Seattle Times Saturday Dec 28, 02 Section B3

I urge everyone that hits this board to take a look at this article. We stand to loose three more hatcheries. It's time to call !

Maybe hatcheries arnt the answer but only a mask to cover up the real problems.

Maybe the money spent on hatcheries needs to be realocated to help bring back a few Wild fish.

Maybe if a few hatcheries disapear so will the comercial fisheries that are supported by those hatcheries. And those ESA listed Wild fish that are sacrificed so comercials can make sure they catch all those darn hatchery fish will get to spawn and maybe in the future they wont be on the ESA list anymore.

Yeah lets fight to keep those darn hatcheries open.

I'd rather catch hatchery fish than no fish, which is exactly what we would get without a hatchery program.

Jacob

The problem is that hatchery fish in our rivers are makeing it extremely difficult to restore wild runs so there are no wild fish then a year like this comes along and there are no hatchery fish to catch either... SO basically you get shafted on both ends no hatchery fish to catch and now because of hatchery fish there are no wild fish...
Rich is right hatchery fish ONLY mask the seriousness of the problems with our rivers and at the same time are a huge problem themselves..

Any way you slice it if we want fisheries for our future we MUST restore our wild runs.. Though some choose to ignore it the science of the hatchervs wild issue is absolutely crystal clear as is the science of salmon recovery.. It has been acomplished in BC and it could happen here. We can have awsome fisheries without hatcheries and no just 30 years from now.. We ,by relying on hatcheries are forefeiting our fishing future.. PERIOD!

I guess the question remains, can there be a balance between hatchery fish and wild fish? (Hatchery Reform?) Hatchery fish came from wild fish, right? If we don't step up to the plate to preserve the wild fish runs and they continue to dwindle to nada, will there also be hatchery fish to catch in the future?

Can we truely see the forest for the trees?

Double haul I agree it's all about balance but it seems that no one wants any balansing to hurt their fishing in the short term. So balance is never attempted.. We are still so far slanted towards hatchery production that any talk of balance means planting fewer fish in fewer locations anything else wouldn't be balance at all but business as usual.

Can anyone name a few steelhead rivers where hatchery fish are not planted??? I know of ONE in the entire state.
balance means fewer hatchery fish in fewer locations any way you slice it. I volenteer my home rivers hatcheries fore closing. Thoes hatcheries being the Skamania trout hatchery and the Washougal Salmon hatchery..

Maybe we should start at the top of the state and work south. Close a river system for three years, no fishing at all on that river, and let it replenish itsself. Then move to the next system south. Until the state has been cleansed of hatchery fish. I still like the way the Canadians do things. They seem to have a nice fishery.

I know the Nisqually hasn't been stocked in over 10 years and hasn't been open to steelhead fishing (not even CnR) for almost 10 years now. Although it is still netted by the Nisqually tribe, they averaged about 83 fish each year (in the last 8) except for one year they didn't net and another year they only got 28 fish.

I see the same thing happening to every river that ends hatchery stocking. It's been over 10 years and we still can't fish the Nisqually; how long would it take the average river to produce enough wild fish alone for even a CnR fishery? Evidently more than 10 years.

I've said this before, but the simple answer to me seems to be to close the hatcheries on rivers that have wild runs and wild fish habitat, and beef up the hatcheries on rivers that have been dammed or otherwise compromised so that little habitat remains for wild fish. Also, stick with the temporally seperated stocks that spawn too early to cross with the natives. Talkin' steelhead here, other options exist for salmon.

By the way, I fished in Canada for salmon this year, and did a hell of a lot better down here thank you very much. Canadian salmon stocks are overexploited, and there hatchery practices and habitat protection regulations are 30 years behind ours. Now maybe they are doing things better with steelhead, no personal experience there.

Wow am I confused. Too many hatchery fish for the wild fish to survive. Where is this taking place at? Hmmmm. I think the rivers can handle a lot more fish than they have in them now, so what's stopping the wild fish from increasing their numbers. Unless I'm blind I don't see all that many of either in any system right now. Hatchery fish originated from a wild stock so what's the difference?

I am with spawnout on this one take a couple more rivers on this side of the mountains and turn them into fish factories like the Cowlitz and let the systems that have viable wild fish runs and make them wild fish only rivers.

The state would save money by closing down hatcheries and use the money to build a couple of Super hatcheries and put the rest towards wild fish restoration.

Sounds pretty easy to me.

Glowball

In no way shape or form are hatchery and wild fish the same. Hatchery fish are interbread. They did not come from the river that they are planted in. There gentic makeup is not the same as the wild fish in that system. They are smaller and inferior to a wild fish. Huge plants of hatchery fish compete with wild fish for food in the river when they are smolts and compete for food in the ocean.

JoJo... It would be rather easy if we were living in a rational world. What you're not seeing, however, is that the state is not in the business of saving money. As illogical as it is, they are in the business of spending money. The political doctrine of state run agencies is to spend it or loose it. If a bureacracy fails to spend its budget, the state doesn't reward them for their good business sense. They take away that money! And NO bureacratic agency ever wants a smaller budget the next year because they failed to spend every dime this year. Bureacracy is by it's very nature, always trying grow and expand.

IMHO, habitat restoration is not as politically important as are hatcheries. The private interests involved in keeping government out of habitat restortation, such as the timber and construction industries, prevail often times over good environmental management. Hatcheries are much easier to politically justify and support- very little political risk involved.

I agree with spawnout and cwugirl..

So apart from actually closing a hatchery what can we do to minimize the impact hatchery fish have on wild fish..
In my opinion there are two basic things that need to happen for balance to begin to take place.

1, all hatchery fish must be identifyable by a fin mark to increase the rate of harvest for hatchery fish. This is especially true on the Columbia and it's tribs.

2. hatchery plants need to be discontinued on all rivers where large hatchery fish cannot be physically removed from the river before spawning. Rivers without hatcheries or wiers that can trap all migrating fish should NOT ever be planted with hatchery steelhead.

These two things represent the bare minimum of what should be done.

It's really sad that the Washington State DFW doesn't get some guidance from this web site. It looks as though some pretty good ideas could be sent to Olympia. IF ONLY THEY WOULD LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE WHO PUT THEM THERE!!!!

CWUgirl has it down...The pigs at the tax money trough are compelled to spend every last dime they can get their hands on. The say it is "WASTED" if it is not spent..as if the money would be burned if not spent. No incentive to save money in the good ole boy network of government...so we have initiatives to try to make them stop and they do whatever they can to ignore the voters...WOW..but a majority of us keep voting these trough slurping swine back into office over and over again. Closure of hatcheries is just another hot button the governor can push like teachers, police and firemen....No mention of waste cutting is there.

CWUgirl,

Very valid points, but the state does have a budgit for habitat and I would like to see some of the hatchery budget being devoted to habitat. I personaly don't see this happening, but my plan would try to to be a best of both worlds of sort. Allowing the guys that want to harvest fish to have a select group of rivers which are managed for that purpose. That extra money that would be left over would not be lost just devoted to another area.

My dad flew the gov up to some political party one time. I told him, he should have opened the door and pushed him out, it woulda done us all a favor.
But anyway look, the reason there are no steelhead on the nisqually even with all the restrictions is because they have no place to spawn(2 dams Alder lake), just like the steelhead on the cowlitz. Possibly the mashell river(trib to the nisq) would work if they put some fish in there i know some salmon go up it.
I honestly doubt the hatchery smolt have nearly the negative effect on the wild fish like you claim compared to the damage blocking a river like the barrier dam does on the cow for example or the high pollution or stream bed distruction on some rivers. Also those commercial guys are hard working people out there trying to make a living just like us, the state has f'd them over just as bad as us, too.
The suggestion to build huge hatchery runs on rivers with "killer dams" is a great idea, thats what the nisqually needs and good habitat management of non disturbed streams to increase wild stocks is a good plan, will the state do it? probably not.
matt

Glowball ... That very scenario has occurred on the Sol Duc where state / tribal managers told the Guides' Assocaition that we were planting too many fish in the Sol Doc via the broodstock program there. In order to avoid a nasty fight we agreed to voluntarily cut the plants from 100,000 to 50,000 fish.

A few years back, there was a large egg take and about 125,000 smolt made it to release size. The state ordered the program folks to destroy 25,000 smolt.

Since the inception of this program, there has been a pretty significant increase in spawning in the upper reaches of the Duc and even some tribs in that area ... coincidence?? You tell me

Well lets see. Close down a river to protect the spawning fish Salmon and Steelhead. Well the did that to a river System in Eastern Washington. They closed the Wenatchee river system down to protect the spawning wild fish and then in the few years they planted 750,000 hatchery fish. I don't think that is the way to protect the fish and still they don't open it to harvest the hatchery fish. No closing down a system won't work as long as people keep snagging fish and disreguard all fishing rules. Just my opinion.

I dont think the problem is compition, (God knows our rivers arnt produceing what they did 50 or 100 years ago even with hatcheries), The problem is interaction between wild fish and Chambers and Skamania stocks. That is what is causing all the problems in my opinion.