Will do. If it helps, I’m young and forgetful. Will have to fly out there at a pretty good pace after work that day, but I’ll be there.

Projects curbing bank erosion showing success in Chehalis River Basin

The Daily World

Since 2013, the Office of Chehalis Basin (OCB) has invested $98.8 million for 39 projects to reduce flood-related damage and 68 projects to restore aquatic species habitat in the Chehalis River basin.

There are eight other basin projects that have dual flood-reduction and ecosystem benefits. For these integrated projects, OCB has invested $1.6 million to acquire property, develop a streamflow gauge plan, create a demonstration project to test how groundwater and surface waters mix, and manage erosion, according to a news release.

In Grays Harbor and Lewis counties, two completed erosionmanagement pilot projects are:

■ Satsop River Mile 3.5 to 4.0 Erosion Reduction Pilot

■ State Route 508 Erosion Reduction Pilot

Just outside of Brady, along a two-mile stretch of the Satsop River, the Grays Harbor Conservation District has been working with landowners since 2020 on an aquaticspecies restoration project. The project is funded by the Chehalis Basin Strategy’s Aquatic Species Restoration Plan, or ASRP, and involves planting riparian vegetation and installing engineered log jams to increase habitat complexity, connect floodplains, and slow erosion. Due to the large scale of the overall plan, design and permitting can take multiple years until construction is able to proceed. Further construction is expected in summer 2023 and 2024.

Once complete, the ASRP project will primarily benefit four species of salmonids, but the i n c rea sed hab i t a t complexity will also benefit amphibians, waterfowl, and other native fish. Unfortunately, bank erosion in the project river reach has been progressing aggressively for decades, sometimes at more than 100 feet per year.

Since 1991, one of the main project landowners has lost approximately 30 acres of riparian forest and farmland, causing irreversible flood damage to their farm and increasing risk to their home. While the ASRP project will address the erosion, the district developed an erosion management pilot project to begin to slow it sooner.

The $14,600 project, funded by the Chehalis Basin Strategy, created an “instant” riparian buffer using six-foot- to 10-footlong native cottonwood and willow live poles. The 350 poles were installed in two rows parallel to the bank in February 2022 by the district crew and a Washington Conservation Corps crew of five.

The team used a oneperson motorized augur to create pilot holes, and then used a pneumatic post pounder to drive the poles anywhere from three feet to eight feet down.

“We used these techniques so that we could get them as deep as possible, to hopefully get roots establishing throughout the potential erosion zone,” noted Anthony Waldrop, the project manager from the district. “Depth also makes the live poles more resilient to summer drought conditions, as their roots can access deeper groundwater.”

Cottonwoods and willows are used in many river-restoration projects, due to their ability to propagate from live cuttings and establish root systems quickly in highly dynamic river environments. Using cuttings mimics their natural adaptation of colonizing flood-disturbed areas from branches that have broken off from existing cottonwood and willow plants. Due to the rate of erosion on this property, the district decided to use larger and longer live cuttings. Installing them deeper than a typical live-cutting project has also helped to more quickly jumpstart erosion reduction.

Over the course of almost a year, the project continues to be monitored closely. As of September 2022, about 80% of the installed poles have survived. Live-cutting survival, according to Waldrop, was largely driven by access to water.

“All of the poles did well initially during the wet spring, but as the soil dried out, those that were only driven three feet into the ground had trouble surviving during the summer drought. Poles that were deeper, however, were able to thrive with access to water all summer long,” he said.

Poles driven at least four feet into the ground were the most successful at surviving and thriving. Some poles were quite vigorous, putting on close to 10 feet of new growth in one season.

Poles were able to compete with aggressive non-native weeds such as reed canary grass, without any maintenance needed.

“A key takeaway,” Waldrop said, “is that, so far, this is a cheap and effective technique for rapidly establishing a vigorous riparian forest without maintenance or watering. Additional time is needed to determine if the added root-cohesion is enough to significantly slow erosion in this reach.”

Maintenance and monitoring of this pilot project will continue through spring 2023.

In March 2022, the property on state Route 508, near




In March 2022, the property on state Route 508, near river mile 18.5, was identified as a high priority because of its proximity to the South Fork of the Newaukum River.


Just outside of Brady, along a two-mile stretch of the Satsop River, the Grays Harbor Conservation District has been working with landowners since 2020 on an aquatic-species restoration project. COURTESY PHOTOS / CHEHALIS RIVER BASIN

river mile 18.5, was identified as a high priority because of its proximity to the South Fork of the Newaukum River. Aggressive erosion had been threatening damage to the home. Also known as the MacBryer Project, OCB worked with the Lewis County Conservation District on a plan to act fast to save this home.

“We looked at seven sites, and three of them were determined to be in imminent danger for different reasons,” said Bob Amrine, project coordinator for Lewis Conservation District. “One site had encroachment on the septic system, one site was where the river was right next to state Highway 508, and the other site was the MacBryer site, where the house was determined to be in imminent danger,” he said.

According to Amrine, the South Fork of the Newaukum River had moved 15 or 20 feet in the last year and had moved over 100 feet in recent years, encroaching on the home.

Homeowner David MacBryer noticed the issue a couple of years ago. “The bank started disappearing,” he said. “We’ve lost over 40 feet in six years.”

During the March 2022 site assessment, OCB identified the primary causes of the erosion and targeted potential mechanisms to deflect erosive flows and trajectory for future flows and erosion. Starting in April and continuing through the summer and fall, we approved a project design, secured $168,000 in funding, obtained the necessary permits, and completed construction.

OCB offered the Lewis Conservation District a grant to get a conceptual design, final design and permits, and to construct the project, Amrine said.

In September and October, contractors and engineers constructed engineered log structures known as “cribwall jams” with tree trunks and timber piles that were embedded 8-11 feet; regraded the upper bank of the river; installed erosion-control coir fabric and live willow fascines; and prepared the site for vegetative plantings.

With the Lewis County Stream Team, the district planted 25 potted willows, 25 red osier dogwoods, 10 western red cedars, 10 Douglas firs, and 100 willow stakes in November 2022.

This fast-paced project is complete and is now in the monitoring stage.

“We are watching it close during high-water events, and the log cribwall seems to be functioning as designed,” Amrine said. “We have a 10-year agreement with Mr. MacBryer, and if he sees anything that looks like the project is in danger, he will call us, and we will attempt to assist at that time. Hopefully, this does not happen.”

MacBryer has been keeping an eye on the project site, noting that the firs are taking, and the willows are sprouting, but the cedars are struggling.

“We [recently] had that one major rainstorm, and we never got any water up on the land at all,” he said.

Regarding his overall feelings about the project, MacBryer said, “It was very satisfactorily done.”

Bit of a side note here..

As I am hearing lots of questions about creel data and why it's not up to date on the wdfw website, I have no idea. But yea it's super annoying.

You can access all state data thru the website linked below(use the search bar at the top)... you can look up the creel data and other pieces of information like even my Survey data for our local GH tribs.
Hope this helps people on the quest for this info.

wdfw open source data website

REMINDER FOR EVERYONE:

It is North of Falcon time and the first meeting this year will be a public meeting at the Log Cabin Pavilion, Morrison Riverfront Park, 1401 Sargent Blvd, Aberdeen, WA 98520. Which is just as you drop down from the bluff entering Aberdeen to your left. The meeting will be about projected returns and not the final season, which will be only Zoom meetings. Here is the address for the complete NOF schedule for 2023.
https://wdfw.wa.gov/fishing/management/north-falcon/public-meetings

WDFW Press Release:
Welcome to the 2023 North of Falcon (NOF) salmon season setting process; WDFW staff wanted to share with everyone some public meeting information that has now been scheduled for Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor to discuss upcoming forecasts, management objectives, and fishery opportunities for the upcoming 2023 salmon season.

Our website has been updated with the 2023 NOF public meetings scheduled to-date, which can be found at 2023 North of Falcon public meeting schedule | Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife; All meetings will be conducted virtually via Zoom for Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor except for the March 1 meeting, which will be held both in-person and virtually at the Log Cabin Pavilion, Morrison Riverfront Park, 1401 Sargent Blvd, Aberdeen, WA 98520.

The 2023 Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor NOF public meeting dates are:

Meeting
March 1 6-8pm Joint Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor Forecast (hybrid: in-person and Zoom)
March 21 6-8pm Willapa Bay Fisheries Discussion (Zoom)
March 22 6-8pm Grays Harbor Fisheries Discussion (Zoom)
March 30 6-8pm Joint Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor Fisheries Discussion (Zoom)
April 12 6-8pm Joint Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor Fisheries Package (Zoom)

Other NOF and Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) public meeting dates:
Meeting
March 3 2023 Salmon Forecasts and Fishing Opportunities, Lacey, WA (Puget Sound, Coastal, and Columbia River)
March 5-10 PFMC Webinar, Seattle WA (link)

March 15 North of Falcon #1
March 29 North of Falcon #2
April 2-7 PFMC Webinar to adopt final federal regulations, Foster City, CA (link)

Please check our website for updated information throughout the NOF process using the first link at the top of the page. 
If you have any questions regarding this schedule, please contact WDFW staff or reply to this email with your questions.

Thank you

Time to groom and bathe the pup and get the horse new shoes.

Here is the Grays Harbor preseason salmon forecast. Formatting is off as I had to convert it to word which throws things off a bit. Last night preseason forecast meeting was a productive one I think but I did notice one thing, damn we are getting old! Those who attended were the same folks that followed and participated in NOF for years. You know on this thread and in general lots of bitching but the bitchers didn't participate. If one thinks a email to staff saying I want to kill a fish is as good as actually participating in the process you would be wrong.


SUBJECT: 2023 Grays Harbor Pre-Season Forecasts-Spring Chinook, fall Chinook, Coho, Chum

Grays Harbor Spring Chinook: 1,232 terminal runsize
Forecast is based on the geometric mean for three-year-old brood year count by age for the last 10 years along with last 10 years average not adjusted for brood performance for the four-, five- and six-year-olds. All are unmarked.

Brood Year 3 yr – 2020 4 yr – 2018 5 yr – 2017 6 yr – 2016 Total
Chehalis 352 817 61 1 1,232


Grays Harbor Natural Coho: Ocean Age three recruits 102,841 (Chehalis River = 92,432 and Humptulips River = 6,212, South Bay Tribs = 4,197
An Ocean Age 3 (OA3) Coho marine survival prediction is applied to Grays Harbor smolt production estimates. The OA3 marine survival prediction uses QDFi prediction of Queets coho January Age 3 marine survival and divides it by the natural mortality rate of 1.23169. The Chehalis wild Coho smolt estimates was developed scaling the 2022 Queets River natural Coho smolt production to the Chehalis River production based on the relationship between the Backward FRAM January Age 3 ocean abundances of Queets and Chehalis natural Coho adult abundances during the past 15 years. Humptulips and South Bay tributary smolt estimates are based on recruit densities scaled from Clearwater and Chehalis basins, respectively.

Grays Harbor Hatchery Coho: 111,430 Ocean Age three recruits (Chehalis River = 80,672 and Humptulips River = 26,073, Grays Harbor Net Pens = 4,685

Forecasts were based on recent 3-year average terminal return/smolt release rates scaled by current hatchery rack returns per release compared to the past five-year average, expanded to Ocean Age 3 recruits based on Bingham Creek hatchery tag recoveries for broodyear released 2013-2016 (most recent full complement of tag code recoveries)(9.81% of the tags recovered per-terminally).

Total Marked Total Unmarked
Chehalis 76,694 3,978
Humptulips 25,935 138
GH net pen 4,685 0


Grays Harbor Fall Natural Chinook: 15,006 terminal runsize (Chehalis River = 10,828 and Humptulips River = 4,178)

The forecast is based on a five-year average geometric mean returns for age 3s, 5s, and 6s, while age 4 forecast is based on a linear relationship of recruits per spawner of age 2 plus age 3s to age 4 recruits per spawner. Humptulips age 5s is based on a 10-year average linear relationship of recruits per spawner between age 4s to age 5s.

Brood Year 3 yr – 2020 4 yr – 2019 5 yr – 2018 6 yr – 2017 Total
Chehalis 1,872 6,942 1,967 47 10,828
Humptulips 631 2,364 1,176 7 4,178

Grays Harbor Fall Hatchery Chinook: 5,922 terminal runsize (Chehalis River = 1,196 and Humptulips River = 4,726)

Hatchery forecasts for both stocks are based on the same methods. For age 3, a ten-year average recruits per release is applied to the 2020 smolt releases. Age 4 returns are based on the age class relationships determined from log linear regressions for 4-year-olds returns per release to 2- and 3-year-olds returns per release for broodyears 1991 to 2019, applied to the 2022 age 2 and 3 return value. Age 5 method is similar to age 4 but uses the relationship between age 5 returns per release and age 4 return per release for broodyears 1991 to 2017 than applied to the 2022 age 4 return value. Forecast for age 6 fish is based on the most recent mean 5-year return per release for 6-year-olds adjusted by brood performance of the most recent age 5 return per release as it relates to the previous 5-year average return per release.

Chinook Marked / Unmarked Information

Chehalis River
Brood Year 3 yr – 2020 4 yr – 2019 5 yr – 2018 6 y – 2017 Total
2023 Forecast 378 518 299 1 1,196
Mark Rate 0.983 0.998 .953 1.00
Marked 372 517 285 1 1,175
Unmarked 6 1 14 0 21

Humptulips River
Brood Year 3 yr – 2020 4 yr – 2019 5 y – 2018 6 y – 2017 Total
2023 Forecast 824 2,868 1,032 2 4,726
Mark Rate 0.994 0.993 0.992 0.993
Marked 819 2,848 1,024 2 4,693
Unmarked 5 20 8 0 33




Grays Harbor Chum: 53,519 terminal run size (Naturals 51,976 hatchery origin 1,543)

The wild chum forecast utilizes the relationship of recruits per spawner for 3-year-olds (Broodyears 2000-2019) to the NPGO (Jan-March) 2000-2019 to predict the 3-year-old component. Selection to use NPGO over last year’s use of the Upwelling Anomaly was due to a more consistent model performance over time. The 4-year-old component in forecasted using the last five years average recruits per spawner applied to the 2019 escapement.
Sibling relationship between 3-year and 4-year-olds is poor and model performance using ocean variable was inconsistent. The 5-year-old component is predicted using a 5-year average recruits per spawner adjusted by brood performance of 4-year-olds. There is a survival relationship between 4-year-old chum and the following year 5-year-old that is not seen between the 3s and 4s. The use of marine variables was not as consistence over time as a sibling based forecast model.
Hatchery component forecast is based on the most recent 5-year mean return/release.

Grays Harbor wild and hatchery forecasts
Brood Year 3 yr – 2020 4 yr – 2019 5 yr – 2018 Total
Wild 19,658 30,990 1,328 51,976
Hatchery 422 894 227 1,543

The disgruntled angler has the right to bitch. Mismanagement of salmon/steelhead seasons and 30,000 surplus coho is a pretty good reason to. But keep planting those fish that we will never get to fish for, that will eventually be rotting on the banks of the Elma ponds.

Hatchery fish are raised for harvest and paid for by the license holders right? If so, you guys collect your eggs and let us collect our fish. Not a heaping pile of fish but you know what i mean.

I think this opinion article is relevant at this time.



Salmon management must build on the lessons of the past 50 years

Ed Johnstone

Chairman, Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission

One year from now, in February 2024, we will mark the 50th anniversary of federal Judge George Boldt’s ruling in United States vs. Washington, which affirmed tribes’ treaty-reserved rights to harvest salmon outside of our reservations.

The court case was brought about by the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ’70s, when state authorities arrested tribal fishermen violently — often with tear gas — for exercising the fishing rights we reserved in the Stevens treaties of the 1850s. The state confiscated our boats, our nets and our fish. Racism against Native Americans seemed to be at an all-time high.

Now, despite the co-management relationship we have developed since then to manage salmon harvest with the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), some elected state leaders seem determined to set tribal fishermen up to endure that kind of racism again.

Gov. Jay Inslee recently asked state legislators to pass a bill banning commercial gillnets on the Columbia River. He knew this would put a target on our backs because he offered to include $500,000 for fish and wildlife enforcement to prevent the expected increase in harassment of tribal gillnetters.

Member tribes of NWIFC, Columbia River Inter-tribal Fish Commission and Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians formally opposed this legislation, but Inslee’s senior policy adviser implied at a senate committee meeting that, because the governor’s office held several meetings with tribes, we had been consulted. These meetings were not in the spirit of government-to-government consultation. True consultation requires tribes’ free, prior and informed consent to policies affecting our treaty-protected resources. The governor’s office disregarded our concerns.

Fortunately, this bill did not make it out of committee, but we shouldn’t even be having these conversations. While the proposed legislation would not have applied to tribal fisheries, this discourse endorses the misconception that the gear used in tribal fisheries is somehow harmful to salmon recovery.

Tribes use gillnets because they are selective by time, place and mesh size. Nets are the most efficient way for us to harvest salmon while causing the least amount of impact on other species.

Tribes already have reduced their chinook salmon harvest by 60-95% since the 1980s, at great cost to our way of life. If recovering salmon were as easy as taking tribal nets out of the water, we would have done it by now. The Stillaguamish Tribe of Indians hasn’t held a commercial chinook harvest

in decades, and yet low numbers of Stillaguamish River chinook continue to constrain state and federal harvest allocations each year.

If conservation were truly their goal, elected leaders would do the hard work of protecting and restoring salmon habitat. Preventing landowners from degrading and destroying habitat. Ensuring our streams and rivers are protected from the high temperatures and low flows exacerbated by climate change. Amending legislation to allow for the management of marine mammal predation of salmon. Increasing funding for hatchery production for harvest and to protect endangered runs that lack sufficient habitat to sustain their populations. These are the areas we need to focus on.

Tribal governments and WDFW have worked too hard to reach our current level of co-management to be undermined by calls to ban gillnets. For the first decade after the Boldt decision, the state continued to work against us. During a meeting with tribal leaders in the 1980s, Bill Wilkerson, then director of the state Department of Fisheries, turned his attention to the technical staff that were resistant to work with the tribes.

“I don’t want to hear that anymore,” he told them. “If you’re going to keep going down that pathway, just walk right out the door.”

Tribal and state co-managers have learned a lot of lessons since then. We all need to work together — not against each other. It’s what we have to do if we hope to have salmon to harvest for another 50 years.

Ed Johnstone is a member of the Quinault Indian Nation. As a statement from the NWIFC chairman, the column represents the natural resources management concerns of the treaty tribes in Western Washington.

Mr. Johnstone says "the co-management relationship we (Tribes and WDFW) have developed" Really? His definition of co- management and mine are definitely not the the same. His definition of gillnets being selective is another bone to pick.When the tribes continue to kill wild salmon and steelhead and the the burden of wild fish conservation is always on the rec anglers.

The tribes have learned alot. Not so much for state officials.

LOL

Ed Johnstone, or his ghostwriter, wrote: "These meetings were not in the spirit of government-to-government consultation. True consultation requires tribes’ free, prior and informed consent to policies affecting our treaty-protected resources. The governor’s office disregarded our concerns."

It's nonsense to hold that consultation requires ". . . tribes' free, prior, and informed consent . . ." before adopting a policy. Mr. Johnstone clearly doesn't expect that the Quinault Indian Nation needs the "free, prior, and informed consent" of the state before adopting a Tribal policy. I can't help but conclude that Mr. Johnstone is blind to co-management actually being a two-way street.

Amen, Salmo. The Tribes want, and have been given, veto power over non-Indian fishing. I believe the reason for this is Boldt II. Habitat. The State is rightfully afraid that their actions have **cked the fish and Boldt actually guarantees fish to catch and not just water to drag gear through. So, essentially, WA traded fish for land and development. And Casino Gambling.

3/04/2023

WDFW and QIN bad feelings started a long ago.

Wynoochee River, Dam and major fish hatchery in the area just below the dam. To many meetings, to many groups involved, to slow to spent the "original monies", so Federal's took the monies back, and spent it on the Afghanistan war effort.

Just think, major hatchery, water right from the lake, cool no major heating problems in the summer time, less problem with diseases that have been a problem at Lake Aberdeen. Could have been a Spring Chinook, Coho, Fall Chinook, steelhead(winters and summers), maybe even searun cutthoat. Gone, gone, gone, but of indecisions by WDFW.

2nd Phase.....Holding ponds, in same area......never got done

then the 2.4 million "Wynoochee Mitigation", meetings by bucket full, presentations before the Full Commission, WDFW personel told to "get that Wynoochee taken care of".....QIN wanted it taken care of, most sports also...still to this day, 30+ years......not done!!!!!

I was very involved in the rearing ponds, having contributed to the pollution abatement design. I do know that some in WDFW wanted the money spent on wild fish/habitat regardless of the fact that it was mitigation for a specific number of fish. To them, habitat was the "warm and fuzzy"; didn't have to actually produce the lost fish.

About 77,100 lower Columbia River “tule” Chinook are expected to return this year, a reduction from the 2022 return of 87,542 fish. Approximately 213,200 total Columbia River tule Chinook, comprised of lower river and Bonneville Pool stocks, are forecast to return this year. These fish make up a sizeable portion of the recreational ocean fishery. Chinook returns to Willapa Bay and the Chehalis and Humptulips rivers are also expected to decline slightly in 2023

This is from the last WDFW press release and you have got to love the word smithing WDFW does. Decline slightly in GH & Willapa is what it says but a better way to say it absolute disaster! Nearly 50% of the fall Chinook run will be taken by the massive marine harvest in BC & AK . Nobody objects including the QIN. WE have become a bit like sheep being sheared.

Through the history of salmon management AK is treated differently. A US Commissioner to PST once asked if AK and the US could agree on a point. Nobody but them catches their fish so nobody has a hammer.

Notice that for many listed fish down here NOAA bases management on "Southern Exploitation Rate". That would be south of BC; north they get a pass.

AK has, or had, an outsized political pressure they can wield in Congress, The fish pay for it while we all head north to catch them before they "count".

Larest from NOAA that a Friend sent it to me but here is the entire press release and it is mostly south.

Inseason Actions in 2023 Ocean Salmon Fisheries, South of Cape Falcon Recreational & Commercial
NOAA Fisheries has taken inseason action in the Pre-May 16, 2023 recreational and commercial salmon fisheries south of Cape Falcon (SOF). Modifications are needed to conserve SOF impacts on Klamath River fall-run Chinook salmon and Sacramento River fall-run Chinook salmon.
The following fisheries have been modified by inseason action:
Oregon
• The commercial salmon fishery from Cape Falcon to the Heceta Bank Line (latitude 43°58′00" N), OR, previously scheduled to open on March 15, 2023. The fishery is closed starting 12:01 AM March 15, 2023, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The commercial salmon fishery from the Heceta Bank Line (latitude 43°58′00" N), OR, to Humbug Mountain, OR, previously scheduled to open on March 15, 2023. The fishery is closed starting 12:01 AM March 15, 2023, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The commercial salmon fishery from Humbug Mountain to the Oregon/California border (Oregon Klamath Management Zone), previously scheduled to open on March 15, 2023. The fishery is closed starting 12:01 AM March 15, 2023, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The ocean salmon recreational fishery from Cape Falcon to Humbug Mountain, OR, previously scheduled to open on March 15, 2023. The fishery is closed starting 12:01 AM March 15, 2023, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
California
• The commercial salmon fishery from the Oregon/California border to Humbolt South Jetty, previously scheduled to open on May 1, 2023 through the earlier of May 31, 2023, or a 3,000 Chinook salmon quota. This fishery is closed starting May 1, 2023 12:01 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The commercial salmon fishery from the area between latitude 40°10’ N and Point Arena, CA (Fort Bragg management area), previously scheduled to open on April 16, 2023. The fishery is closed starting 12:01 AM April 16, 2023, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The commercial salmon fishery from Point Arena, CA, to Pigeon Point, CA (San Francisco management area), previously scheduled to open on May 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting May 1, 2023 12:01 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The commercial ocean salmon fishery in the area from Pigeon Point, CA, to the U.S./Mexico Border (Monterey management area), previously scheduled to open May 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting May 1, 2023 12:01 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The ocean salmon recreational fishery from the Oregon/California border to latitude 40°10’ N, previously scheduled to open on May 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting May 1, 2023 12:01 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The ocean salmon recreational fishery from latitude 40°10’ N and Point Arena, CA (Fort Bragg management area), previously scheduled to open on April 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting April 1, 2023 12:01 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The ocean salmon recreational fishery from Point Arena, CA to Pigeon Point, CA (San Francisco Management Area), previously scheduled to open on April 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting April 1, 2023 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.
• The ocean salmon recreation fishery from Pigeon Point, CA to the U.S./Mexico border (Monterey Management Area), previously scheduled to open on April 1, 2023. This fishery is closed starting April 1, 2023 AM, through May 15, 2023 11:59 PM.



Please refer to the Final Rule for the West Coast Salmon Fisheries 2022 – 2023 Specifications and Management Measures for additional regulations and supporting materials.
The 2023 – 2024 Specifications and Management Measures currently in development will be posted here.

Ya think NOAA is finally waking up to the "problems" our salmon are having? Or has the lawsuit saying they need to pay attention to SRKWs actually opened their eyes?

They are also getting hammered rather hard by the trawl bycatch in AK.