The Chehalis Basin is a strange watershed because it a rainfed stream (mostly) not snow pack. Flows at record low to average are not that far apart so we are always in a low flow situation in the summer. Why fish come in early like last year vs a few years back when R-6 manager Steve Thiesfeld shut things down on ended being run well short of forecast and LATE nobody knows. Water temperature, PH, DO these are always present in one shape or form. A friend of mine who worked with fish all his adult life said fish just seem to know when it not a good thing to be in the river. They have time before spawning so who knows. One lesson I got in the 90s dry years was with Chinook. We captured males but almost no females and as we got to November with the males starting sour on us here come the Chum just pouring up the river and with them female Chinook and we got of 40 female Chinook in a day. We witnessed this three years if I recall correctly and why I do not know. Why behavior changes vary not so much from year to year but in blocks of years several years is a mystery to me.

A good example is the Satsop in the 80s always lots and I mean lots of redskins rolling around and if went to the Chehalis even more above South Monte. Now not so much in fact nothing like the past. Sure we have lost 60% of our hatchery Coho production and that is a biggy but the behavior should be similiar just less numbers.

It will be interesting to watch this year for sure but it is feeling more like the year Steve had to deal with. Run forecast well above actual returns with fish running late. Keep in mind when the Coho under perform it is usually front to back not any week of Sept to Dec. The late thing ......