Low-holin' in Alaska is NOW on alert

Bold action....

http://www.wildfishconservancy.org/noaa-...d-killer-whales

This is the first time I might agree with the WFC. Hopefully something changes for the better because of this because it always seems to change for the worse when the WFC gets involved.

Hmmm. Typically it seems theyre sicking NOAA on the WDFW. Now theyre just flat going after NOAA. Wonder how this will go in the long run.. while i agree with BK and WFC this time, they seem to be going after the hand that feeds them.. or has assisted anyway. Britches getting extra large.

I figured several more SRKWs would die before something like this came about. Hopefully the big money factory ships destroying our oceans for fish sticks and sandwiches feel the heat as well.

This I could support! Finally getting to the root of the problem!

http://www.piscatorialpursuits.com/forum...WA_Coastal.html

And what is Governor Inslee's stance and action on this? And Oregon's Kate Brown? This is a multi billion dollar issue!

They need to team up and go at this issue. Instead, they defer to stopping vessel noise, and preparing for oil spills that have never happened.

Time to roll up the sleeves...

Done properly, if this suit is successful, it will be a boon to WA and OR salmon fisheries. What it will show, if successful is that the marine mixed stock fishery in front of the whales is damaging. Again, if successful, we will have more adult salmon here. That will mean bay and river fishing on adults.

It will also show that the marine mixed stock fisheries are not the way to go until we get massive rebuilding. There are, if memory serves, some issues with trawl fisheries catching salmon. I think those are AK stocks, but controlling them will be expensive.

Lastly, those salmon need something to eat out there. Putting more Chinook into the N Pacific means they need food, which will affect other fisheries.

Gonna need lots of popcorn to watch this unfold.

Oh my goodness do you mean they cannot harvest the food chain top to bottom? What a novel thought.

I know, it's novel. Let's keep those silos blast-proof.

Fingers crossed, would be nice to see an actual run for once, instead of the standard hatchery only msy fishery.

[quote=Carcassman]Done properly, if this suit is successful, it will ....

I didn't see it was a formal suit, just a letter at this point

It's a 60-day notice of intent to sue. NOAA has 60 days to respond and comply with the deficiencies noted. If they don't comply, then they go to court.

Fish management-by-lawsuit is rarely a good thing. This might be the exception.

The SE AK troll fishery has been hammering Columbia River fall Chinook for decades. It’s a bit surprising it took WFC this long to notice. Hopefully this action will enable NMFS to reassess this fishery, and its impacts along the entire Pacific coast, particularly as it relates to SRKW's.

And, of course, it would be great if the Canadians would also reduce their harvest of Columbia River Chinook as they migrate along the westside of Vancouver Island, and thru the Johnstone Strait bottleneck. But that would mean the commercial folks (tribal and non-tribal) along the north coast of Washington would have to lay off the Canadian sockeye salmon bound for the Fraser River. Not sure if they have the incentive to do that, but NMFS might be able to provide them with one......

BC has quietly said for some time that if US ( AK ) gets off their fish they will do the same with ours. Devil is in the details but it is the AK fisheries that are at the root of the problem. From trawlers to trollers the majority are WA ( PS ) based or residents of WA, OR, and ID.

All about money! Commercial fishing brings A LOT of money to Alaska. There is no way in hell they are going to voluntarily curb any fishing, let alone large commercial.

One thing that might help a little is to enforce international boundary zones, although I don't have enough knowledge to say if other countries are intercepting our fish out in international water, or if they are dipping into Alaskan waters to scoop them up.

I've seen videos of those huge factory ships and they devastate fish!

Many of the AK boats are headquartered in WA. Big money flows through here, too.

Probably most are, as are most of the guides and resorts that low hole Washington fish up in SEAK.

Fish on...

Todd

Yup. It's been largely Washingtonians taking those Washington fish. Some of those particular Washingtonians are associated with large seafood distributors that have bottomless pockets (lots of lobby power), and many of the others are recreational fishers on vacation, chasing the fish they can't catch around home anymore. Pretty screwed-up situation that is extremely unlikely to be resolved by anything shy of extinctions.

I’m not that pessimistic. NMFS certainly has the authority to regulate salmon fisheries in the U.S, including the SE AK troll fishery. And now that SRKW’s are threatened by a lack of preferred prey (Chinook salmon), NMFS has another incentive to emphasize conservation when those Chinook salmon are in their feeding phase in SE AK. The WFC Notice of Intent to Sue might be the incentive they need.

My concern is whether our conservation efforts (if they are successful) will be thwarted by an increase in Canadian fisheries in Canadian waters. NMFS doesn’t have nearly as much control when those fish migrate back home thru BC provincial waters. NMFS has influence thru the Pacific Salmon Treaty and the Pacific Fishery Management Council, but it’s indirect compared to their control over U.S. ocean fisheries.

And it's complicated by the sockeye salmon fishery in the U.S. which is directed at Fraser Rv (Canadian) fish when they pass thru the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

I think it's going to take more than the notice of intent. NMFS relies heavily on regional advisory councils for regulatory purposes. And the council is not populated with members of the "Friends of Killer Whales." The members are from the commercial fishing industry, and if the example of the pollock fishery impacting ESA listed Pribiloff fur seals is any indication, it will take a ruling in favor of SRKW over SEAK salmon fishing to make a change.

The Courts may be our only hope as the managers/co-managers/advisors certainly aren't.

Although I may not be pessimistic, I shouldn’t be naïve either…….

Salmo g is correct. It’s gonna take more than a 60-day NOI to get the necessary conservation measures in place for SRKW's.

Another example is the Federal Columbia River dams. It took several adverse ESA rulings from the Oregon District Court (Judge Redden) to get enough spill to protect juvenile salmon. Plus, NMFS never really proposed the levels of spill we currently have. They were court-ordered, thanks to Judge Redden.

So even now, the battle isn’t finished.

The thing with the whales is that they are documented to h--- and back. They have given them names so it is not I guess or maybe when one dies it is known and which one it is. The blame on Columbia salmon and steelhead works due to politics and frankly we need electricity and most prefer the light switch to coal oil lamps and stoves. This is one of the few times that there is no place to hide for anyone including the courts. Going to be interesting but I have a fiver on WFC just for those reasons.

Lost another one. A very productive male. The whales, and salmon by extension, won't be saved until Greenpeace, Sea Shepherd, and the like weigh in. Even then, you see Japan keep whaling. It will be the general public, that likes charismatic megafauna, that will do it.

It will be like the wolf restoration. The general public will drive it and the Courts will support it. And, by extension, the fishermen will all be grouped as opponents because we would rather kill salmon than have whales.

As I mentioned in a different thread, NMFS needs to take action immediately if they want SRKW's to survive much longer. Getting more $$'s for hatchery production is great but it won't be quick, cheap or easy.

Conversely, they can reduce harvest almost immediately. And they can increase productivity by allowing hatchery adults to access the spawning grounds rather than taking them out via blocking weirs (e.g., Kalama River).

Reducing harvest is quick and easy, but if you're one of those SE AK trollers, it won't be cheap.

Not only does Alaska low hole us on the fishing side, they low hole us on the hatchery side. Alaska dumps about 1.8 billion fish a year (mostly chum and pinks) into the ocean and those fish compete directly with wild and hatchery fish from elsewhere for the same food sources in the N. Pacific. When hatchery plants from Russia, Korea and Japan are included, about 5B hatchery plants are added each year to the feeding grounds.

Since the early 1970's, the global salmon catch has been nearly perfectly correlated with the total number of hatchery plants (with a few years delay) and since about the early 1990's the global salmon harvest is approximately flat (800,000-1M metric tons). But the locations of harvest have shifted north (towards the locations of the greatest number of hatchery plants. From this, I can only conclude that there is very little we can do down south to recover our fisheries UNLESS we can reduce the rate of interception and increase our relative percentage of hatchery plants (either more from us or less from elsewhere or a combination of the two).

There is abundant evidence regarding the impact of pink salmon populations on the population of other salmon species. For just one example - see - https://krsa.com/pink-salmon-a-keystone-predator-in-the-north-pacific-salmon-food-chain/.
Also, I note that the abundance of killer whales off of Alaska has increased while the SRKW population has decreased. This is also consistent with a shift in salmon population to the north.

I couldn't figure out how to get an image of the data uploaded but the link below will get you there.
[img:center]https://photos.app.goo.gl/FdXbijCEfv6vNUhC9[/img]

WA has cut its hatchery production by almost 50% since 1985. In a broad sense, those cuts also track the decline in the SRKW population, the decline of natural origin spawners, and the reduction in harvest opportunities for all parties.

We cannot forget, too, the impacts of predation by fish, birds, and pinnipeds on both the out-migrants and returning adults.

Lastly, what have been the impacts of the mixing of salmon stocks by old hatchery practices?

One example is the out of basin movement of over 40 million Chinook eggs from the Green River hatchery between 1980 and 1987 to 12 different river basins in Puget Sound. In total, statewide, WDF transferred over 277 million eggs out of basin in those years. Roughly 180 million were distributed in Puget Sound, 75 million in the Columbia, and 16 million in the coastal rivers. These numbers do not include tribal, federal, or cooperative hatcheries.

From the 2006 NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS-NWFSC-78 titled “Independent Populations of Chinook Salmon in Puget Sound”, they say for the Stillaguamish (North and South Forks) that the “Early run diversity form is extinct; not clear whether this form represented an historically independent population” and for the main stem they say “Historical and current status are unknown; no evidence that this form represented an historically independent population”. For Mid-Hood Canal they say the late run “Historical diversity in late run is no longer extant” and for the early run “Early run diversity form is extinct”.

In a different time frame, 1952 to 1973, WDF planted 250K spring Chinook and 22.4 million fall Chinook in the Stillaguamish between 1952 and 1973. The point source for those fish isn’t known.From the same stocking report, the Hamma Hamma received 275K fall Chinook, the Dosewallips received 587K spring Chinook and 3.2 million fall Chinook,and the Duckabush received 1.3 million + fall Chinook. The source(s) for these fish is unknown.

Are we really saving “wild” fish or are we trying to save natural spawning populations? I ask that question because of WDF/WDG/WDFW hatchery practices that have planted billions of salmon in over 600 creeks, streams, rivers, and lakes in this state over the past 120 years. Salmon stray. They colonized the Puget Sound basin following the retreat of the glaciers. How many hatchery fish have successfully spawned over the years in their natal river basin or were successful spawners in some other river basin and not necessarily Puget Sound rivers?

Are we being unnecessarily impacted in the NOF process by Stillaguamish and mid-Hood Canal stocks that were at one time classified as not extant or extirpated/extinct.

Conceptually, are they not the same?

In my mind, a wild fish is one that has withstood the relentless selection pressures of the natural world at every life stage… from egg laid in the gravel, to free swimming fry, to outbound smolt, to foraging oceanic subadult, to returning adult spawner churning a new redd in the gravel from whence it came.

Self-sustaining production from the gravel womb of every viable salmon bearing artery in the Pacific Northwest should be the end game of recovering depleted fish populations.

Your question is a good one. I believe the answer is that instead of protecting the infinitely renewable salmon resources with which the PNW was blessed, policy folks and fish managers for the last 150 years have focused on protecting fisheries (harvest) as their primary goal... regardless of what happened to the wild fish and the places they called home. Every possible convolution has been concocted to enable the ongoing harvest to persist to the maximum extent possible. And chief among these is perpetuating the illusion of abundance thru artificial propagation. As long as society continued to see totes full of commercially-caught salmon, limits of salmon hanging from trophy racks at the dock, and creeks teeming with hatchery-produced salmon... well, "Problem? What problem?" The relentless and progressive assault on salmon habitat wrought by human encroachment could be conveniently ignored.

Even with everything we know today about salmon ecology, for every project attempting to restore habitat, there's at least at least 10 others degrading or destroying it somewhere else. In my own back yard, the last bastion of wild salmon production from entirely within Western Washington, construction of a new a dam is being actively pursued on the Chehalis River. Bottom line the enemy of wild-produced salmon is US!

It's really only been in the last 20-30 years that ESA has re-directed the focus toward the health of wild fish populations and the places they call home. And yeah, paying for the abuses of the past hurts. It hurts ALL of us.

I can sympathize with the perspective that fishing itself is NOT the highest proximate cause of ongoing depletion of PS chinook at this stage of the game, specifically as it pertains to Stillaguamish. Stopping all fishing for Stilly kings by itself cannot correct the inability of wild Stilly kings to replace themselves thru natural recruitment.

But know this... neither does continuing to kill them at whatever rate NOAA/PFMC/NOF decides is acceptable. Continuing to fish on the stock only accelerates the extinction trajectory. Dead fish don't spawn and can't contribute to recovery.... whether they die at our hands or those of Mother Nature.

Eyefish-
I certainly understand that dead fish do not spawn. What I do have a hard to understanding why is it inappropriate for those dead fish come from fishery impacts but it is ok to kill individuals of the same population through habitat degradation.

For example it seems to be ok to kill list Columbia river Chinook annually at each of dams at a more or less constant rate (same annual rates) but the fishing related mortalities are treated differently.

Or to the Stillaguamish the data seems to indicate that the potential Chinook carrying capacity of the basin has been reduced by 95% from the historic level through largely habitat loss. Yet somehow killing less than 1% of that historic abundance is not

The harsh reality is that the combination of the current recovery and fisheries management paradigms will lead to the end of mixed stock fisheries, many terminal fisheries and ultimately the extinction of many of the list populations.

Curt

Viability of wild populations is primarily predicated on good habitat. No way to get around that. While some valiant boots on the ground soldiers are fighting that battle on our behalf, society as a whole has neither the discipline nor the moral/ethical fiber to restore let alone protect functioning wild salmon habitat.

The tragic history of salmon depletion in Europe and New England obviously wasn't enough of a motivator to do the right things here on the West Coast.

When the final and definitive tale of the demise of PNW salmon is written 50 years from now, it will note that the well-being of the fish was at nearly every crossroads sacrificed for human expedience and the short-term profits to be made from exploiting them.

To boil it down to one simple sentence, this. We chose to place the resource in this state and we will choose to not stop the very actions that created the problem.

Some profound info and insight in these last several posts above. Thanks guys. I just hope our state and tribal co-managers and feds are reading, understanding, and heeding the inevitable implications.

If the characters in that new WDFW video really believe salmon can be restored and recovered, it would sure be nice to see them acting like it.

I have been in favor of significant increases in escapement for quite a while. Looking at 1-2 k/sq metre. These get laughed at around here as being way too high. Recently read about how Russia manages pink and chum wild stocks. The capacity of the stream is 1-2 SALMON per sq metre. They try to hit 50% of that as a minimum target. That is, of course, way above what I was pushing. And, they have rather large harvests and call this MSY management.

Should be noted that they probably have more intact habitat, but probably not too different from most of the OP, especially where it is in the Park.

TIME'S UP!

“Most people don't realize that over 97% of the Chinook salmon caught in the ocean off Southeast Alaska are not from Alaska, they’re actually from rivers in British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon. These salmon are not Alaskan salmon, they belong to the rivers and peoples of the entire coast, as well as the killer whales and coastal ecosystems that depend on them. Data from the Pacific Salmon Commission show that only 3% of the Chinook caught in Southeast Alaskan ocean waters each year are actually from Alaskan rivers; roughly half are from the Columbia River and the remainder come from other rivers in British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon."

Curiosity or just stirring the pot a little this thought comes to mind. If our chinook show up here from June onward, during which months are they catching our fish? Would there be a possibility to restrict the Alaska seasons to allow the escapement of more of our fish?

They catch our fish EVERY month they deploy their gear. SE-AK is the PASTURE for multiple age classes of actively feeding pre-spawn adults year-round. The pressure SE-AK trollers exert on PNW bound kings is RELENTLESS!

Then you have the massive incidental harvest that is based in Alaska which kill nearly as many. Your fish burger comes with a price.

I believe the winter troll is the "dirtiest" up there, from some discussions I have seen but all will get ours.

The aquamarine and yellow chiffon bands make it obvious how the SEAK trollers hammer our summer and fall brights headed for the upper CR

In my (probably warped) view, you should fish on the fish you produce in your rivers. So, that troll fishery should be limited to SEAK...

To the Alaskans, your cows are grazing on my pasture so I'm gonna take a few for grazing fees.

I have always thought the assumption that "they were born in my river so they're my fish" to be pretty damned arbitrary, but it does feel more fair that those who bear the most habitat burdens should receive some payback for that burden.

Fish on...

Todd

No matter where the fish are going or where they are feeding, Alaska would be taking these fish . They're like "Janice from accounting, she just don't give a fu*k" (apologies to the Colbert Show). The "right thing to do" has never entered their thought process. It's Alaska, after all.

Jeff Koenings, when he was in AK, argued to the PSC that AK was owed Canadian and Lower-48 salmon because they "protected" the ocean.

Consider, if you believe that AK can take what they want then can Canada, for example, take all the water out of the Yukon, Columbia, Skagit at the border? If not, why not?

What pray tell does AK do to protect the ocean?

They clean the ocean out (to the best of their abilities) of all those pesky salmon that think they have unfettered access to their home waters. Not to mention all those spawning big halibut girls that they also scoop up as "bycatch'.

Actually, AK plants lots of pinks and chums who eat up all the zooplankton. Makes the ocean cleaner. Might cause other species to starve, but the water doesn't have all those pesky zooplankters.

AK doesn't dump oil in the ocean, they don't dump sewage from ships. They are, after the Tribes, the "First Conservationists".

The fishing occurs off SEAK, but the people doing it are mostly from ports in the states getting "low-holed." Somehow, it annoys me more that a few people from our area seem to be entitled to the lion's share of ALL North American salmon than it would to know it was actually Alaskans doing the low-holing.

I'd argue Canada gets screwed over the worst under the status quo, considering that our harvest up there consists of something like 30% Canadian fish. They take more American fish, but at least one COULD argue those fish are America's to manage. Not so for Canada's fish, which are effectively being poached..

Which is why Canada goes after WA and OR salmon off of WCVI. They hav e been unsuccessful at getting the attention AK; they hoped WA and OR could/would. Istead, we'll collectvely fish those stocks into oblivion and then wonder what happened. Or blame the Ocean.


Pogo was right.

The bycatch numbers are staggering. Over 200,000 lbs of halibut in one week!

https://www.kbbi.org/post/week-bycatch-october-22#stream/0

But what was the target catch? What percent of the target catch was halibut? And how does it compare with the rates we use for C&R?

Do not know but during that one week alone 4677 kings were also killed during that pollock trawl fishery. That’s a lot of by-catch. Surely there must be a better way. Such waste.


“ By-catch of king salmon remained above average for the week ending October 12. Onboard observers recorded four thousand six hundred seventy-seven kings, over half of which were caught by pelagic trawlers targeting pollock in Area 610, covering the southern side of the Eastern Aleutians. Bycatch of the other four species of salmon is typically much higher than chinook. However, during this week, observers recorded only one thousand six hundred and ninety three non-chinook salmon.”

The by catch in those AK fisheries are, percentage-wise and poundage-wise minuscule. IT may be a lot of halibut or a lot of salmon but since it is a tiny fraction of what they are after it doesn't matter. At least to the managers.

IT’S OFFICIAL!

Yea!

If the hammer comes down, don't expect it to fall just on Alaska. So. U.S. fisheries including WA/OR ocean, Puget Sound, Columbia River are mentioned too in the Treaty and are part of the annual assessments of fishing impacts. It could very well be that the nuclear option would mean just BC fisheries and perhaps Tribal Treaty fisheries would be the only game allowed. Check out Chapter 3 pg 47.


https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.psc.org%2Fwp-admin%2Fadmin-ajax.php%3Fjuwpfisadmin%3Dfalse%26action%3Dwpfd%26task%3Dfile.download%26wpfd_category_id%3D45%26wpfd_file_id%3D2337%26token%3D355d07112ed25d88e8b785147168a816%26preview%3D1&embedded=true

In order to feed the SRKWs, you need to get adult salmon back to them. Obviously marine mixed stock fisheries should get hit. But, fisheries after the fish pass the whales are constrained only by conservation and allocation. If there is no ocean fishing, then it should be close to 50:50 in the bays/rivers.

That line of thinking makes sense but things don't necessarily work out that way. Federal court is like a box of chocolates you never know what you are going to get (eg corporations are people too).

Is there a specific section of that Chapter you want folks to pay attention to?

The worst part of the PST-managed chinook fishing is the AABM (aggregate abundance based) component. This is what allows Alaska and Northern BC to indiscriminately hammer the mixed stock nursery. It needs to be scrapped for a biologically-based ISBM (individual stock based) objective all across the board. If they can't figure out a way to sustainably fish in a manner that allows recovery of depressed individual stocks.... THEN THEY DON'T FISH!

The purpose of the agreements is to keep fishing going. Managers have known since almost forever that there is ALWAYS a stock out there needing protection. That is the problem with mixed-stock fishing. You deliberately overfish some stocks. We call them "minor". The problem now is the anything south of AK is considered "minor".

I assume the lawsuit claims that the PST jeopardizes the likelihood of recovery of SRKW and ESA Chinook. The Fed defense will essentially be that following the provisions in the PST and allowing the fisheries as described in the PST, the recovery of SRKW and ESA Chinook will not be significantly impeded. The Fed defense will cover all the US fisheries (state and tribal) as a group. I can't imagine they will go through and pick "good and bad" US fisheries. Good and bad, of course, is subjective. Is the SEAK fishery that is outside the range of SRKW worse than the fisheries that are in the same waters that SRKWs are foraging? The court might see things different than what you want. Applying different management approaches (eg AABM, ISBM, ER ceiling, escapement goal, weak stock etc) could be undertaken in a redo of the PST, but the current form is good through 2028. The Fed will be defending the PST in its current form in its entirety that it does not jeopardize the chance of recovery for SRKW and ESA Chinook.

NOAA will have to show that what they are doing is working. They have had close to 30 years to turn around the declines. While you can argue that SRKWs don't go to SE AK, their food does. Not sure that they are attacking PST directly. AK fisheries should be response to all appropriate US law; it will be up to the diplomats to settle international issues. Or the Hague.

https://olyopen.com/2022/08/10/bombshell...recovery/?amp=1

OK. Now what? What may, can, or will happen from this? Hard to believe that AK's and Canada's commercial fleet is all the sudden gonna stop fishing. Is this just a symbolic decision? Or, something that has teeth to shut it down. Appeals? How many more years until something changes?

Latest judgment recommends shutting down SEAK chinook troll fishery until a new recovery plan can be cobbled together to get a better accounting of sustainable chinook mortalities that satisfies ESA.

https://wildfishconservancy.org/court-re...-killer-whales/

If you truly care about wild salmon, orcas, and the like, this is nothing but good news. I don't think the same can be said for those who like ocean fishing for Chinook, but this is the kind of changes it will take to recover wild salmon. I think tying Chinook to orcas made the difference here. It was good strategy on the part of the WFC to do so. The downside (from a fishing perspective) is that future Chinook fisheries will now depend on meaningful orca recovery, and who knows what that looks like?

Well, I think this is good news for salmon, if it's not entirely great for salmon anglers. This is the hard part about conservation: it requires sacrifice.

As we have seen, the SRKWs eat all species of salmon. But, they concentrate on adults and concentrate on the larger fish. I mean , how many pinks equals (nutritionally) a June Hog?

IF we are serious about meaningful recovery of the SRKWs it is relatively easy regulation-wise. No marine fishing for juvenile or immature salmon. Anywhere. All salmon fishing occurs terminal areas (bays, inlets, rivers) so long as SRKWs are not present. For example, we currently have coho and chum fisheries in Areas 10,11, and 12. If there are no whales around, the fishery can open. If the whales show up, the fishery is closed.

This, of course, opens the rivers to much wider-open fisheries (and likely Buoy-Zooey).

In this way, not a single salmon is lost to harvest; it is just moved. Managers don't need to raise their precious low goals, because they can still catch the fish. We just give the whales first shot.

But while those in favor of SRKWs rejoice over this court action it doesn't affect the trawl fisheries that are hammering Chinook and other bycatch in AK.

So, why are we tying the “ recovery” of the SRKW to our Chinook recovery ?

If one looks at the whale population from the magic date of 1995, then follow it on through today, it does look like the whale population for the southern resident pod is crashed. Now, when we look at the population from 1975 to 1995 it looks like the numbers went from roughly 75 whales to 90 to 95 whales.

What could have driven those numbers up ? Way more chinook salmon available? More seals, what ?

And if the lower numbers as shown in the 70s were the normal , why pin recovery of the whales to the 1995 levels when they were mysteriously much higher for a very short time frame ?

Could the mid 1970 numbers of approximately 70 whales be the normal average over time vs. the magic 1995 numbers the state uses today ?

Just Wondering

If we look back to the 1970's at salmon abundance, I believe that a major factor was that hatchery salmon were spawning naturally in many of our rivers. I spent a lot of time on the Green as a young fishcop, and there were Chinook spawning in the river downstream of the hatchery in big numbers. Coho were not as easily seen because of higher water. When I moved to the Kelso area, I was astounded by even greater abundance in the Toutle and Kalama - both with good hatchery programs. If you look at Dave Croonquist's analysis of how the hatchery fish have been moved around from river to river by the millions over the last seventy years, it's easy to conclude that our true wild fish are very rare. If we have a "good" genetic stock in our hatcheries, I think we can have a much quicker true "recovery", by letting hatchery fish spawn naturally. As it now stands we are protecting actual hatchery fish that have spawned in the wild and have a fin. Salmon are very adaptable and are continuing to evolve. I've seen Coho introduced to a barren stream on the lower Columbia, who thrived and now have viable "Wild" run.

You hit that nail on the head, Tug. We have, or had, a data set of the adult salmon run size for all species entering the Straits. All species, all timings, hatchery and wild. Every year. We can easily see the numbers of salmon (by species and combined) and compare them to SRKWs.

As to how many Chinook we had, in the early 80s we had 100K+ Chinook entering Bellingham Bay, alone.

I believe that this year we peed rings around ourselves because maybe a million coho were coming back to all of Puget Sound. In the 80s more than a million returned to South Sound ONLY. Yeah, we had boatloads of fish back then.

Maybe the srkw(or some) of them moved to better waters? Has there been an increase in other areas? How do we know the orca’s actually died? If the fish come back in record numbers someday maybe the orca’s will start showing up more. Sounds like they just swim in here to pick up food and take off or are they here year round?

SRKW managers know the individual whales by sight. Each is unique; named and numbered, and counted. You rarely see the bodies, just like most any other wildlife. They just disappear.

Between 1952 and 1973, the WDF produced and planted 846,195,140 salmon, mostly coho and Chinook and put those fish into virtually every creek and river within driving distance of a hatchery.

From 1980 to 1987, WDF moved 277 million Chinook eggs out of basin of origin. Out of 40 hatcheries, 36 received out of basin stocks. Out of 27 river basins, only the Snake River did not receive transfers. The Green River hatchery alone transferred 40 million eggs to Chambers Cr, Coulter Cr, Deschutes R, McAlllister Cr, Minter Cr, Nisqually R, Nooksack R, Puyallup R, Samish R, Skagit R, Skokomish R, and the Skykomish R. These numbers don't include tribal, Federal, or co-operative facilities.

A hatchery is the most efficient tributary in the river basin it exists in. Hatchery fish don't all return to the hatchery. As Tug says, salmon are adaptable. One has to wonder about the influence of 125 years of hatchery production/releases. We have natural origin production that are now classified as "wild" fish because they have an adipose fin when they come out of the gravel. How do you tell whether the parents were WxW, WxH, or HxH?

In very broad terms, one can look at a graph of cuts hatchery production since 1989. There's been an almost 50% cut to protect "wild" fish. The graph roughly parallels the loss of natural spawning populations and, interestingly, the decline in the SRKW population.

When you stop providing food things starve. Simple.

A few observations:

The ruling is a recommendation from a magistrate judge. The district judge will make the final decision, but I don’t expect anything different. The recommendation seems to be well-supported, and consistent with legal precedent. But nobody can appeal this ruling until the district judge makes it final.

This was a partial win for WFC. The judge is recommending closure of the SE AK Chinook fishery but she did not enjoin the additional hatchery production for SRKW’s. WFC is probably not happy about the split decision.

This decision does not affect the Canadian troll fishery off the BC Coast. But the Canadians have cut back on their troll fishery considerably b/c of the impact on SRKW’s. It’s helpful that ocean harvest reductions in both countries seem to be occurring.

It’s likely the Chinook returns to the Columbia, and likely Puget Sound, will go up. Perhaps considerably. It would be great to quantify the increase in returns because of the reduced harvest pressure, but that might be difficult to tease out.

Unless the increase in Chinook salmon can be accurately predicted, fishing in the Lower Columbia is going to become considerably more uncertain. We saw this last fall, and we might see it again in the spring. In short, if there are more Chinook than is forecasted, we will hit the allocation limit faster. And the fishery will be shut down until the pre-season forecast can be updated (as the fish start coming over BON). And that might not happen until the run is almost thru the Lower Columbia. It’s great for the folks fishing upstream of BON, especially the Tribes, but not for the folks fishing the Lower Columbia.

I still believe the best way to increase the production of fall Chinook, and help SRKW’s, is to let the hatchery fish spawn rather than using barriers to keep them off the spawning grounds. It’s unbelievable that NMFS is spending millions to do something the fish will do for free.

As an example, the weir on the Kalama River removed 14,411 hatchery adult Chinook (tules) this past fall from the river. If those adults were allowed to spawn, they would produce as many out-migrating sub-yearlings as most hatcheries. And it wouldn’t cost anyone a dime. The fish will do that for free. But noooooo. NMFS wants to crank up hatchery production rather than produce more wild smolts. Hard to believe.

The weirs that keep hatchery fish off the spawning grounds continues to be a fish management failure of the highest order. But the real problem is that neither NMFS or WDFW will admit this, given the $$’s that have gone into these facilities. And so it continues.....

cohoangler -
Don't thing this decision will result in an significant increase in PS Chinook returns. The limited data I could find (Stillaguamish and Snohomish) only about 5% of the total harvest occurs in Alaska. BC takes a much larger share so reductions there would be more impactful. The Columbia upriver brights would be the big winner. I don't thing it would make a detectable difference for the springers. Shocking few are caught in any marine fisheries.

In many of the Puget Sound streams increasing the number hatchery fish would unlikely to significantly increase the wild production. Many of the the basin are on the average producing less than 1 recruit/spawner and that ration declines as the total number of spawners increase. For example, the most recent data on the Stillaguamish was the average R/S for escapements below 1,000 was 0.77 and for those over 1,500 it fell to 0.50 - a push.

I continue to argue that the biggest action the managers could do with PS Chinook for the orcas would be selective breeding of hatchery stocks for older/larger returning adults. Currently the average PS hatchery Chinook caught in PS summer recreational fishery is 28.5 inches (less than 10#) and 3.6 years old. At some of the hatcheries the adults collected at the rack is even younger (lots of 2-year jacks which are too small (less than 22 inches) to be legal in a marine fishery. I'm guessing increasing the average age of those returning hatchery fish to say age 4 would increase the overall biomass of chinook by a 1/3 without increasing the numbers. It would take significantly fewer to satisfy the orcas diet needs.

Curt

Since, at least in AK, the size at age for adult salmon is decreasing, that indicates lack of food for the salmon. They are going slower. As Smalma noted, we need bigger and older fish but to get that there needs to be the food resources. It is more complex than just closing a few troll fisheries, but that's a start.

CM -
The size of Chinook salmon across their range has been shrinking for at least a century. A major driver has been selectivity of fishing methods.

A couple examples -
The historical information shows us during the early 1900s the typical gear used in the Skagit in river spring Chinook gill net fishery (a non-treaty fishery) had a stretch 9.5 inches. Such gear would be very efficient in capturing the larger fish (say over 30#s) but fish smaller than 15 #s could potentially pass through the mesh. The very definition of selective against the larger fish.

In a 1970s Sam Wright (WDF) paper he made the case that the minimum size limit in the troll fishery was selecting against the faster growing fish. He based his argument on the fact that the faster growing fish exceeded the minimum size during their second year at sea while the slower growing fish would not enter the fishery (exceed the min. size) until their third year. The result would greater exploitation on the faster growing segment of the population. Over time this was expected to lead to smaller size at a given age.

While the forage abundance is important, we can not overlook the impacts from our fishing and in this case the impacts from fishing on the feeding grounds. Those impacts are more easily (if the managers had the will) than changing ocean conditions.

Curt

Yes, Smalma, historically the size of Chinook shrank due to fishing removals. But, in the past few years researchers are seeing smaller salmon at an age; a two year old fish now is smaller than a 2-year old fish (say) a decade ago.

I agree that the fishery removed the faster growing fish, too, but this appears different. Also, I was told that the actual quality of food is declining. The salmon have full stomachs but the nutritional quality is lower; fewer calories per gram. This made sense to me as herring have a lot more calories than some other forage fish. Anyway, the large adult salmon leave the feeding grounds for home, hit warmer water, and are unable to maintain life as they can't collect enough calories to stay alive. I was conversing with the researchers on this before retirement; they have since retired too.

Note, too, the strong correlations between the number of pinks released from AK facilities and declines in most salmon species, SRKWs, seabirds, and zooplankton.

I think one of the major factors influencing smaller salmon is plainly selectivity. Years ago when I was getting my basic salmon understanding when volunteering at the hatcheries on my days off, I found out that the largest of the returning adults were used for hatchery stock. This made sense to me, because in the various fisheries, especially the gillnet fisheries, selected larger fish with appropriate mesh size. Over the years, the largest of salmon are taken by various fisheries. I'm now unaware of hatchery practices - if they select for large size or not. Years ago I learned that hatchery selectivity was across the board for size. What's the practice now? I don't know.

It seems to me that we're breeding, both naturally and artificially, a bunch of jockeys instead of defensive lineman. The smaller fish also diminish in fecundity, but good 'ol WDFW doesn't adjust the numbers to relate to that diminishment in viable eggs.

Remember that the hatcheries select spawners from what makes it back. I know there used to be some size selectivity but I don't think so now. And, with the intensity of fisheries and the demand to not waste a single fish they often end up with few to sort out.

But, yes, if we kill the big fish we spawn the little ones. Right again that fecundity goes down with fish size, but we keep those sacred escapement goals. Unless we want to lower them.

The past several posts raise some interesting questions.

Fish managers know how to increase the numbers of salmon but are they prepared to increase the size of the adult salmon? We have known for quite some time that the average size at maturity is going down, and that this is not good for anyone. Lots of problems arise, as several folks have pointed out (Smalma, Carcassman, Tug).

What needs to be changed to reverse this trend? What actions can be taken to increase the quality (i.e., size) of the returning salmon rather than just the quantity?

Perhaps hatchery practices can be modified to focus on spawning larger adults. The genetic problems associated with doing that need to be balanced against the need to achieve larger adults. And we ought to be re-thinking how we are managing the forage base primarily herring, anchovy, sand lance, and perhaps smelt. Seriously reducing harvest of forage fish that salmon feed on might be a step in the right direction.

I don't pretend to have all the answers but actively managing the North Pacific fishery to increase the size and age at maturity of Chinook salmon might be the next step in helping to conserve these stocks. And in helping the SRKW's.

They should know better than to Name the pets...

Gets people to donate...Governmnet won't fund recovery, at least not willingly.

Spawning only the biggest fish regardless of how many might be a good start. Bigger fish from start to finish would be much better able to survive than smaller fish and lay more eggs if allowed to spawn. Smaller fish can’t get away from predators and probably are less smart at doing so.

Salman. Yes and no. Way back, in an effort to increase the size of Skamania summer steelhead they spawned the big fish only. The larger fish spent and additional year in saltwater so they got bigger. Worked super except for one thing. Marine survival was too low to replace the brood. The additional year of mortality reduced returns below egg-take needs.

There is a reason why there are multiple age classes and it is not so that anglers can catch big fish. We need all the pieces. Plus, since age at maturity tends to be inherited if you focus on one age at maturity you run the risk of run failures. Remember that there is no safety net with pinks. A huge flood and you get damn little back.

As to the other questions about increasing adult size and fecundity the managers (or at least knew when I was involved) what needs to be done. In simple terms, increase the food base so they have food to eat. Stop killing any and all immature fish, which means having NO marine mixed stock fisheries. Limit fisheries to maturing adults in the bays/rivers. It ain't rocket science, it had been known for decades, but the political opposition is too great.

Then, you throw a warming ocean that is also getting more acidic, a human population that keeps expanding, and you have a recipe for failure.

I very much agree that the root cause of low or nonexistent salmon runs in Oregon and Washington over the last 30 years was due to over harvest by SEA commercial fishers intercepting our fish.
But be very careful of what you wish for with this court battle and remember that WFC’s ultimate goal is Wild fish only, they want hatcheries GONE!!!
Just my two cents.

Perhaps a little nuance to WFC's position. I have found that they will accept hatchery runs where the habitat is in such poor shape that it can't produce wild fish. There is no reason why here in PS, for example, there are any hatchery fish in (at the minimum) the Queets, Quilleute, Elwha, Skagit, Stilly, Snohomish, and Nooksack watersheds. They have the habitat, or could have with proper management.

The problem with hatchery production is we try to catch them in the ocean, where the wild stocks get hammered.

A problem with what you allege, or agree about, is that the evidence does not support it. Except for Columbia River Up River Bright Chinook being caught in large numbers in AK. Most of the interceptions of WA Chinook and coho salmon occur in BC, Canada, not AK. Good thing you only invested two cents in your (Misguided) opinion.

Have to respectfully disagree SG. The projected 2022 Chinook escapement for the Chehalis was 14,957. Below you can see that AK & BC were projected to take more Chehalis Chinook than made it into Grays Harbor Bay. For coastal Chinook it is AK & BC that is driving stocks down.
wild hatchery total
SEAK 7,588 4,028 11,617
CANADIAN 3,046 1,588 4,633
SUS NON-TREATY 126 65 191
SUS TREATY 66 35 101

Sure would be handy if this site allowed posting of screen shots. It would much easier to show data tables for the misguided, misinformed or those that know more than the generals.

12/31/2022




I sure agree with this, also be able to "cut and paste" and it'd be ohhhhhh so nice to be able to post pictures.

Happy New Year.....2023 hopefully better sport fisheries for the whole State, but especially Region 6......

Double agree! But! Steel are in! Time to fish instead of bitch! If I could post pics I would. Happy New Year!

Rivrguy & Misguided,

Sorry. My bad. Sometimes I think I remember fishery catch statistics better than I actually do. I need to more often look them up instead of trying to remember them.

oh I would not worry, at all ! I think the memory thing is over rated to say the least at least from the old guys seat in the bleachers.

Memory may be faulty on the details but, dayum, the old guys used to actually manage the fishery. With much more primitive technology. Sometimes, Rivrguy needed to take his shoes off when we counted over 10....

Math sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Regular math is fine with me. Calculus sucks big time.

But, hey, the folks now have difficulty with simple addition and subtraction.

Ain't the cheap seats grand???

Aside from harvest selectivity and the loss of genetic material from older spawners, there is also increasing evidence that environmental and habitat factors also play in to the decreasing size picture. The majority of the older fish, especially for Chinook, have longer juvenile freshwater residence times. Most of the Chinook that return as 5 year old fish reside in freshwater for a year, and outmigrate as yearling smolts to the marine environment whereas the 3-4 year olds are typically fry-parr migrant type only rearing in freshwater and estuary environments for a comparatively short amount of time. The yearling life history strategy for chinook is shrinking not only due to those genetics being harvested out, but also due to unfavorable habitat conditions and environmental factors such as water temperature and poor food availability that make freshwater rearing habitats unfavorable, especially for over summering yearling type Chinook. Chinook as compared to Coho have much lower temperature thresholds they can withstand for survival. In the lower river and estuaries I have studied, we consistently see temperature values too high to sustain Chinook life during summer low flows particularly as summer flow values decrease and ambient air temps increase.

I feel strongly there is an important habitat/environmental factor playing in to the decreasing size story.

I may have come late to the game but in my experience with Chinook the age-1 smolts were Springers; the Falls were naturally 90-day wonder fingerling migrants. It may well be that the loss of age-1 smolts in wild fish leads to fewer large adults. But, if age-1's were Springers then we need to bering those stocks back.

I believe they found on the Skagit that there are one year smolts among the summer Chinook at about the same rate as the spring Chinook. Roughly 5% as I recall, but we know my recollection of fisheries statistics has been off a time or two lately. It used to be the conventional wisdom that Skagit springers were one year smolts, and the summers were sub-yearling. If I'm not mistaken (again) Russ Orell included that statistic in his report on Skagit Chinook in the 70s. And perhaps the springers were at one time predominately yearling smolts, and the changes going on in the environment and possibly the fisheries combined to favor the sub-yearling smolt variety. I think the same thing was found with Nooksack spring Chinook as well.

With the main Chinook stock in the Skagit being summers, it's certainly possible that their life history strategy would be a blend of what we "thought" spring and fall Chinook were supposed to be like. By finding yearling smolts among the summer Chinook stock, I think what the fish are telling us is that they will adopt life history strategies that are most successful for them in their respective watershed. And the yearling strategy hasn't played out so well in recent decades.

Couple things, Salmo, as the rust leaves my memory.

Somewhere, in the early 80s, the idea was floating around WDF that PS Chinook were Springs and Summers. The Falls were actually imports from the Kalama around the turn of the last century. This made some sense to me (at least then) because Falls show up at low flow times and would have a harder time getting upstream. The idea floated around and died, but not did make sense.

I wonder if the increase in fisheries, and love of MSY, cratered escapement of all species so in stream productivity declined and that may favor the fingerling migrants.

Again, back in the 80s, WDF was running a recovery program for Dungeness Springs. Fish were raised to yearling because all of our successful Spring programs (Columbia) were yearlings. Nick, the tribal bio in the area, noted that all the Spring scales showed fingerling migrants; WDF stuck with yearlings because it works in the Columbia.

Maybe Columbia Chinook are different from PS Chinook. Nah, then we'd have to think.

There are two ways to measure the contribution of yearling smolts to a Chinook population; The portion they contribute to the smolt outmigration or the contribution to the spawning population. I prefer the latter and believe it is more related to either the discussion of providing forage for orcas or their contribution to the adult returns.

The contribution to adults sampled on spawning grounds for some of the North Sound Chinook populations.

North Fork Nooksack springs average 29%
South Fork Nooksack springs average 38 %
Suiattle (Skagit basin) springs ranging from 20 to 85%
Upper Sauk springs ranging from 35 to 45%
Upper Cascade springs ranging from 10 to 90%
Lower Sauk summers average about 20%
Skykomish summers ranging from 16 to 20%
Snoqualmie falls ranging from 16 to 20%

The Snoqualmie falls stand as significantly different than the typical Green river Falls in not only the yearling contribution but also in spawning timing. They often spawn into December with a genetic differences from the Green River fish. Have to wonder if they might represent what the PS falls may have originally looked like prior to the swamping of central/South Sound systems with Green River falls.

Curt

That's interesting information Smalma. Do you have the sample years for that data handy? Certainly more comprehensive than anything I've seen and lends a little support to what Russ Orell reported for Skagit Chinook long ago.

C'man, PS fall Chinook arrive at seasonal low flow due to the long term selection of first arrivals as hatchery brood stock at Green River. Historical catch data indicate peak tribal catches of fall Chinook coinciding with fall rain and the rise in stream flows. Kalama fall Chinook are from local and lower Columbia River Tule Chinook which are later timed than Upriver Bright Fall Chinook, but earlier than historical LCR Tules, most likely because of the same tendency of hatcheries to select first arrivals as brood stock. As Smalma pointed out with respect to Snoqualmie fall Chinook, wild Skagit falls, what few still exist, have a much later run timing than the ubiquitous Green River hatchery stock. I recall seeing a very few caught in early December when the Tribes were targeting Chambers Ck hatchery winter steelhead.

Salmo g-
Those numbers came from the draft 2022 co-managers PS Chinook management plan's stock profiles so assume they are current and from a significantly time series.

I had also been told the Skagit Falls and those summers spawning in the larger Creeks have similar yearling contributions as the Sauk summers while those summers spawning in the main stem Skagit have a much lower yearling contribution (2%?). But do not have a hard copy so did not report that.

Curt

It would be interesting to see the annual (brood-year) percentages and compare that salmon escapements that occurred during the age-0 rearing summer. I know that in steelhead they respond strongly to pinks or fertilizer, as did Skagit coho respond to pinks.

CM -
The Snohomish pink might be able to provide some insight into the questions that are asking. There was a major change in the escapements pre and post 2000.

Since the 1950s the basin escapement goal has been 120,000 spawners. In the 7 pink cycles immediately prior to 2000 the average escapement was 135,000 or a bit above the escapement goal. In the 7 cycles immediately after 2000 the average escapement was 1,185,000 or nearly times the average prior 2000 and nearly 10 times the escapement goal.

While I don't have access to the total run reconstructions of either Snohomish Chinook or Steelhead there is access to the spawning escapements. Looking at those escapements for the years impacted by those prior and post 2000 pink escapements should provide an indication in the effect of that size of pink escapements. One word of caution since 2000 the over-all exploitation rates were lower for the Chinook and steady or lower for the steelhead.

The average Basin Chinook escapements (NOR) for those years likely to influenced by the pre-2000 pink escapements was 4,858. The average of the post 2000 pink escapement influenced was 5,159.

For the Snohomish wild winter steelhead, the average escapement for those available years influenced by the pre-2000 pink escapements was 5,578. The average for the available years influenced by the post 2000 pink escapements was 3,476.

Curt

Have to look at individual brood years which requires complete age analyses. On the White and S Prairie when the pinks boomed the SH R/S improved. The pink/steelhead-coho benefit accrues on the brood that pawned the year before the pinks. Also need to be able to look at the whole production; catch and escapement. Steelhead, with essentially all the fishery terminal the run reconstruction should be easiest. Chinook would be hardest because you would need (to my mind) the adult-equivalent run for each brood year stratified by age each year.

It is interesting that the Keogh River steelhead responded immediately to the fertilization and this kept up when pinks replaced the fertilizer. When either the fertilizer (budgets) or pinks dropped off so did the steelhead. On Ford Arm in AK it was the cohonwho responded immediately and closely followed the annual pink spawn while the steelhead lagged close tp 5 or 10 years behind. That same sort of lag was seen in a lake fertilization project designed to compensate for mysid introduction. The kokanee responded immdediately while the Gerrard Rainbow were, again, 5-10 years behind.

Well , now that you guys have switched into some serious Humpy Talk, ( and I’m not smart enuff to understand the other language ), can we get a prediction for the Pink Salmon returning to PS this summer, 2023 ?

Maybe posted to a new fishing thread , as I was not intending to hijack this discussion. It’s just that it maybe another great chance to fish all summer here for Humpys, and that has always been a fun activity to look forwards towards, and begin serious planing to have a go and get at ‘em !

Ok, now back to your reel discussion.

Cheers

I'm hoping they show up but with the N Pacific crash going on I don't have high hopes.

Although the Columbia system is only involved in this to a degree from what I've read, this might help a little in recovery;

CCA Washington News Release:
Bill Aims to Eliminate Non-Tribal Gillnets on the Mainstem Columbia River
By request of the Governor, and with strong bi-partisan support, Senate Bill 5297 would end non-tribal gillnetting on the Columbia River
Olympia, WA – Today, by request of Governor Jay Inslee, Senate Bill 5297 was introduced in the Senate to eliminate non-tribal gillnets from the Columbia River. With strong bi-partisan support, the bill would eliminate non-tribal mainstem gillnetting after January 1, 2025. This bill comes on the heels of the recent voluntary gillnet buyback program where $14.2 million was spent to retire 85 percent of the active Columbia River gillnet licenses.

“We are very pleased with the bill and look forward to working with the Legislature to ensure it makes it over the finish line this session,” said Nello Picinich, Executive Director of CCA Washington. “A special thanks is owed to Governor Inslee and the bill sponsors for taking this strong stance in support of conservation.”

Thirteen stocks of Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead are listed under the federal Endangered Species Act. The bill recognizes that non-tribal gillnets are ill-suited in the mixed stock fisheries of the mainstem lower Columbia River, where wild and ESA-listed stocks are intermingled with returning, fin-clipped hatchery-reared salmon specifically produced for harvest.

“Thanks to our thousands of members across Washington State who helped make this momentous occasion a reality,” said Gary Loomis, Chairman Emeritus of CCA Washington and longtime salmon advocate. “While we still have much work to accomplish, this is a time to celebrate all that we have accomplished over the past 15 years.”

This bill follows other significant victories by CCA Washington to enhance and protect populations of Columbia River salmon in recent years, including an end to mainstem commercial gillnetting during the spring and summer seasons and federal legislation to protect salmon and steelhead populations from unnatural levels of sea lion predation.

“Every step we take to save our salmon and steelhead depends on the active engagement of our members,” said Picinich. “Eliminating non-tribal gillnets will require a united effort, but I am confident that achieving this incredible goal is within reach. We will be working and communicating extensively to give concerned citizens every opportunity to join us in this effort.”

www.ccawashington.org

It's a good first step but all gill nets have the same problem. The only mixed stocks saved by eliminating the NI nets are the stocks below Bonneville. They hit gill nets again above that point.

If we are going to continue to "produce fish exclusively for harvest" and designate these with an obvious external mark then we need to ONLY schedule fisheries that can be very successfully (say 5% mortality) release non-target fish.

Seems like it won’t do much without Oregon on board.

I believe Oregon has been ahead of WA on this. It is my understanding that there was a bilateral agreement to end the gill netting and WA pulled out.