It's is historically interesting that Hoh v Baldridge came about because the last in line (Hoh) were saddled with the burden of conservation because all the earlier intercepting fisheries were allowed to proceed.

It is my belief that the ocean fisheries are heavily supported by the Tribes to ensure that their terminal fisheries go ahead. If conservation, recovery, and restoration were actually the goal then there would not be (many-updating fisheries are needed) fisheries until the runsize was confirmed by an inseason update. Then, fisheries would be managed daily by use of current catch information which would be available within a few days of landing. Might be costly but the fish would benefit.

It would also mess up all the staff who want to be out in the field hunting and fishing in the fall.

Did anyone else notice that they closed the other ocean shores area streams but nothing North or South of it. Seems odd to close the entire streams when they could have just closed it from the highway down.

QIN Chehalis numbers are up with the first three weeks all at once. So we all wondered what that the numbers do or do not show. That huge movement of fish that parked in East county plus the modeled numbers looks really good on Coho. Chinook numbers look bad and this is where the guessing starts. Were they in the movement so large so early? Did they hold up and this was a Coho thing? Now the Chum numbers way short and this supports the fish movement was a Coho thing the old rule is Chum will come through the bay by the 1st week of Nov even if it is a dry year. It also supports the thought that October fish came in early and the Coho tail down with the QIN was falling behind the curve as in the last couple of years with rain. It looks to be that Coho now are coming above forecast and Chinook not. The big unknown is the early movement being the largest I have seen validated by the fish in East county.


FIXED THE ERROR MY BAD

Actual Modeled

Coho
4920 4467
4859 10603
3559 6014

Chinook
612 1170
280 1448
142 623

Chum
32 5
295 295
205 2224

hmmm....I dont understand your numbers. The actual vs modeled for coho were exactly the same to the fish for 3 weeks in a row????

Looks dodgy to mee, too.

10/13/2022

1. Go to the WDFW web site

2. Fishing and Shellfish

3. Tribal Fishing.....You should be on the right page

Then Rivrguy information will be clear........

Looks like Chinook on Chehalis side AND Humptulips side are both in trouble!!!

When the modeled and actual are exactly the same three weeks in a row I think it suspicious.

Well it does not pay to do three things at once. I have fixed the modeled Coho numbers. Keep in mind harvest numbers do not show fish that got by the nets. The massive early movement were the very fish that were modeled for the QIN to catch.

I also received this from another gentleman who like me does not eat WDFW propaganda for breakfast.



When I read about the closure due to low flows, I went to USGS flow data (https://waterdata.usgs.gov/wa/nwis/current/?type=flow). I only ran three tribs, the Satsop, Wynoochee, and Humptulips; discharge only, and for all years available. What the graphs show is this isn't a bad year flow wise for the three tribs I looked at.

The graphs are rather busy so I tried doing tables copied from USGS, importing them into microSLOP EXCEL, but I am now in ongoing discussions with the software as to how to properly sort the data. The sort function is not cooperating; go figure.

What I'm trying to do is distill the data down (approx. 35,000 records per year) to only the lowest flows for each year. I'll keep working on it, and when I get the sort function to work, I'll run all USGS tribs in the closed areas. I'll send you the results.

What one has to remember is the model and run timing is based on history of years of harvest. It does not reflect years that rain is early as the past couple of years or dry years such the early 90s as well as this one which usually means movement is late. Also every year somewhere around the first week of Nov the rains come and the river is unfishable for all QIN & NT and we have a major movement.

One retired bio I keep in touch with e mailed me that it looks like Chinook and Chum are a little late and Coho early. Then he followed with or Chinook and Coho are both early and Chum are late. What is puzzling to him is why this behavior in 64 degree plus water was another thought.

One final bit is the long range forecast has changed with rain expected the Oct. 21 though the 27th. Now that is a change that is positive.

I'm good with Excel, in case there's a need to help get a spreadsheet working...

Beyond debunking WDFW's justification for the closure (which we should do), I think flow is probably the wrong metric to study; I'm pretty sure it was water temps that were slowing the fish down. As you have pointed out, dry weather and low flows are absolutely normal late summer/early fall conditions. What was not so normal this year was the air temperatures. Seems like we saw 90 degrees almost weekly from July on, and while the overall average may have only been a couple degrees above normal, in water temp terms, a couple degrees can make a really big difference....

This is some cool stuff here. I have always loved low water fishing for both Salmon and Steelhead so I have some diary entries over the years during low waters. 2018 was the last bad one. Obviously for sure, not all watersheds are created equal. The information I have is so inconsistent. Drought years, certain watersheds do better but not necessarily. So many factors set up a watersheds performance during a drought or freeze up. One detail under these current conditions caught my eye, I have noticed the Hoh @ 190cfs. I have never seen that one. Many others have not seen either. But some, as mentioned, are still better. Another thing for sure, super low water may slow migration but does not stop it. I hope the gentleman's research is posted. How do we get the Hump gauge funded and back running?

Just saw the updated numbers for coho in the QIN catch. Looks like all species are in the crapper, at least compared to what was expected.

I missed out on "the mob." Are we thinking a really large portion of the early run moved up before the nets went in, and that explains the poor QIN numbers after the first week? I certainly didn't see what looked like a "large" number of fish in the Satsop before it closed. Maybe I was just looking in the wrong places? The Nooch and Wishkah had even less going on, and I haven't seen, but I heard accounts Porter was all but deserted, so I doubt those were early upper basin fish.... I dunno.... Doesn't seem to me like any significant movement happened before the nets went in, but I guess it could be there were a lot more fish in the Satsop than what it appeared....

Oh the Coho stacked at the bottom of the Satsop but I posted a video of them moving toward Schafer Park. That said nothing much moving on the Chehalis tidewater this morning but the "mob" has spread out from Elma to Monte with fresh fish moving be it the most lock jawed bunch still.

Thanks. So it seems the mob persists and is above the nets, if not very far. I guess the nets only fish up to around Friends' Landing or so, so they might have missed a bunch, explaining the lower than modeled catch numbers. Sound right?

Well, we juuuust started really seeing springers spawning in the Pe ell to Jones creek float and Elmat gt rd to porter floats...
Everything else above there is an absolute ghost town... like only 3 redds above wheyerhauser..that whole upper basin!

Surveyed skookumchuck from the dam down to bucoda and same story...springers are just now hitting the gravel, well past peak(same story i hear in the Newaukum) and fall fish are starting to show despite the dams flow regime that was trying to separate the 2 stocks.

My index areas are about to go crazy next week if we get a bump of rain, However, it's still dead dog low and those fish will still be spawning in all the areas I don't want to see them for fear of losing most of the eggs to our first big freshet.

NOAA this morning.

".LONG TERM /WEDNESDAY THROUGH SATURDAY/...Models in good agreement
with the upper level ridge over Western Washington Wednesday and
Thursday. The ridge will begin to weaken Thursday. Front moving
down the British Columbia coastline still north of the area during
the day Friday. Front moving through Friday night. Over 90 percent
of the ECMWF ensembles indicating rain Friday night. The GFS
ensembles not that certain yet but trending that way with more
than double the number of ensemble solutions showing rain Friday
night versus the October 15th 00z run. Rainfall amounts also
trending upward with a chance of a wetting rain in the North and
Central Cascades.

This system looks to be the pattern breaker with another system
embedded in the northwesterly flow aloft arriving later Saturday.

Highs Wednesday in the lower 60s to lower 70s which is still warm
enough for possible records this time of year. Highs cooling a
little Thursday and more Friday and Saturday. Good chance many
locations do not get out of the 50s Saturday." Felton

With all that has happened in recent days around fishing and the closure confusion over what why how this happened is present to say the least. So I feel the need to share this with folks. I received an email from a guy I met years ago and we have some things in common both being multi tour vets of the war in SE Asia. He asked if I could give him a call and so I did. Guys that was the most difficult conversation I have had since the my last one with my wife before she passed.

So to boil the conversation down he wanted to know why we had let the agency do this heavy-handed closure. Why did the bankie take the brunt? Why did he pay for two licenses and not be allowed to fish? At this point I was more than a little defensive, confused, and frankly a more than a little angry. In the middle of this I had a moment of clarity and asked him just who was this “we” thing? Why you GH Advisors he fired right back and you’re the one who has always tried to get a fair shake for the river fishers. At this point I was beside myself and explained as far as I knew the GH Advisors had been fired by the Director. Not true was his response I sent the link to your email to see it. So I did a C&P with the link he sent and there it was the GH Advisor list. https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/files/about/advisory/ghsag/gh_salmonadvisorygroup_2019_update.pdf

Then this, the nets are in for 5 days! Oh no was my reply, you go look he said which I did and sure enough off the WDFW website the QIN are in 16,17,18 followed by NT commercial 19th and 20th. That is a complete violation of the Grays Harbor Policy.

I was stunned and I want to say this. I want to sincerely apologize to those who depended upon myself and the other Advisors to represent them. I had no idea that folks did not know that the terminal Rec fishers had no input into the harvest process other than that phony ZOOM crap. I had no idea that WDFW continued to utilize us on their website. I had not done up the commercial days both tribal and NT on the calendar because I simply believed that staff would not violate the policy. Again folks I apologize to all for my shortcomings on this as I did not pay attention, trusted staff, and I failed you all miserably. My short comings as a person are many but I have always tried to make sure the inland fishers got a fair shake and again I failed you all miserably.

If I were still an Advisor I would have urged caution on this year’s harvest which I did in the ZOOM thing. Also when faced with the early Coho movement and the possibility of problems with wild Chinook I would have supported an emergency rule change but not what came down from WDFW. Closed above Fuller Hill, yes it was the correct move. The Satsop could have been closed above the old highway bridge which would have afforded the protection Chinook needed but allowed reasonable opportunity for the bank fishers. On the Wynoochee it could have been closed above or near the railroad bridge upstream, just down the road from Region 6 offices, allowing some bank fisher opportunity while protecting Chinook.

In my mind it is Mr. Cunningham and Mr. Losee that are responsible for what has transpired and I cannot believe the Director did not sign off. I give to all my word that I will seek answers to all the questions surrounding this year’s terminal fisheries. As a former Deputy Director once said on a similar issue “it is not one of WDFW’s finest moments”. I think we can all agree on that!

And we (the collective We) still buy licenses from these guys?

RG-2 comments-Thanks for info you supply to all of us. I appreciate your info and the time you take to keep us informed. Second comment concerns "the mob". I scouted the lower Satsop on Fri 30 Sept-I always go to river before opener to check river changes, snags, new drifts etc. What I saw was mind boggling to me-thought I was in AK! For an hour, wave after wave of coho went by me-heard them first coming thru rapids(skinny water) then saw them in schools of 30 t0 50 fish. Talked to WDFW guys who were spraying knotweed and they said the same thing had happened the day before. No idea how many total went up, but had to be a chit load! Again thanks from a fellow Vet.

Saw the same thing FnB. Up river at the middle fork. Two days in a row (last week). A couple hundred fish (at least) two days in a row blowing right up river. Somehow the pros keep missing them? Looking in the wrong place? There are….more than enough coho in that river to justify it still being open.

Thanks Riverguy. I really appreciate your opinion and (often times) facts (even in the face of what WDFW is spewing).

So if I got this right (living in east GH and not willing or able to burn the gas to look) the tribe AND the state commercial fisheries in the chehalis went on as scheduled? Am I getting that right? If so…that would explain most of the low chinook numbers getting up the tribs. Combine being thrown back (probably multiple times by different net boats) with the water temps and conditions, that would explain the pile of dead chinook below the satsop. The fish might make it out of monte down to the bridge after getting in the nets a couple times, but then they have to wait at the mouth of the tribs.

I’ve fished the fuller section more than a couple times…hardly a dead coho on the bottom. 99% chinook. Hmmm…only salmon species that has to be thrown back in October by nets…funny how that works isn’t it.

On the other hand, I’ve seen very few chinook hooked on the fuller section lately. Probably has something to do with people targeting coho with types of water and gear (spinners and jigs). Very few people where throwing much bait on the chehalis now that a jacks aren’t really the main target by the majority of fisherman this time of year.

So tell me…how is this decision about conservation again? How is this not discriminatory policy towards mostly bank bound anglers? The group the least likely to actually impact the fish? It’s 2022…people can just live in fantasy land and delusion I guess?

We’ve already lost our steelhead seasons for the foreseeable future, now hardly a coho season. Management by closure is the lazy cop out strategy (except nets, that’s a MUST). The smallest factor in fish mortality is also tue easiest for the state to control. Us.

Again…if this wasn’t bad management…the chehalis would have been closed and the state would have worked with their masters errr “co” manager to keep their nets out. Instead, just keep the bank anglers off the rivers because the game wardens are to lazy to find snaggers (which will catch just as many fish at 1500cfs as they do at 150).