from a grant or something to that effect that will allow the fishing families that rely on the fishing for income and putting food on the table. I know that this maybe a little far fetched but something as dramatic as this I feel maybe the only way that we can achieve positive results. Ofcourse, there are plenty of ways to fix this but we all have to be willing to take a hit on this somewhere. We have had no problem sacrificing the fish our causes, now we have to be able to make a sacrifice for the fishes cause. Otherwise we are all sheet out of luck sooner or later.

I have a problem with buy-outs for commerical fishing licenses. If you draw a sheep license, you could re-sell it for a sizeable chunk of change if you were permitted to do so. You can't. Why should a commerical fisher be allowed to benefit from the sale of his/her license over and above what hte state gets for a transfer?

It would take time (years) but eventually the non-tribal commerical net fisheries would go away.

For a review of the commercial fishing license portion of the Revised Code of Washington, take a look at the following link. Of particular interest are sections .020, .030, and .070

http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=77.65

NWP,

Glad you enjoy the discussion. If you're following it closely, you'll see that nets are not a part of this equation. I'm not aware of ANY net fisheries targeting or even significantly incidentally catching Stilly chinook.


GBL,

I've lived in WA 59 years and have been working in fisheries since 1976. The difference I see between us is that you seem to let your feelings about certain fishing activities color your interpretation of facts. I try to let the data speak for itself.

Sure there are net fisheries in the Straits and terminal areas, but they are not 24/7/365. The Straits and PS have been closed to net fishing when the preponderance of Stilly chinook are passing through since the late 70s or early 80s. While gillnetting certainly contributes to some conservation problems, I can't point my finger at any gillnet fishery as either a proximate or secondary cause for the declining abundance of Stillaguamish chinook. If you some data other than your emotionally enhanced general observations, I'm completely open to a different interpretation of how Stilly chinook arrived at their present status. If you examine data, rather than your feelings, I think you'll find that Stilly chinook harvests occur primarily in BC sport and commercial fisheries that WA and the Stilly Tribe have no control over. The only practical way to extend further harvest protection to Stilly chinook in WA waters is to close all sport and commercial fishing in salt water, and frankly, that is not a practical solution - at this time.

Pug,

The public shows repeatedly that salmon are an important icon of the PNW. And in support of that icon, WA citizens and politicians express the highest quality lip service and even millions of $$ toward salmon recovery. Unfortunately, the vast majority remain unwilling to accept the kinds of hard choices necessary to actually recover salmon. People don't want to give up urban sprawl or single occupant vehicles or Walmart supermalls. People want to fund one habitat improvement project for every nine or ten state, local, and federal gov't. approved habitat degradation projects and believe they are making a positive difference when it isn't. Virtually all hard data, exclusive of emotions like GBL and others express, point to habitat as the variable most limiting the natural production of salmon and steelhead.

That is exactly the case with Stilly chinook. Massive erosion from forest practices has degraded and in many cases eliminated the habitat conditions chinook require to successfully hold as pre-spawners, spawn, incubate, and rear in freshwater prior to emigration to Port Susan. There is no quick fix. Stopping sport and commercial fishing for 5 or 6 years is meaningless, as few Stilly chinook are harvested in such fisheries in WA anyway. The habitat of the Stilly will stabilize and improve over time. I haven't a clue as to how long that might be.

The commercial bailout you suggest is unnecessary, as the non-treaty commercial fisheries that used to target returning PS chinook have been closed for many years, and are unlikely to ever resume. No one in WA makes a living commercial fishing for salmon in WA anymore and most likely never will again. You needn't worry about taking the food off a commercial fisherman's table. He's doing something else these days and fishes part time or as a hobby.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

At the risk of saying it not as politely as Salmo g., anyone, and I mean anyone who thinks that commercial fishing over Puget Sound stocks makes even the tiniest dent that habitat degradation makes is fooling themselves...and contrary to what GBL says, all available data points directly to that conclusion, except of course the made up data.

Fish on...

Todd

Thanks for the clarification of the commercial industry and how it affects the runs locally. However, the point is more towards the theory of it and not so much the actual industry itself. The elimination of all the variables that negatively affect the salmon population is more the point. While I do appreciate the data that is, there are alot of emotions pointed toward the salmon and if you take away all the access to the fish then there is no one that can gripe over any one group getting access to the harvesting of the fish. This way there is no one or anything that can affect the fish but the habitat itself. So aside from good old fashioned natural selection there wont be anything that can be a contruibuting factor to the degradation of populations. This is something that is aimed at the whole of the problem and not just the Stilly.

Think of this more as an idea to the solution. I am not actually suggesting that this is what needs to be done. Just a thought really. It is nice to get input back on the matter though. As you have suggested, or rather stated, the habitat is the prime issue. I think that we can all, atleast most of us, agree that there inlies the issues. By not allowing that access to the fish by ANYONE then we can be allowed to focus on the one serious issue at hand that is the one singular contributing factor to the degradation of the salmon populations. That means noone and I mean noone gets access to the areas. No logging companies, who seem to be a huge factor in the destroying of habitat with all the slides and silt deposits in the streams as a result of logging practices, commercial fishing, which is obviously not as big a factor as the habitat, both tribal and non-tribal. Recreational fishermen and women to be included in the group of unallowable users too. These would be considered extreme measures by many, but sometimes extreme cases require extreme measures.

Pug,

There's no doubt that the existing habitat has to be protected... but the decades of severe habitat loss that is already out there needs to be addressed, too, espeically in situations like the Stilly where the stream's productivity is almost eliminated due to exising problems.

Protecting the bit of habitat that is left needs to happen, but reversing the severe habitat destruction will take some serious political will that I think is probably absent right now. Lots of lip service paid to it, but even the most draconian restrictions on development and resource extraction do nothing but slow down the destruction of the existing habitat, and do nothing to reverse the destruction that has happened.

Like Steve said above, so long as the population is growing and considers Wal-Marts and strip malls, apartment complexes, and giant subdivisions a good idea, then it's all just delaying the inevitable extinction of most species that rely on rivers...especially Chinook and steelhead.

Fish on...

Todd

Sad but true, I see what you are saying.

Salmo-
I guess you think I am targeting Puget Sound or Strait nets or Indians with my "emotionally" charged responses? I am not, I only want everyone to understand there are way more influences that have a bigger impact than what is being preached here.
One trawler in the right place can and will wipe out a whole run of fish and all we do is sit here and say "another bad run" blame it on habitat.
My brother in-law has been a Biologist for the WDF for years and contradicts much of what you are saying, Bycatch and netting are the single worst event to a run of fish, it does not matter where the netting is done (Alaska, Russia, Japan or Indians), but until you admit it is a problem, your whole discussion about habitat is meaningless, yes habitat is real important and should be worked as a high priority, but our fishery in this state has proven through time that anyting we do to help the fish has not worked so you must come to a conclusion that you have to attack it from a different position. My main problem is everyone including the state of Washington has decided to put commercial fishing on the back burner and get everyone to believe it is all "our" fault for over populating the region and hurting the habitat. It is true, logging and people have hurt habitat, but what goes on in the bays, oceans straits and outside of our region is much worse.
If you have been here 59 years, I am surprised you do not agree that what goes on from the river mouth out to sea is the biggest problem?

read this one
http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/npfmc/analyses/BSAIsalmonbycatch205disc.pdf

RIGHT FROM THE WDF-and you do not really know what the bycatch is, only what is reported! And this is only GROUND FISH bycatch! (Hake) It goes on and on every year.
Limits to bycatch of Chinook salmon were set in 1991
under the NMFS initiation of the Biological Opinion for groundfish management (NMFS
1991). High numbers of salmon bycatch in 1995 resulted in a reinitiation of section seven
of the 1996 Biological Opinion (NMFS 1996a). The bycatch rate is now limited to 0.05
Chinook salmon per metric ton of Pacific hake with an associated total catch of 11,000
chinook for the coastwide Pacific hake fishery.

Permitted vessels are not penalized for
landing prohibited species (e.g., Pacific salmon, Pacific halibut, Dungeness crab), nor are
they held liable for overages of groundfish trip limits.

And more on over fishing without fines---remember bycatch numbers?
As of September 25, 2003 the mothership, catcher/processor and tribal fisheries continue
to harvest the allocations. The mothership fishery has completed 89.4% (26,021 mt),
catcher/processor fishery 89.7% (36,981 mt) and the tribal 89.0% (22,274mt).
(Preliminary Report #7, NOAA, Seattle; http://www.nwr.noaa.gov). It is expected that the atsea
sectors will harvest their full allocations. Even though the shoreside allocation was
increased, the 30-day shoreside season is the shortest since 1992 or program inception
(Table 1). The shoreside directed fishery closed on July 14th at 12:00p.m. and harvested
51,061 mt (0.31% over the allocated amount) (Table 1).

No one was looking and think of what went on in Canada and Alaska!
Salmon
A total of 425 salmon (all Chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha)) were taken as bycatch
in the 2003 shoreside hake fishery and turned over to state agencies by processors: 209 in
Oregon, 12 in Washington, and 204 in California (Table 3). The low number of salmon
reported in WA may be a symptom of lack of observer presence in Ilwaco in 2003. The
shoreside component as a whole was well below the 0.050 Chinook salmon per mt hake
cap. The shoreside rate represents an incidental catch rate of 0.008 salmon per metric ton
of hake for the entire EFP fishery (Table 5). Rates for individual salmon species can be
found in table 6 for 1992-2003.

Chinook salmon bycatch in 2004 was much higher
than the long-term average from 1990-2001.
BSAI Salmon Bycatch:
Chinook Chum
1990-2001 average 37,819 69,332
2002 36,385 81,470
2003 54,911 197,091
2004 62,493 465,650

It just does not get any planner than this--What happened then is affecting us now.
Problem statement:
In the mid-1990’s, the Council and NMFS implemented regulations to control the bycatch of
chum salmon and Chinook salmon taken in BSAI trawl fisheries. These regulations established
closure areas in areas and at times when salmon bycatch had been highest based on historical
observer data. Unfortunately, these regulations did not appear to have been effective in 2003 and
2004, when record amounts of salmon bycatch were taken. Information from the fishing fleet
indicates that bycatch was exacerbated by the regulations, as much higher salmon bycatch rates
were encountered outside of the closure areas.

The 85% or so loss in productivity on the Stillaguamish system due to habitat destruction could produce many more fish than that every single year, were it still around, both chums and Chinook, not to mention steelhead, coho, pinks, and sea run cutthroat.

Fish on...

Todd

"The 85% or so loss in productivity on the Stillaguamish system due to habitat destruction could produce many more fish than that every single year, were it still around, both chums and Chinook, not to mention steelhead, coho, pinks, and sea run cutthroat."

"Chinook salmon bycatch in 2004 was much higher
than the long-term average from 1990-2001.
BSAI Salmon Bycatch:
Chinook Chum
1990-2001 average 37,819 69,332
2002 36,385 81,470
2003 54,911 197,091
2004 62,493 465,650 "

In my above post when I was talking about the lost productivity of the Stillaguamish River, I meant that the entire amount of bycatch that is noted in your post, GBL, could be more than made up by the historical productivity of the Stillaguamish River.

That's just one river.

Add in the historical productivity of the other seven or eight major river systems in inner Puget Sound, all of which are larger systems than the Stilly, and I bet you could have 50 times the amount of fish that are represented by the commercial bycatch.

Almost all of that lost productivity, that would be measured in terms of tens of millions of salmon and steelhead, is lost due to massive losses of spawning and rearing habitat.

Combine that with the fact that those bycatch numbers represent bycatch of fish from a much, much wider range than just the inner Puget Sound, and the lost productivity due to habitat destruction is likely tens of thousands of times higher than that caused by current commercial bycatch.

Most every stream in Puget Sound has multiple fish stocks that are limited by their habitat, not by fishing...commercial, tribal, or sport.

Fish on...

Todd

GBL

What are your solutions? Trying to Shut down a 300 million dollar a year commercial trawl fishery seems futile at best. At this point in time what we can do is try to improve the habitat for the remaining fish that we do have. I am a firm believer that we are never going to see hstorical numbers of King Salmon, Coho, and steelhead again. Hopefully providing better habitat will give them a stay of execution of sorts and hopefully save what we have left. Hopefully we are not to late.

GBL,

I don't presume to know what fuels your apparent emotional responses. You're way off base if you think the haul of a single trawler wipes out an individual chinook run with its bycatch. There is far too much variability in ocean distribution - tho it certainly is not random - to be accounted for that way. I'm not defending bycatch, but the total coastwide catch, ranging from 37 to 62K chinook, is worth noting, but it's also worth noting that bycatch isn't wiping out any chinook runs, including the Stilly.

Since your brother-in-law is a biologist, and I'm a biologist, shall we take a vote of all the fish biologists as to the proximate cause of declining Stillaguamish chinook runs? Yeah, that's real scientific, altho maybe more scientific than taking an opinion poll of sport fishermen.

Bycatch and netting are only the single worst event to a run of fish if those actions are responsible for limiting the production and productivity of the population in question. Sorry, but blanket statements like that are an indicator of ignorance, not of being informed. I'd estimate that more Stilly chinook are taken along the coast of BC on sport and commercial hook and line than are taken as bycatch in trawl fisheries. It seems like you're using the trawl fishery as a handy scapegoat because the chinook taken therein are not allocated among specific rivers of origin. It's easy, but pointless, to debate that which cannot be verified. The allegation that Stilly chinook may be taken as trawl bycatch is offset by the equal and opposite allegation that Stilly chinook are not taken as trawl bycatch.

If the habitat in the Stilly basin were suited to chinook production, the issue of bycatch would be less relevant than it already is. However, I expect that you'd be complaining that the Stilly Tribe was exercising its fishing right be netting chinook because they were abundant enough to support a fishery. I say that only because you've repeatedly blamed Indian gillnetting for a host of fishery problems, real and perceived, regardless of any correlation between the gillnetting and the status of the fish population.

Todd,

With respect to the Stilly and the severity of the habitat condition, I wouldn't be surprised if it's closer to a 95% reduction in productivity. Unfortunately, it's bad. But your point is on the right track, at historic productivity, the coastwide bycatch would be less than a drop in the bucket, but it would probably exceed the Stilly chinook run. But not by an awful lot.

Sg

Salmo-
Again you miss my point. The trawler is just one example of hundreds of tribulations the salmon go through in their life, but, the commercial interests are all the same, take as many fish as they can in a given time frame regardless of what it is doing to the resourse.
I have fished the Stilly for 40 years, yes I know the habitat is screwed up, but back in the 80's and 90's when there were still fish coming back, there were netters all over the san Jaun islands (both Indians and non-Indians) and in the straits taking fish with no intervention, you cannot tell me that did not have an effect on todays dismal returns.
I have never argued that trying to fix a great river like the Stilly is not the right thing to do, but you got to get to the source of the problem and unfortunatly the state has pretty much given in to the commercial intersts over the years. It has become better, but the damage has been done.
Our coutry should be pushing foreign interests out of our waters, forcing Canada and Alaska to change their way of managing the commercial interests.
As a Biologist for the State, you know well how good we have been at predicting runs in any system, we just cannot do it with any consistancy. There are to many outside influences. Yes, ocean enviroment has much to do with it, but I contend, the hidden things going on out of our sight is probably doing more damage than anything.
As I travel a great deal in Asia for business, I can tell you as a fact that I have seen Big Chinook, Coho and once in awhile Steelhead in Fish markets all over Asia. Japan and Korea being the two biggest. Every time I see it I stand there wondering what river those fish would have spawned in.
I am not looking for a fight with you or anyone wanting to help our resources but after years of watching what has gone on around here, I want to make sure people focus on ALL the problems and solutions.
I know you will never get rid of the commercials and don't want to, but I do want the State and our government to acknowledge that the commercial interests need to be number 3 in line for those fish. 1-river returns, 2-sportsman, 3-commercial fishing

GBL, again you offer up no solutions. Habitat restoration is a piece of the puzzle and is something that is an acheivable goal, we need to take care of our problems in our back yard first. The issue's that you bring up are out of most of our control.



In Washington state the commercial interests are already last in line behind sportsmen. In Puget Sound King Salmon, Coho, and Sockeye are managed for recreational use. As such you don't see any gillnet or sein fisheries until chum are present. If you had your choice which ones would you have them target?

Before the items below, remember Salmo, Todd, JoJo and Pug and anyone else that thinks it is all about habitat-----Alaska has been experincing some of the lowest run levels in years and yet they have the most prestine habitat and spawning grounds anywhere in the world.
I own a lodge in Alaska and the river is protected from the top to the bottom and has never seen logging or habitat destruction, yet the runs of Chinook and Coho have decreased every year. Even the Sockeye runs have decreased.
The only run that has increased and is the best in the world is the Steelhead which has virtually no commercial fishery. They get back to the river un-molested and the sportsman release them all. Those fish have the best spawning grounds you have ever seen, so habitat is real important once you get fish into the river!

Now--for starters
Initiative 659

More pressure on the Canadians who have admitted they take up to 150,000 Chinook that were heading for Washington and Oregon
The pacific Whiting fishery results in about 11,000 Chinook as bycatch but is concidered acceptable. There are many "fisheries" out there all with "acceptable" bycatch. I don't accept "acceptable" anymore.

Force Alaska to limit licenses and fishing times to better protect Chinook and Coho for that matter. They have their own problems with over fishing now not to mention all of our fish they take!

Buy out the Indians gill net rights and give them Salmon from where it can be taken without hurting any one system. They can still sell it and make money or use it for "Ceremonial" uses

Stop clear cut logging and repair the damage, the Stilly and Sauk would be very happy

Make the WDF more accountable, they make way to many back room deals with special interest groups and have for years

Keep the pressure on the power companies to help pay for Habitat where required which is anywhere there is a damn

Force the Feds to kick the foreign fleets out of our waters

Severly limit the herring, Anchovie and Sardine commerical fisheries

And JoJo---Please don't simplify what I am saying, it is all commercial interests not just the ones in our back yard. They should always be number 3, problem is, they were number 1 for 40 years, the damage has been done.

Oh, and Happy New Year!!!!!
This is exactly what needs to happen on these boards, good open discussion.

GBL,

I'm trying very hard to not miss your point, if you have a point beyond emotional ranting. I kid you not.

"hundreds of tribulations" Really? Please list them. I'm pretty good at following this and will review each and every one.

Yes, I know very well, and have written repeatedly that the job of commercial fishermen is to harvest fish, not conserve them. Conservation is the job of management, which BTW, the state and feds have been less than half-assed if one examines the track record.

At least we agree that it is important to get to the source, or root cause, of the problem on the Stilly. And while commercial fishing causes problems, it isn't the root cause of the declining Stilly chinook run. If you can figure out how to stop the CA interceptions of WA salmon, I'll nominate you for conservationist of the year, no make that decade, award.

Our country weighs multiple interests in negotiations with other countries. Salmon are not the highest priority. Biased as I am, I might wish it otherwise, but I know it's not realistic. If you travel internationally on business, you probably know that even better than I.

BTW, I haven't been a biologist for the state in decades, but I have worked for WA, OR, tribal orgs, and fed agencies. I think the diversity has allowed me a fairly broad perspective.

Again we agree on identifying all the problems and solutions. You might agree that some solutions are more doable than others?

I don't want to get rid of commercial fishing any more than I want to get rid of recreational or treaty fishing. I only oppose fishing that doesn't make ecological, biological, economic, or social sense, so yes, some commercial fisheries I'd close in a heartbeat. Just make me King and consider it done. BTW, I don't disagree with your allocation priorities, but you should know that they are at odds with state law. At law conservation and harvest are given equal weight. What that means is, legislators are capable of talking out both sides of their mouth and passing laws intending the same.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

"hundreds of tribulations"
OK, I exaggerated a bit!! Maybe not hundreds right off the top of my head but--

Bad spawning beds
Preditors in the river like Mergansers
Open sea
Peditors like seals, whales, other fish
Lack of feed during their growth cycle
Polution
Gill nets (both Indian and non-indian)
Trawlers
Purse Seins
El Nino
Foreign fleets
Interception on their way home, you get the picture
They just do not have much of a chance.

We should limit the fish take and protect them first, let the price of Salmon go up like gas and the users like the Indians will still make money, which is what it is all about.

And please--
Tell me why in your world of habitat restoration and protecting the rights of Indians and commercial interests, (which is fine)
Why is Alaska suffering some of the lowest returns on record and yet the Habitat is perfect in the rivers for spawning?
Some of what you are saying just does not support the reality of what is going on out there. Alaska should be returning record runs every year based on what you have been saying above!!??

Just so everyone can get the scope of what by-catch really means-This is just one commercial fishery over 10 years(reported),,,over 703,000 Chinook bycatch
It does not count all the other fisheries that have by-catch
Read this-
http://www.adfg.state.ak.us/pubs/afrb/vol9_n1/withv9n1.pdf

Salmo g--

Not pickin' a fight here, because I find your comments well-reasoned, balanced, and educational, but when you noted "The habitat of the Stilly will stabilize and improve over time" I had to chuckle. Been up in them hills lately?

Unfortunately, the state prioritizes resource extraction to the detriment of protecting ESA-listed species.

I applaud any effort to realign such prioritization.

GBL

SE Alaska abundance numbers have been very high the last 5-6 years and recreational fishers have seen an increase from 3 -4 King Salmon a year because of it. Last year was a down year but go figure Puget Sound saw returns of Hatchery Chinook that were some of the highest in 20 years. Alaska can survive a down year or two because the habitat allows for higher survival rates than our frshwater environments do. If there habitat was as bad as are's is I think that they would be seeing the same results that we are down here.

I understand that by-catch during the trawl fishery is a big issue with you but since the feds manage it and the fact that on average the pollock fishery is a 300 million dollar a year fishery I don't see that getting shut down and in the end the feds have chosen to kill more King Salmon instead of the ammount of Steller Sea Lions that were being killed before. I guess the lesser of 2 evals.




Licenses for trollers in Alaska are already Limited Entry so you have to buy an existing license to partake in that fishery.

There is no incentive for Native Americans to sell there treaty rights, why would they want to do that. We can't force them.

I agree it all sucks but like the others have said we need to clean up our messes in our own back yard first and then go from there.

GBL--

I've appreciated your comments on this thread, but feel like you've tried to hijack a discussion of "S. Fk. Stilly chinook" into a rant against commercial catch/bycatch, and have become argumentative and defensive when others have tried to focus the discussion.

On one hand, I feel for you--but on the other, the list of "tribulations" you've offered is in no way specific to the S. Fk. Stilly. Frankly, reading over your posts, it seems you are focused beyond the scope of the thread. Well. nothing wrong with that, per se--but do understand that to a reader interested in recovery efforts on the S. Fk. Stilly your comments rate as nothing more than noise...

...as does this one.

(...and actually, on the other hand, I have five more fingers...yuk yuk)

Fro those that are interested in some numbers/data a visit to the following site -

http://www1.co.snohomish.wa.us/Departmen...ecoveryplan.htm

If you click on appendix C you'll find the escapement data base for both the North and South Fork Chinook stocks.

Some low points -
The South Fork stock has been hovering below 400 spawners a year since the start of the data base - 1974!

It was mentioned that there all ready is a brood stock program with the North Fork population. That program with a release goal of 200,000 smolts has been in effect for 25 years with minimal improvements in wild returns. Again from appendix C you'll see that since that program started roughly 1/3 to 1/2 of the spawners are from that program.

One of the positives of the NF brood stock has been the ability to CWT tag the released fish and get good info on where the catches are occurring. In the last decade the harvest rates on the NF stock has been reduced by roughly 50% to about a 25% level.

The combination of the portion of hatchery spawners on the spawning grounds More than1/3) and the fishing rates (less than 1/3) would indicate that the spawning population (hatchery plus wild) is not or just barely replacing itself. While it may that the hatchery spawners are not as productive as the naturally produced fish most of the available data indicates that both the capacity and productivty of the basin's habitat is so degraded that current North Fork escapements are near carrying capacity.

The latest CWT data that I have seen indicate that the distribution of that catch (25% of the total run) was -
Alaska - 26.7%
B. C. - 46.3%
Wa troll - 0.5%
PS net - 2.8%
Wa sport - 23.8%

By the way those Alaska catches come from SE Alaska not the Berring Sea.

I agree with some of the others that major problem facing the Stillaguamish Chinook is lack of productive habitat. And yes I agree with FishKisser that the excessive sediment problems that drive much of the production limitations will not improve in any large measure given current land management activities and time soon.

Latest year the Stillaguamish Chinook was the stock that limited the Puget Sound fisheries. The situation is likely to be a chronic issue and the status of the Sitllaguamish stocks will likely limit recreational fishing opportunities in Puget Sound for years.

Tight lines
Curt

Many very good points made on this thread. We are so Lucky to have dedicated and knowledgeable fisheries experts here and to have knowledgeable and passionate anglers like GBL.

If we assume Curt is right and the problems with the Stilly will be a major limiting factor in sport chinook fisheries for years to come I have this question:

What can CCA or any other advocacy group to alleviate this problem?

It seems to me "fixing" the Stilly problem might give CCA the biggest bang for their buck in this regions: That and getting the G.D. nets out of the Columbia, and getting enough water down the Columbia and Snake and . . .

When a single stock in a very mixed stock fishery context is the one that is really limiting all the other fisheries, there are only two choices...ignore that stock, and write it off, or recover that stock, and then reap the benefits of it.

State and Federal law don't allow for choice number one, so we're stuck with choice number two. To gain a meaningful increase in any fishery limited by Stilly stock Chinook, Stilly stock Chinook numbers must be meaningfully increased.

Ending all the commercial fisheries that catch any of those fish will add only a handful of fish to the equation, and with the severely degraded habitat in the Stilly basin, it wouldn't matter anyway...the productivity of that basin has been so damaged that it probably can't even support spawning and rearing of a modest increase of fish.

That being the case, we're in a holding pattern on those fish...at best, they will remain exactly at replacement levels, and will continue to limit all the other fisheries...sport, commercial, and tribal...that catch any of them in Washington waters.

Unless the habitat is improved, that's how it will be until they are finally deemed functionally extinct (i.e., "written off"), and then the rest of the fisheries can go on their merry way...assuming another stock hasn't stepped into the spotlight as the next "about to go extinct PS Chinook run" and limit the fisheries.

If any group wants to have a positive effect on increasing PS sportfisheries by increasing Stilly Chinook numbers, then that group will have to play a positive role in increasing functional spawning and rearing habitat in the Stillaguamish Basin.

Period.

That starts by successfully opposing current and future threats to existing functional habitat, and while that is being handled get to work supporting a basin-wide project to stabilize the slopes that were almost completely destroyed by poor logging practices in the past, and fix the dozens of culverts that carry spawning tribs under Highway 530, and other roads.

From what I understand (Curt and Steve?), the Stillaguamish River has historically had a lot of its productivity wrapped up in beaver ponds in the lower river...those ponds are gone now, along with their productivity. Re-establishment of off-channel rearing habitat like beaver ponds would go a long way towards getting some rearing habitat back in shape there.

There's this other group out there that could help...they're called "beavers"...but while what they do is good for fish, it also floods peoples' backyards and driveways...people tend to not like that.

Removing miles of dikes out of the lower Stilly below I-5 would help, too...fully diked rivers like the Stilly, the Puyallup, they really have a hard time supporting rearing habitat.

Harping on harvest won't do any good on the Stilly...even if it were all stopped and a couple hundred more fish returned, they would have a hard time finding room to spawn, and their young would have an even harder time finding somewhere to grow up to smolt size successfully...and then they'd have no room to spawn when they returned in a few years.

Fish on...

Todd

I believe Smalma's summary of the 25 year NF experience clearly shows that the relative numbers in my hypothetical River Zip scenario over multiple generations actually do pan out in real life.

1) We start with a conservation hatchery of similar magnitude: I assumed 50 hens producing 3500 eggs apiece yielding 175K eggs, but a hatcheryman I know says it's probably closer to 4000-4500 per chinook hen... or roughly 200-225K eggs.

2) We end up with a naturally-spawning population consisting of between 1/3 and 1/2 hatchery-born spawners.

3) We end up with disappointingly marginal gains at best within the population of wild-born spawners.

4) And we still end up approaching a miserable steady state over several generations based ENTIRELY on the carrying capacity of the habitat.

The only difference is now the depressed wild run is forced to co-exist within that limited carrying capacity with a superimposed hatchery component.

For the amount of time, talent, and treasure invested in the "conservation" hatchery, that's a pretty $hitty return.

Is that really the best use of limited salmon recovery dollars?

25 years of immediate past history is staring us right in the face with a very valuable lesson. You think anybody's paying attention?

Dave -
Great question -
First this is not just about Chinook sprot fishing in Puget Sound but rather salmon fishing in Puget Sound in general. The impacts from all the various fisheries are included in determination of the sum of the total impacts. This pass season a major item of discussion at NOF was whether to use a portion of the incidental Stilly Chinook impacts to support a 6 week in-river fishery for pinks and early coho or for a month of blackmouth in MAs 8-1 & 8-2.

I think it should be apparent to most that the commonly talked about as being CCA priorities (commerical fishing, gill nets, tribal fishing, etc) in the various fishing discussion forms while provide little benefits in this case.

I would think a good short term strategy for local groups would be sit down and honestly assess their interests and priorities. Is it important that some of our local stock productivity is used to support fishing? Once that has been some what defined take the time to research the issues and move from this reliance of good sounding rhetortic that we have been hearing and move to the point of making informed decisions on solid information.

I have to agree with Todd the long term solution for populations like the Stillaguamish Chinook is in habitat restoration and protection. Without that focus we will be doomed to seeing decreasing numbers of fish and the following reduced opportunities.

If advocate groups decide to take on that sort of the effort they will need to mend some of the fences with their natural allies in that effort. If the recreational fishers are to have any hope of success in this effort they will need to stand shoulder to shoulder with the area's Tribal and commerical fishing interests. We all will better off dividing a large pie than continuing to bicker about who gets what of a constantly decreasing pie.

To date I have not seen any interest in that sort of united effort; in fact quite the opposite.

While folks are researching the issues and forming opinions what they as individuals can do is make decisions of where they fish. A quick review of where the impacts on Stillaguamish is habitat would indicate that anyone who fishings Chinnok in SE Alaska or BC or promotes those fisheries are part of the problem.

Tight lines
Curt

FNP-
You asked - "You think anybody's paying attention?"

The answer of course is yes. However it is equally true that the priority of most decision makers has been surviving ESA listings rather than recovering the fish. Or if you will political science has been trumping biological science.

Progams such as these brood stocks are often little more than the easy way to give the appearance of "doing something". Yes there are cases where "rescue " programs are needed but there are more common cases where the current approach needs to be re-thought.

I would suggest that a more effective way to aid the fish would be some sort of "pulsed" enhancement effort. Using the NF Stillaguamish as an example what I would envision would be that the enhancement level would step in to aid the population when natural escapements fell to a certain level - let's say a 1,000 fish. At that point wild brood fish would be take, smolt raised and released for one generation (4 or 5 years). At which point the program would be suspended for a generation or long to see how the population responds and to allow natural selection processes to work against the mal-adapted hatchery fish. of course the risk of such an approach is that in many cases that limit factors are habitat based on not fisheries driven and the ultimate fix has to be in the habitat arena.

Tight lines
Curt

While many often contend that there is no one actually addressing the issues that face our fish and fisheries, they are flat out wrong. There are many groups and individuals working on the issues that most affect our Puget Sound fisheries, those issues mainly being centered on hatchery/wild interactions and habitat.

Those two factors affect our PS fisheries more than all other factors combined, dwarfing the effects of any harvest, anywhere.

The problem is that most folks don't like to hear the truth...they like to hear that it is all the commercial or tribal fishers faults...it tweaks their emotional responses, and that's what drives people to sign up for an organization.

Show them the truth, and they fight it tooth and nail...as I said, they aren't actually interested in the truth.

While appealling to the emotions of the potential membership, and encouraging them to send in their membership fees, even if harvest were almost completely curtailed there would be little benefit to the fish, and little or no sportfishing opportunity.

As one leader said to me when I asked him about this, "A win is a win, right?"...wrong. How can it be a win when there is no benefit to the fish, and the result is the end of sportfishing in much of Puget Sound?

The fact is, habitat work is not sexy enough to get people involved, and hatchery/wild interactions are so poorly understood by the average angler that even attempting to explain it is most often completely futile...they tend to practice a particularly insidious form of ignorance...it's like they put their fingers in their ears and just keep yelling "Commercial nets, tribal nets!!" at the top of their voices so that they don't have to hear anything that doesn't align with their pre-determined emotional reactions.

Frankly, it's the reason why there are so few people actually doing the heavy lifting for our Puget Sound fisheries...they have to do it because they really care about the fish and the fisheries, because they sure don't grab the headlines like the guys yelling about nets.

There are certainly places where harvest is an issue...there are many places where it is as big an issue, if not a bigger issue, than is habitat or water quality/quantity.

Puget Sound is not one of those places.

Fish on...

Todd

GBL,

Yes, I do get the picture.

"Bad spawning beds" - that's habitat, like I've been saying.

"Preditors in the river like Mergansers" - that's part of the natural ecosystem that I don't think is out of balance, except too few salmon for the predators.

"Open sea" - ocean survival varies from year to year, and it's not on the list of things we can manage.

"Peditors like seals, whales, other fish" - again part of a healthy natural ecosystem. There are exceptions like the Ballard Locks and LCR sea lions that are out of balance, but there's no indication that is an issue for Stilly chinook.

"Lack of feed during their growth cycle" - assuming ocean rearing conditions, those vary naturally, and healthy salmon populations survive both the good times and the bad times. And - it's not on the list of things we can manage.

"Polution" - equals habitat; just what I've been saying. Some urban and rural, but ag pollution I think is the main culprit on the Stilly.

"Gill nets (both Indian and non-indian)" - if you'll check the catch data provided by Smalma, you'll see that gillnet interceptions of Stilly chinook are inconsequential as I previously stated.

"Trawlers" - refer again to catch statistics and you'll note that trawl bycatch of Stilly chinook is inconsequential.

"Purse Seins" - referring to the same catch statistics, please note that PS net catch is inconsequential. The sport fishery catches very many more. Would you like to close all recreational fishing as I suggested would be necessary to meaningfully reduce harvests?

"El Nino" - a naturally recurring ocean condition that healthy stocks survive again and again, and kind of a "red herring" in this discussion.

"Foreign fleets" - well ya' got me there, but I already said Canada is a prime harvester of Stilly chinook, and WDFW has zero clout over their fishing. Shall the US declare war on Canada until they stop fishing the ocean?

"Interception on their way home, you get the picture" - that would be Alaska and BC, already discussed, altho I admit I thought the Alaska interception was less. However, AK acts like a foreign country when it comes to dealing with interceptions of WA salmon. Should we declare war on AK until it stops fishing the ocean also?
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Habitat in SE AK is not all perfect. Some is pristine, and some is trashed just like we do here in the PNW with forest practices. Salmon returns in AK have traditionally cycled with ocean conditions. Typically when marine survival is low for AK salmon, it is high for WA and OR salmon, and vice versa. Therefore there is no way I would or have or will say that AK should have record runs every year. You're making that up. Knock it off and read this entire thread. There is a wealth of information, and you could learn a lot if you are open minded.
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Fishkisser,

I didn't say how much time. It will stabilize if we let it and or if we take measures that facilitate it. Of course, society may choose to just keep on screwing it up. In that case, I'm wrong, but I choose to remain somewhat optimistic. It's the only chance we have to leave functional ecological options to a future generation.

Smalma,

As usual, thanks for joining the discussion. It looks like maybe the whole Stilly chinook conservation/rescue mission should be re-evaluated and re-designed. And maybe those fish really are already out of time. I'm not ready to pull the plug though.

Dave,

As Todd pointed out, we can try to improve the Stilly chinook stock status to reduce the impact on PS fishing. However, by definition, there is always a limiting stock, whichever is the weakest. The only way to avoid that is to have no weak stocks. Unfortunately, I don't expect that to ever happen. Maybe some day some stocks will recover and be healthy and not limit PS fishing, and the remainder will have gone extinct so that they don't limit fishing either. Not fun to think about, but it's certainly on the list of probably future alternatives.

FNP,

Well this thread is causing me to re-think what to do. We might be out of viable options. I agree with Smalma about the policy support of programs that give the appearance of doing something, even if that something is not substantial. I do think that some type of conservation hatchery intervention is necessary as long as trashed habitat is limiting recovery. I recognize that entails a risk. But I'd rather take that risk than pull the plug and eliminate options for my kid's generation to try to bring about recovery.

Todd,

Thanks also for helping out here too. You articulate the policy issues well.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.

OK Curt I took a peek at Appendix C

Click here for Appendix C, folks

YIKES! Not pretty.

The NF hatchery program did not start seeing a full complement adult age classes returning until about 1989-1990. They had ONE good production year of hatchery recruits which brought back about 353 fish in 1991. Must have been pretty encouraging to see that, but reality quickly set in when the bottom dropped out on the initial gains the following year. Overall production even with the aide of the hatchery (natural plus hatchery) seems to be just slightly above replacement since 1993. On average, hatchery-born spawners made up about 36.4% of the run beyond 1991. And that is with a recruit ratio from hatchery production of nearly 3.5! I estimated that by dividing the 11-yr average hatchery return of 347 (between 1992 and 2002) by the 100 fish required for broodstock each year = 3.47.

Pretty amazing how well the real life NF experience tracks with the hypothetical River Zip scenario I painted.

Like we talked about on the phone the other day, Doc...a "conservation hatchery" has got to be looked at as a life support system to keep the stock from going extinct while the habitat is fixed...pretending that they will recover a stock while the actual problems the stock is facing are ignored takes extra deep sand for managers to stick their heads in.

Fish on...

Todd

I think that we can all definitley agree on that one Todd.

This has been another interesting discussion, is it habitat, harvest, or bad management, and is it worth the money to solve the problem. I think that it has been demonstrated that habitat is the limiting factor. What has been left out of the discussion is that the limiting area may not be freshwater and it is not ocean survival. The fact that both wild and hatchery escapements are low indicates that even though spawning habitats are trashed the major habitat problems are the estuary and nearshore areas in Skagit Bay and Saratoga Passage. In the discussion of the document that Smalma referenced it is indicated that juvenile chinook use these areas year around. Because of dikes, conversion of land to agriculture use, and urban development, the estuary of the Stillaguamish has been silted heavily and productivity greatly reduced. That may be the area where salmon recovery money should go first.

The issue of bycatch may be important but recreational fishermen can't complain too loudly. In the same document I mentioned above there is a graph of chinook escapement from 1974 to 2003 in the Stillaguamish system. What I find interesting is the pronounced even/odd year variation with odd years having significantly lower escapements than the even years over the last ten years of data. I speculate that this is related to the greatly increased popularity of the pink fishery in area 8. In the few times I fished for pinks in area 8 I saw several chinook hooked and released without consideration of good release techniques. The Pacific Salmon Commission estimated coastwide bycatch mortality of chinook in 2006 for commercial troll and recreational fisheries was 45,000 fish. None of these moralities are in the CWT data because the fish are not retained. I don't know if these numbers included Puget Sound recreational fisheries. I do know that there is an impact and relative to the number of fisherman I suspect that the winter blackmouth fishery is the worst in terms of bycatch. If recreational fishermen raise the issue of chinook bycatch I think the blackmouth fishery would be the first fishery to be closed.

It's my fault, Aunty. I'm starting to live with that fact now.

I think I saw this episode on the Sopranos.

Don Loomis: "Parker. You NEED our protection."

Parker: "I don't need YOUR protection. No. I'm not paying!"

Don Loomis: "Aunty, break his knee caps! We know he's not carrying and he's not prepared."

<WHACK!>

Parker: "Ouch! Allright. I give up. I need to be protected. Here's your membership dues."

Don Loomis: "Let's go boys. We have Todd to visit next."

Good scenario there Parker, welcome aboard. Kudos to Aunty M.

Easy there old man. I've yet to see Don Loomis personally show up at my door.

If and when that happens, I'll hand over my $25.

Don might appreciate the $$, but Gary and CCA could put it to better use.

Parker, I feel a bit let down, according to that strange post it sounded like you had given up. I know Aunty M will keep working on you, and be careful, I hear she does in fact have a baseball bat.

Been over 3 years since we visited this issue.

This document spells out the 3 year plan for 2009, 2010, and 2011.

http://www.psp.wa.gov/downloads/SALMON_RECOVERY/2009_workplan_updates/2009_stillaguamish_update.pdf

The cost of implementation is a staggering 8.2 million per year... 4.6 million for capital expenditures and 3.6 million for operations.

Of that, 358K per year is budgeted for hatchery operations.

Would love to see the stats on the most recent returns of Stilly chinook. It would be interesting to see the marginal recovery cost for each incremental chinook that comes back to the system.

I imagine it rivals the cost of producing CR spring chinook.

One of the reasons for the even-odd cycle in Chinook escapements is that the surveyor's ability to see Chinook redds is compromised by the presence of pinks. Time and again surveyors have told me that the presence of all the pinks, and this was back in the 80s, makes Chinook harder to see, much less count.

As the South Prairie pinks have exploded, it has become more and more fifficult to even see the Chinook and redds.

Not saying that the number may not show an impact to fishing mortality; release or unreported.

Also, there was a strong even-odd cycle on PS coho that seemed to be tied to bycatch in the Fraser pink fisheries. They ran later in the fall, when some of the coho were coming in. Even if they were noit taken in US waters they would be picked up in the Canadian fisheries.

Read it... then read it again... and again... and again... and again.

The Stilly kings CAN'T be recovered without wholesale habitat restoration. No amount of hatchery technofixing will pull these fish out of the hole. Not 10 years ago when I first penned this... not now as McIsaac proposes with his pie in the sky conservation hatchery plan (does he really need to re-invent a failing wheel?)... not EVER!

The policy guys simply ignore the reality that this is 100% a habitat problem.

Salmon without rivers, indeed.

More people more growth....Yay!!! I’m sure salmon will fit right in.


https://snohomishcountywa.gov/3642/Economic-Development-Initiative

I don't think that they "ignore" it, in fact the plan acknowledges it by saying that additional fishery restrictions will not recover some of the populations.

However, that does not change the fact that the populations are in terrible shape and folks are proposing actions that decide what level of them can still be killed! See the rub? the answer should be NONE! But, since that is not realistic, given it would likely shut down untold numbers of fisheries that would otherwise be open, the alternative is not "Kill as many as you want", but rather, kill very few.

I know folks have a hard time with this concept. You can't just point over there at habitat and say "Hey, the problem is over there, not here!" while continuing to kill the fish at any rate that is not shown to be reasonably low enough to not drive the population past any reasonable threshold for recovery.

Back to something that Todd said a decade ago in this thread (my summary) - Either let these stocks continue to limit our fisheries or get to fixin' the habitat. Recently I heard the head of the Governor's Salmon Recovery Board talk about the cost of recovery. He stated that, to date, the actions called for in the Regional Recovery plans have only been funded by about 15%....

The power of production (or lack thereof) rests on the habitat!

Good habitat drives the recruit ratios to something bigger than one... that's what makes the population grow. Quit raping what's left and let's get to work on improving the stuff that's been trashed.

Habitat restoration is the ONLY thing that will allow this run to recover. That's where the effort and $$$ needs to be invested.

No rivers... no salmon.

We agree! I think everyone does.

The question is what do we do while we wait for that to happen, assuming we get on with it?

We've been sitting on the proverbial pot for 35 years now... literally waiting for $h!t to happen.

Doing the same old thing, business as usual, fluffing up the pillows and dancing around the hard issues that MUST be addressed if we're truly serious about ESA recovery. Perhaps we as a society simply aren't.

Mebbe the shock and awe of NO FISHING is what society really needs as a final wake up call to get serious about habitat conservation and restoration.

The enemy is US!

This was the 3-yr plan (conceived and drawn up almost a decade ago) that was meant to jump start the restoration of some of the most critical habitat bottlenecks identified in the Stilly basin.

http://www.psp.wa.gov/downloads/SALMON_RECOVERY/2009_workplan_updates/2009_stillaguamish_update.pdf

Anyone know if this plan was ever fully funded or implemented. Or did it just die on the vine?

Here's a link to all of the completed and on-going habitat projects in WA. Looks like you can just zoom into any of the areas and check it out.

http://hws.ekosystem.us/projectmap?mlayer=projects

Whoa! Blast from the past! Way to go eyeFISH! Talk about pulling a rabbit out of your arse. Is Phoenix77 still around.

The problem with putting all the eggs in the habitat basket is that unless harvest is curtailed so that more fish can spawn in restored habitat, you will end up with rivers without salmon. The other problem, assuming recovery is somehow achieved to any extent, is that under the current management paradigm, any additional fish will go straight to commercial markets, leaving our lovely, restored habitat devoid of spawners.

So yes, fix the habitat, but don't forget to fix harvest, too. Nothing will recover salmon unless we stop killing 90% of them every year. Fish are habitat, too!

The "Habitat is the only problem" mantra is that if we improve the freshwater productivity we don't need to change fishing. If the current R/S is (say) 1.1 and the habitat fix takes it to 1.2 you can double your catch for the same escapement.

Right now, as bad as the habitat is supposed to be, most of the salmon runs are having R/S's greater than 1. We just catch them, excess seals eat them, etc.

We are conducting a different sort of experiment with salmon as opposed to other ESA species. We are trying to harvest our way to recovery. It is more complex than that, but politically there is no will to shut down all the impacting fisheries.

eyeFISH,

The Stilly plan, like all salmon restoration plans, has not been fully funded. Like the public, the Legislature has a short attention span. Both have grown salmon funding weary, and the money spigot has had its flow cut back. I don't think the body politic gets it, that you can't just pour money on habitat and get the desired results - more salmon - in 5 years. I doubt society has the fortitude for a 50 -100 year plan to recover salmon habitat. I don't think people get how expensive recovery is. IMO, a $200,000 habitat improvement project is lucky if it results in $10 worth of new salmon per year in the near term, i.e., say 20 years.

I think the most effective, and least popular based on what I see happening, is riparian land acquisition, removal of rip rap dikes and levees, and revegetation, as part of longer term restoration actions.

Hill slopes in the Stilly basin are inherently unstable. Restoring to relative stability probably requires letting all timber on steep slopes grow unmolested for decades. And that won't stop land slides. It would just reduce the frequency of major landslides to something that allows natural Chinook production to become sustainable.

Just look at Chinook biology. If something good happens in freshwater this year it is 4 years before the results come back. If the ocean lets it.

We should learn (now there's an oxymoron) from other species like Trumpeter Swan, Whooping Crane, California Condor. The swan and crane had protection in the early 1900s and it wasn't until about a century later that they really seemed to take off. Slow increases, with no kill.

Salmon recovery isn't going to happen because we won't control population. Like Salmo said, if we acquire land and protect it (tie it up) we may have a chance. Just takes money and willpower.

I believe I heard folks testifying to recruitment rates of somewhere around the 0.6 range... HORRIBLE! 25% worse than the scenario I painted 10 years ago with 0.8 recruitment.

10 spawn... 6 come back. Never gonna make up that deficit on volume alone.... no matter how many we get back to the gravel.

Looks like the only active projects right now are ongoing installations of engineered log jams in a handful of select locations. The Stilly tribe appears to be the main entity leading the charge.

How many would come back with no fishing? That was my question.

Years ago, Tacoma's agreement with WDF on the Cowlitz required X fish to return to the Cowlitz. WDF caught them all out in the ocean and then claimed Tacoma wasn't meeting the mitigation agreement.

Anyone else find it interesting that the latest NOAA-F Fishery Stock Status Report lists only the Stilly's coho as "subject to overfishing" yet the ESA-listed Stilly chinook are absent from the list?

This might only be a Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA) thing, not an ESA thing.

Also interesting is the fact that the NWIFC receives federal and state money. Money that comes from non-tribal taxpayers like you and me. Seem's I saw something in the federal law about the citizens having a RIGHT to know how that money is spent... just saying.

Bay wolf,

What state money does NWIFC receive? I think their major funding is via BIA Rights Protection section.