Obsessed

Let's talk about what you have said. Believe me, no one hates dams more then I do, nor do they understand more then I do what they have done as far as blockage of both up and down stream fish passage! Saying that, one has to look at my first harvest chart and think about this; the Grand Coulee Dam went into operation on July 16, 1933 when you look at the chart, you can see a huge peak (about 1882) in harvest and shortly afterwards there was a huge drop somewhere around 1888.

There were no dams on the Columbia then, and they netted all year long. So what made those run's drop that much in that time period? There was no rapid population growth to degrade the habitat at that time, so what do you think happen? Was it harvest, was it lack of escapement… what was it?

I know this is only one specie (chinook), but this same specie is also the same specie that science is now using on the Columbia as a diagnosis species, which is also now being used in the Ecosystem Diagnosis and Treatment Method (EDT) process on the Columbia River.

So a person should be able to feel comfortable by using "Chinook" as an example on my chart. Remember, it is only being used as an example here. Since there were no dams between 1882 and 1888, what do you think was the reason for such a huge decline in harvest? If you look at time periods from 1888 to 1933, when the first dam went in, harvest rates were already heading downward rapidly. There was no "great lost" of habitat that was caused by "the mother of all dams" at the time, nor where there any other dams, but yet fish runs were going downwards fairly fast.

If you look at the harvest rate of fish after those "21" other dams went in, the runs had already in my mind, started downward drastically! There is no question that each additional dam has "helped" turned production downward, but the major trend was already headed that way. What is your opinion why it was so?

Around 1986 we had another spike that brought the run size back up again, and I am sure when the next graph comes out, you are going to see a huge spike from 2000-2005. So what does all this mean? Are our salmon and Steelhead runs on the curve to come back? Or is it to late to change the curve?

I am not really sold on that one yet! To me, it looks like commercial harvest had a huge roll in deciding the declines on the Columbia! It appears that blame could be divided up to about 50% commercial, and 50% to the dams. It looks like the two are the true culprits to me!


Cowlitzfisherman

At the end of the day it is the NETS that need to be stopped. Plain and simple the whole world over. Study after study can show how commercial megaharvesting has decimated the runs of most of the fish on the planet ...

As Bart Simpson would say: "DOH!!!!!

Grandpa

When will the people in this state ever figure it out! Now, if the Tribes were as smart as some think they are, wouldn't you think that they would be the first ones to propose the banning of ALL gill net fishing? They would get back ten times more then they do now (for the most part), and fish would once again be able to do there thing!

50% is still 50% no mater how you get them!

When will MAN ever learn…..be it white, red, black, or whatever?

Cowlitzfisherman

CRF, the tribes may actualy be smart in not wanting non-tribal gillnets banned, some where in the treatys its says they can fish in-common with the people of the state, if there were no gillnets they wouldnt be in common with anyone

What is your proposed strategy or plan to get rid of the nets? How are you going initiate change?

DH,

My strategy is one of incremental change. It won't be long before WSC and its allies get statewide WSR. Then I'm expecting we'll get WT to shift gears from sensational conservation to effective conservation. Then we'll do the near impossible and unite the majority of the fish conservation interests. Then we ally ourselves with a like-minded deep pocket. Then CFM will, one-by-one, buy every Columiba River gillnet license that can be purchased on a willing seller basis. Oh, while we're tapping that deep pocket, we lobby the legislature to amend state law pertaining to viable fisheries for commercial interests. Another arm of the alliance will seek to further marginalize the economic feasibility of the salmon net fisheries, as if it really needs it. After we have state law reading that commercial net fishing can be allowed only on stocks that cannot be sufficiently exploited by recreational fishing, we can reasonably turn our attention to improving Treaty fisheries.

I don't mean eliminating Treaty fisheries. I mean developing alternative harvest strategies and facilities for the Columbia treaty harvest, so that surplus hatchery fish can be harvested while wild fish are released. On Puget Sound, changes in the treaty fishery should be persued on a business basis - buying allocations from tribes when there is greater economic value associated with increased recreational exploitation, and there likely will be as the human population continues to grow. I'm fairly convinced that these changes are only going to occur when there is a mutual economic benefit.

And, oh, let's see . . . I guess I'll be able to stay busy after retirement after all.

Sincerely,
and only slightly t.i.c.,

Salmo g.

A guy got to start somewhere!!
Sounds good to me Salmo….as long as I can pay those gill netters off with these

CF, what I see in your chinook graph is a rapid increase in harvest to the late 19th century, followed by a decline, followed by a new level of sustainable effort, followed by steady decline after the 1920s. The sustained harvest that was shown from say the 1880s and early 1920s probably wouldn't have lasted, but the true decline certainly does coincide with the dams, after the early 20s.

Don't know about the bump in the mid-80s, but I do know it coincided with large increases in catch state-wide. God must waved his hand over the ocean or something. Just goes to show how ocean conditions can exert a tremendous influence. Good ocean conditions will exert an influence in Columbia numbers over the past few years, as you point out, but keep in mind, most of these are hatchery fish, not wild. If left to natural production, the glory days of the Columbia are gone.

I believe that the reason for the double peak in chinook harvest is also due to the high effort of commercial fishing.

Through the late 1800's almost all the chinook commercially harvested in the Columbia were highly valued Spring Chinook. Around 1910 or so, the population of springers was in serious, serious decline due to overharvest. Commercial fishers then swapped to Fall Chinook, much less valuable commercially, but still available in fishable numbers.

Initially after the switch from fishing over a depressed run to fishing over an underutilized run, the harvest rates shot up...and then started to decline due to, big surprise, overharvest.

Then the dams came along and really put the screws to both the runs of chinook.

All this info can be found in "Salmon Without Rivers" by Jim Lichatowich, and is backed up by reference to documents outlining the timing and amount of harvest throughout those years.

The above writing by me may not be totally accurate, as I don't have the book here with me, but to the best of my memory, that's what happened. I check the book later, and if something different presents itself, I'll correct my above assertions.

I think it's pretty clear that dramatic declines of Columbia River chinook were taking place before the dams were built, but that the dams really took the ball and ran after their construction.

Fish on...

Todd.

Todd

You got it right, brother. I am a Lichatowich disciple as well.... by far the best authority on the decline of the West Coast's premier chinook salmon superhighway. Decades of overharvest, habitat degradation, mining of wild eggs for broodstock and piss-poor hatchery practices took their toll on the mighty Columbia and had her well on her way to the coffin before the first of the concrete was poured. The dams were just the nails used to seal it!

One of the greatest myths ever perpetuated in this century-long tragedy is how hatcheries would ultimately help us to recover wild stocks. We were lulled into a dangerous conceit that we could artifically manufacture salmon at will without regard for the various habitats that are required to fulfill their natural life histories... hence the title "Salmon without Rivers." Never once has hatchery production proven itself superior to wild production... the key is decent habitat.

Yes we can get more of those eggs to smolt stage faster and in greater numbers than Mother Nature, but then what? These hatchery mutants have such dismal estuarine/ocean survival that perhaps only 1 or 2 percent survive to adulthood. The true measure of production is not how many eggs or how many smolt, but rather how many returning adults.

As our hatchery practices evolve more and more toward drainage-specific broodstock programs, the key question fish managers must be held accountable to is whether the hatchery's productivity at least matches that of the brood river's natural productivity. If we are going to mine eggs for artificial propogation, we damn well better be sure we're getting back at least as many returning adults as we would get if the eggs had been naturally seeded in the gravel. My $0.02.... okay that was a little long.... call it $0.03!

Doc,

I'll make my comment, for now, very brief, as it's almost 3am.

Hatchery production in this state has, for the most part, been assessed as successful or not based on smot production, rather than adult return.

This is like paying farmers for how many seeds they plant, rather than how many plants they grow.

A major goal of the HSRG is to set production goals so that hatchery programs can actually be graded on performance, rather than graded on mere operation.

Later.

Todd.

perfect summation Todd