It will be interesting to see how the numbers come out for the run size. Thing is it rained early and not just the usual bump in Oct but in Sept and following weeks big time. Everything that is " normal " left with Elvis. Inland fisheries prospered and tidal fisheries tanked. When the QIN went in they were fishing on just what was moving day to day as the early part of the runs were way upstream. That fish kept moving was apparent as the areas where they finally stopped would fill up with fish then fade then fill up again. The movement of Coho was a bit strange. All bright in tidal but no sea lice. So it was not a stampede or many would have lice but they were not hanging around either as no color. The old saying held true. Rain early the inland fisheries prosper but rain late tidal fisheries boom.

One thing that the models do not show is just how we make escapement. The peak weeks of any species is about peak based on harvest not the fish. The Chehalis is unique in that it almost always blows with rain in the first part of Nov to mid month. Mud logs just everything come ripping down the river and no tribal, NT commercial or Rec fisheries are possible and a huge portion of the runs move. So we wait but one thing for sure is a dream come true for inland fisheries and tidal fishers worse nightmare.

Inland fisher here. Fishing was quite good in the tribs for a few days following each of the major rains we've had, but it's been tough (pretty close to dead for new fish) when the rivers drop back to normal flows. Last time we had a really good run (2014), the fishing was really good in both tidewater and the tribs for most of the season (not just after significant rains). This has been my best season since 2014, but it hasn't been near as good as 2014 was. My observations lead me to believe the forecast was high (if not hugely).

Would be interesting to see how the hatcheries are doing on egg take. That might give us a better idea of just how many fish came up with the early rain than my anecdotal accounts.

Bingham Coho at 450 & Springs 1500 as of last week. Keep in mind Coho do not run to spawning grounds until rains make the areas available and / or time pushes them. River rising fish come, falling run slows way down and we still 2 to 3 weeks until spawning on a falling river that is below average flows. We do some nice Coho coming up the river right now. When it rains early the whole run does not come early but rather takes a 5 week window and stretches it to 8 or 9 weeks. Same amount of fish but stretched out over a much longer time especially the early and mid portion of the run.

https://wdfw.wa.gov/fishing/management/hatcheries/escapement#weekly-reports

Thanks, Rivrguy!

Your welcome. One thing I would like to add is that I think the front part of the run was OK be a little smaller size as they came off ocean feed early and that makes a difference. That said none of this means the latter half of the run will be as large as expected. I have seen the front of the normal timed not show but the back half do and the back do a no show when the front does. Fish just do what fish do!

The follow is the WDFW web page for Chinook, Coho salmon that are being held at State hatchery's, 10-24-2019. There is lots of information in this document. Left hand column has the hatchery's by name, scroll down until you find a hatchery you are interested in.

I'll use the Satsop River for my example, and just Coho.

Satsop Springs---1500 Adult Coho, on hand
Bingham---------- 450 Adult Coho, on hand

Wish there was a column for the total goal, Chinook and Coho, for hatchery's, would be easy for the average person to check "Adults on hand vs. Total Adult needed"



https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2019-10/weekly_escapement_10-24-2019.pdf

Long time ago, the hatchery report had that. Not only the fish goal bit the egg-take goal. Apparently that was TMI.

Eggtake & transfer numbers are in the Future Brood Doc and you must find the hatchery to get the information. It is organized by hatchery not species. This link is 2019 but you can years back by year also.


https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/02037/wdfw02037_1.pdf

I vaguely recall that putting together a "Future Brood Document "was some sort of state-tribal comanager agreed-to requirement. The Future Brood doc in its current form of 1100+ pages is almost unusable without some level of summarization to the hatchery and/or hatchery complex level. True, the hatchery manager (and tribal comaager) needs to have things identified to this level for their operations but for general information purposes the layout and detail is clumsy at best. The Regional Fish Program manager should have ball park estimates of adult escapement and egg take goals by species for the state facilities. I suspect that putting these values in the weekly hatchery escapement report may not mesh with the layout of the weekly report (eg complex goals vs each hatchery goals vs retained and shipped etc).

The weekly hatchery reports are what happens to each fish that the hatchery process encounters. Spawned, passed up stream, just everything. That data is then put into the escapement reports transmitted to Olympia that one sees week by week.

The production levels in the brood doc are Olympia decisions and are really not part of a day to day hatcheries operations. It is confusing for folks to be sure.

Well the NT net season is over and it looks like a disaster for the run size estimate. The model predicted a total NT Grays Harbor harvest of 17,566 fish (three species) after adjusting for net drop out and wild release. Actual total GH harvest was 5,409 or 30.8% of the modeled harvest. This is close to the tribal harvest so far at 28% of the model prediction. By species this is 10.4% for Chinook, 46.6% for coho and 26% for Chum.
This was a huge miss for the run size prediction! It is too late to hope for the run being late as the second week was much less than the first week of NT netting. I would have expected recreational harvest to be shut down by now.

Soft bite:

Are "you" fishing now???? There are fish to be caught by sports, up river, Chehalis, and in the tribs., there are lots of nice bright fish being caught.

I also noticed that the NT fleet did not fish all the hours they were allotted, maybe, well maybe

NOF set the season....leave it!!!!

Oh....All season, the areas I fish you'd think there wasn't a fish for a 100 miles, the fish were not staging where they have most years since I've been fishing, 50+ years.....they were headed up river, Fuller Bridge, Porter etc.

The rains are coming, brown out rains...…..Leave season as set....

I agree with Drifter, plenty of fish.

I thought I would share this with folks.

I just heard that the new R6 Fish Manager is Jenni Whitney, coming over from R4. I have worked with her before and she is a pretty sharp person. Plus, she has shown the ability to work with at least some Stakeholders, like the Steelhead Trout Club. I'd at least introduce myself and give her a chance to show she ability to think outside the R6 Silo

I think the discussion we're having about how many fish are out there is interesting. I suspect the reality is somewhere between the extremes, but I'm personally a bit concerned about the wild returns vs. projections. Seeing the Quillayute shut down is evidence that I'm not the only one. Obviously, the Quillayute system isn't the same as the Chehalis, so we can't draw straight parallels....

Managers have long used commercial catch as the key indicator of actual run sizes. As recently as a couple years ago, similarly poor gillnet catch was justification to close the sport fishery altogether. What was different that year? If memory serves, the reason given for the closure was concern that the hatcheries might not meet egg take goals (and after they did, the fishery was re-opened). Perhaps the reason we're still fishing is that the hatcheries got their fish early. If that's the case, it's a damned shame, because it suggests hatchery egg take is more important to managers than wild escapement.

As an upriver guy, I've done pretty well this year, but it's slowed down for me big time on the coastal rivers over the past couple weeks. Still catching, but the quality is less than ideal. Sounds like I should have been fishing the Middle Chehalis. Anyway, I'm glad to hear that folks are still finding bright fish. Even if I'm not, that's good news for the fishery.

Actually, Jenni is the new District Fish Biologist for District 16. She is replacing Mike Gross who retired.

James Losee is the new R6 Fish Manager.

Mystery solved!

What a strange fall. September was wetter than I can ever remember, but it's been drier than I can ever remember since. Not looking like the rain headed our way this weekend is going to do much to river levels. It's been hard to figure out where to fish to find bright ones, but we sure are getting treated to a lot more fishable days late in the season than usual, which is great. I think I've only missed one planned day of fishing so far this season due to rain. As long as the fish keep moving, I'm digging this weather.

I have seen it not rain until the 3rd week of Nov in the dry early 90's but it did not rain early so I agree just plain strange. NOAA had rain in a few days at 4 plus in 4 days & more in Olympics then reduced it by half then down to a whimper. Now long range forecast has rain starting around the 24th and rains for the three weeks after that. That should be interesting.

First year working on our study creek was the massive 76-7 drought. Water was so low in the fall/winter that coho only accessed half the creek for spawning. That resulted in half the smolts that were produced of the next brood (normal flows). The steelhead benefitted from a small March freshet, so they got about 2/3 of the stream spawned. This does not look good for the '19 brood coho production if flows in tributaries remain low through the month.