#1060662 - 10/19/22 06:07 PM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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Returning Adult
Registered: 04/18/12
Posts: 311
Loc: Elma, WA
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Well, FF…. Here is an email I got back from Mike Scharpf. I’m not shocked…but it’s pretty telling that they really are dragging their feet.
I understand the chinook concerns, but again…if they were concerned about chinook, the NT fisheries would have shut down completely and not just the tribs. So how much rain is enough. Give us a number. What flow? Anyways….
Here is the email:
Hey Jared,
Thanks for your comments. I understand the desire to get back out fishing the upper rivers, we know coho are in the systems. We will be watching the weather and flows in hopes that the forecasts are correct. My concern and reason I supported the closure is for Chinook, not coho. Forecast for Chinook wasn't real robust and those fish are stacked in pools waiting for rain. These low waters cause stress and to have a dozen anglers hooking and releasing them would not have been a good thing. With that said, we have noted just this week, some of the Chinook are not waiting for rain and have moved to spawning areas. The number of new redds observed during our spawning ground surveys increased quite a bit from last week, but not enough to remove concerns. Will the forecasted rain be sufficient to alleviate the low flows and move more fish up, we will have to see. One rain event isn't enough. We need to see sustained increases. Sorry I can't give you an exact day we are going to reopen, but certainly we are watching all the forecasts and will be monitoring actual flows closely.
As for a conversation about the GHMP guidelines, we opted to develop a fishing package for this fall the exceeded 5 percent impact on natural coho because of the large forecasts. This was contrary to the guidelines within the GHMP and provided the recreational anglers with 81 percent of the NT coho harvest. We developed a NT commercial season following the intent of the GHMP by enhancing the overall economic well-being and stability of Grays Harbor fisheries (allowing more than 5 percent impact on natural coho), providing fair distribution of opportunity across all sectors, and minimize gear and other fishery conflicts. The resulting schedule provides at least three consecutive days without nets in the water each week there are non-treaty commercial days scheduled. During statistical week 43 (this week), those consecutive days occur Friday through Sunday. Each of the other weeks in which non-treaty commercial fisheries are scheduled, those days without nets occur Thursday through Saturday.
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#1060663 - 10/19/22 07:32 PM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: SpoonFed]
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Dah Rivah Stinkah Pink Mastah
Registered: 08/23/06
Posts: 6198
Loc: zipper
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I dont think that dfw has a clue how many Chinook are still in tidewater being encountered. The creel fellas dont get accurate info from everybody. I can tell you first hand there have been very few Chinook encounters compared to other years. They are pretty much nonexistant in the bay over the last couple of weeks and going back to the opener it has been a fraction of what the normal numbers would be.
_________________________
... Propping up an obsolete fishing industry at the expense of sound fisheries management is irresponsible. -Sg
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#1060664 - 10/19/22 08:00 PM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: fish4brains]
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Three Time Spawner
Registered: 01/29/19
Posts: 1510
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I can tell you first hand that in a half hour at one of the ramps last weekend that 3/4 of the boats i talked with released a Chinook. 2 of them for sure did not tell the creel guy that they did. Also saw a couple roll in Aberdeen. Figured they're still some around.
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#1060665 - 10/19/22 08:33 PM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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Dah Rivah Stinkah Pink Mastah
Registered: 08/23/06
Posts: 6198
Loc: zipper
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Think whatever you want, I'm telling you what it's been like in the bay. I have no idea what they're seeing upriver. The fish you saw roll in Aberdeen, if in the Chehalis, were most likely coho.
_________________________
... Propping up an obsolete fishing industry at the expense of sound fisheries management is irresponsible. -Sg
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#1060666 - 10/19/22 08:57 PM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: jgreen]
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River Nutrients
Registered: 10/28/09
Posts: 3313
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Well, FF…. Here is an email I got back from Mike Scharpf. I’m not shocked…but it’s pretty telling that they really are dragging their feet.
I understand the chinook concerns, but again…if they were concerned about chinook, the NT fisheries would have shut down completely and not just the tribs. So how much rain is enough. Give us a number. What flow? Anyways….
Here is the email:
Hey Jared,
Thanks for your comments. I understand the desire to get back out fishing the upper rivers, we know coho are in the systems. We will be watching the weather and flows in hopes that the forecasts are correct. My concern and reason I supported the closure is for Chinook, not coho. Forecast for Chinook wasn't real robust and those fish are stacked in pools waiting for rain. These low waters cause stress and to have a dozen anglers hooking and releasing them would not have been a good thing. With that said, we have noted just this week, some of the Chinook are not waiting for rain and have moved to spawning areas. The number of new redds observed during our spawning ground surveys increased quite a bit from last week, but not enough to remove concerns. Will the forecasted rain be sufficient to alleviate the low flows and move more fish up, we will have to see. One rain event isn't enough. We need to see sustained increases. Sorry I can't give you an exact day we are going to reopen, but certainly we are watching all the forecasts and will be monitoring actual flows closely.
As for a conversation about the GHMP guidelines, we opted to develop a fishing package for this fall the exceeded 5 percent impact on natural coho because of the large forecasts. This was contrary to the guidelines within the GHMP and provided the recreational anglers with 81 percent of the NT coho harvest. We developed a NT commercial season following the intent of the GHMP by enhancing the overall economic well-being and stability of Grays Harbor fisheries (allowing more than 5 percent impact on natural coho), providing fair distribution of opportunity across all sectors, and minimize gear and other fishery conflicts. The resulting schedule provides at least three consecutive days without nets in the water each week there are non-treaty commercial days scheduled. During statistical week 43 (this week), those consecutive days occur Friday through Sunday. Each of the other weeks in which non-treaty commercial fisheries are scheduled, those days without nets occur Thursday through Saturday. What an a$$hole. You should reply to Mr. Scharpf with a request that he please not cite any further Chinook conservation concerns until he pulls the non-tribal gillnets from area 2D. Anything short of that is disingenuous, insulting to your intelligence, and worst of all, detrimental to the best interests of the fish he claims to be protecting. I know it's tempting to include a few choice words, but that never helps, so.... If you ask me, the foot-dragging and absolute BS about needing "multiple rain events" are likely indicators that no upstream opener is planned, and just as we thought, our share (whatever it was) of the coho was handed to the gillnetters and tidewater sports, done deal. The fish are already moving (Scharpf said as much); if the kings aren't there, they aren't coming or somehow managed to get above anywhere WDFW can see them. My guess is we overharvested the ocean again, and they're not coming. Low-holed to death again.... Worst part is we all know a LOT of coho and chums are going to move with this rain event. Only the lying apologists at WDFW are saying anything else might happen. And they won't be doing any surveys while the rivers are puking trees next week. I'm pretty sure we're done, before we ever got started.
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#1060667 - 10/20/22 07:41 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: FleaFlickr02]
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Returning Adult
Registered: 04/18/12
Posts: 311
Loc: Elma, WA
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It will be interesting to see his next reply. I asked him for specific amounts of rain and flow rate. I asked him to lay it out for example on the satsop. Are you looking for 3”? 1.5”? What? Or getting flows to 300cfs? 500? 1000? I kind of hope I can bait him into saying they don’t have a plan. At this point I want to make them look as bad and as dumb as they are. They have no plan (other than keeping us off the river). Im done trying to convince the so called “experts”. They just tow the party line and are good little bootlickers. Most of these “scientists” also think there are 2500 genders…so it’s not shocking they can’t manage salmon. I’m going to be hot at the steelhead meeting tonight. I’ll try to keep my cool. After listening to Bob Kratzer last night…I’m not convinced we’ll have much luck convincing them to have any type of season: especially on the chehalis system. Just look at it ye asshats with the money we are up against. They are a loud and rich minority that have huge sway over the governor, director and the Seattle voter base. A bunch tofu eating vegan nut jobs who hate you. Read the article below and tell me they have any interest in keeping the chehalis open for salmon and steelhead fishing. I went out salmon watching for a 20 minute hike down the satsop, if they have there way…that’s all that will be left to do. Northwest Sports Magazine
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#1060671 - 10/20/22 08:24 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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River Nutrients
Registered: 10/28/09
Posts: 3313
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I suspect you'll get no specifics, and that kind of stands to reason, because they're looking for a satisfactory number of spawning Chinook; not any specific flow value. Gillnet results and rec reports indicate the Chinook numbers are way down. In my mind, that's a good reason to take action; the rub lies in the action they took, which placed whatever kings are around in the tidewater in even greater peril. Robbing Peter to pay Paul is the default for Region 6, but it's a poor conservation strategy. They probably should have shut all the state fisheries down.
We know the QIN didn't catch as many kings as modeled, and that was with next to zero upstream migration happening during their first 3 weeks of fishing. That's a really bad sign, unless there's some mythical land in the upper basin where spawning Chinook frolic among the squatches and the unicorns, unbeknownst to field staff, which sounds cool but unlikely.
Until they find a bunch of kings, we're most likely off the water.
Not saying any of this was fair representation or sound management; we should definitely stay upset about the discrimination inherent in the decision, as well as the fact the decision may have exacerbated a bad situation for our limiting ESA stock, putting future fisheries at risk.
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#1060672 - 10/20/22 08:39 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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Repeat Spawner
Registered: 12/06/07
Posts: 1376
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"I’m going to be hot at the steelhead meeting tonight." May I ask what Steelhead meeting is going on tonight? What time and where?
_________________________
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” – Ferris Bueller. Don't let the old man in!
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#1060674 - 10/20/22 09:09 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: fish4brains]
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Three Time Spawner
Registered: 01/29/19
Posts: 1510
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Think whatever you want, I'm telling you what it's been like in the bay. I have no idea what they're seeing upriver. The fish you saw roll in Aberdeen, if in the Chehalis, were most likely coho. sorry, when i said tidewater, i meant like up to just about the deadline. The fish i saw were about 13-20lbs and colored up. 99% sure they were nooks.
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#1060675 - 10/20/22 09:18 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: RUNnGUN]
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Returning Adult
Registered: 04/18/12
Posts: 311
Loc: Elma, WA
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#1060676 - 10/20/22 09:52 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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Juvenile at Sea
Registered: 03/23/03
Posts: 143
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Does anyone know if the the Quileute system is being netted through this closure?
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#1060677 - 10/20/22 10:29 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: seabeckraised]
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River Nutrients
Registered: 10/28/09
Posts: 3313
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Thought I’d post a little food for thought after observing this morning’s escapement report for Coho.
October 20, 2022: Bingham Creek Hatchery H: 1108 W: 54
October 21, 2021: Bingham Creek Hatchery H: 750 W: 50
I’m sure you all remember how much more water there was early last fall. If I recall correctly, a decent rain in the days preceding the October 1st opener.
Hoping we get at least several weeks of fishing the tribs this November. Those thinking we won’t get any season at all seem a bit alarmist to me; but then again I’ve got less years dealing with the Department than many of you. Coho numbers aren't in question. It's all about Chinook. Unless WDFW is somehow satisfied there are enough Chinook spawning, the tribs will most likely stay closed. That's not an alarmist opinion on what has happened; it's mandated by ESA rules that we not knowingly exceed our impacts on ESA stocks.
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#1060679 - 10/20/22 10:48 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: FleaFlickr02]
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River Nutrients
Registered: 03/03/09
Posts: 4434
Loc: Somewhere on the planet,I hope
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Anyone notice it is raining outside?
In the middle of a full blown fog bank. Unusual but that fits with the way the year has went so far!
_________________________
Dazed and confused.............the fog is closing in
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#1060680 - 10/20/22 10:54 AM
Re: FISHINGTHECHEHALIS.NET
[Re: eyeFISH]
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River Nutrients
Registered: 11/21/07
Posts: 7519
Loc: Olema,California,Planet Earth
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GH Chinook are not ESA-listed. While some would say that QIN and WDFW are working hard at getting them listed, they aren't. Yet.
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