Why imagine?


It's here.


All our rivers are closing one by one.

Mike sent this change to the 2017 season. Sorry on the formatting of the numbers but easy to figure.


Hi all,

During the spring NOF meeting, the regulation package for the Grays Harbor planning model that was provided to you had a treaty/non-treaty imbalance of Chinook harvest favoring the State. Although these imbalances have occurred before, the co-managers asked for both sides to make some fish management changes to both address this imbalance as well as make more progress toward spawner escapement objectives. We discussed ways to make changes that would minimize impacts on our fisheries and agreed to make the following changes: going mark selective for Chinook in the Humptulips River and North Bay Area 2-2 for the full recreational season. There is also a change in the non-treaty commercial schedule. Due to 3/4 conflicts, the four days originally scheduled during week 46 in Areas 2A/D will be rescheduled to Monday through Thursday in week 45 (see attached planning model). These modifications will change our terminal impact as follows (NOR = natural origin recruits (wild), HOR = hatchery origin recruits)) (these do not include our ocean fisheries impacts):

Impact differences Chinook Coho Chum
NOR HOR NOR HOR total
Original Model 1,558 1,861 5,406 5,617 4,755
Revised 797 1,862 5,477 5,666 4,998

These changes will require us to file a supplemental CR102. If you are interested, we can schedule an advisor meeting before filing the supplemental next Tuesday.

These comments were sent to me and from my seat in the nose bleed section do a good job of capturing this perspective.

Mike,

It was great that the co-managers decided to “make more progress toward spawner escapement objectives”. With the recreational fishermen giving up 766 Chinook we now almost meet the basin wide escapement goal for NOR Chinook. Unfortunately the new model shows that we made the basin wide escapement shortfall even worse for both coho and chum. All three species still fail to meet their basin wide escapement goals.

This would have been a great time to address the imbalance for chum in the original plan. The QIN originally intended to harvest 8,696 chum which is 3,546 fish more than their 50% share of the harvestable total and nearly equal to the predicted chum under escapement of 3,151 fish. So with chum facing significant under escapement the co-managers decide to increase harvest for both groups driving the under escapement to 3,556 fish. This model indicates that the QIN plan to boost their harvest to 8,858 chum or 3,708 fish over their share resulting in all of the escapement short fall. Overall I would suggest that the co-managers failed to make progress toward spawner escapement objectives while giving up significant recreational opportunity.

Thanks River for staying on top of "These Dirty Deals" and for your expertise in digging into these numbers and making the math make sense to the rest of us!

These back room deals are going on all over our watersheds, some we sniff out, others we don't. In the end, the results (which we, the sportsmen don't get included in) get rammed down our throats!

and anthers thoughts.

Saw XXXXX note on how sports just lost few Chinook impacts left in GH. Bottom line seems to be that after WA waters ocean harvest by commercial trollers, charter boats, etc. , there are only impacts left for tribes. This is a bay where FD (Fish Department) is managing for true escapement/conservation now. Nothing left for sports there.

This reminds me of the analogy I have been visualizing between tribes in GH and the threat of commercial traps in Willapa. As we know, the North Willapa Bay and river sport fishery is about to get its lump of coal when HORs quit coming back in a year or two. This leaves south bay and the looming gold rush for HORs in the south. This rush which I call a search for The Golden Fleece, is under a full court press from some soon to be ex Chinook netters and the FD. It is taking the form of a sudden yearning for conservation, as commercial traps in our fresh water. These would need enough fish to "pay their own way" plus profit after being bartered the fish by the government. As I have envisioned, this approach would have little or no room for recreational fishers in the bay or fresh water. Bay fishers would have to back off to let HORs through to pay WDFW and trappers bills plus profit. In effect Willapa's lack of tribal preemption can be replaced with trapper preemption. We now have less than escapement crossing our bar. We are headed for a 14% mortality rate in two years per our tattered policy. This was calculated to recover true NOS in twenty or so years. There is no room for both netting and sport fishing under this scenario. Enter the real world of ocean conditions which are far worse than the policy calcs assumed. 14% will be too much. If our Director and commercial only advisors install commercial traps which must pay their own way with recreational priority fish, there can be only enough left for our new tribes, in the form of commercial trappers. I will call them CTs. Tribes and commercials get much of our fish in the WA ocean, along with charters and sport boats. A way to bend the escapement curve and keep commercials on Chinook is to give them all impacts left under the guise of conservation and FD poor mouthing about budget. At the same time, as this year, with CT"testing" replacing effective weirs FD refuses to install or even repair before imminent failure, FD can plant huge amounts of HORs, now needed of course to feed CTs and itself. This is The Golden Fleece, because sports will continue to pay lion's share of harvester bills, just like now, and lose their priority while doing it. Sports would get fleeced worse than now, traps allocated in number and location by Director and his All CT team. Sports get to whine and argue about rules after the fact, just like now. Like sheep we get fleeced once per year. We would be standing between FD budget and CT profit and our Chinook. Bad place to be. This is the result of years of FD led meetings where we only argue about how much of sport priority goes to commercial each year. Commercial priority is just in their bag and not up for reallocation. It could soon approximate the situation in GH where there is now effectively no sport fishery for Chinook. CTs become our tribes, get whatever it takes to fund WDFW and commercial industry ex vessel value set behind closed doors. In below nominal ocean conditions, this CT share of returnees is now about to become well over half. Previously underfunded enforcement will flock to river banks to guard traps. All paid for by selling sportfisher wool.

Since Willapa Policy was adopted by the Commission, set asides for conservation have been openly ignored, along with requirements for payback for overharvest. Should we get CTs, and set asides for sports, what reason have we to believe our set asides would be honored any more than than they have already?

Fish traps have no place in our sport fishing holes, and FD has no business putting CTs on our backs. Two of the best surviving riverine sport fisheries in the state, Nemah for Chinook, and Naselle for Coho, are on the block. The best small boat sport fishery, North Bay and Willapa River, has its die cast and is gone in two years.

All should be aware, and all should speak up. It will be up to the Director of WDFW, the Commission, or our Governor and legislature to stop this Golden Fleecing. There is a simple solution. Honor the one recreational priority we the sheep have in Willapa, Coastal Fall Chinook. These bodies must have the will to honor our one recreational priority in Willapa. The Fish Department does not.

This is off the model and the Prior tab always had Coho but this time Chinook also. So scroll down to Chinook and sort out the numbers and you will see the problem. After AK & BC most of the damage is done then you have our fisheries and Southern fisheries. So by the time you get terminal it is pretty much done. So the concerns on sharing get a little distorted but bottom line the 21, 824 return to GH is all that is left from the nearly 48,000 ocean abundance prior to marine harvest. If you want the model PM.

Model Run : 1731

GRAYS HARBOR COHO
FISHERY Wild Hatchery Total
Projected Ocean Escapement 47,872 33,274 81,147
Spawning Escapement Objective 35,400
Projected Marine Exploitation Rate 4%
Projected Exploitation Rate (all fisheries) 29%
Exploitation in Southern U.S. Marine Fisheries 3%
- - -
CANADIAN 433 854 1,287
ALASKA 219 154 373
S. of Falcon Troll 40 29 69
S. of Falcon Sport 178 233 411
NORTH OF CAPE FALCON OCEAN: - -
Treaty Troll 516 364 880
NT Troll N. Leadbttr 97 151 248
NT Troll S. Leadbttr 89 100 189
Coastal terminal area "dip-ins" 288 196 484
Treaty dip-ins 102 67 169
Non-treaty dip-ins 186 129 315
Sport: Area 1 70 206 276
Buoy 10 14 40 54
Area 2 243 700 943
Area 3 10 28 38
Area 4 * 19 58 77
PUGET SOUND CATCHES: - -
Treaty Troll 1 0 1
Sport: Areas 5 19 78 97
Area 6 0 0 0
Areas 7-13 0 0 0
Nontreaty Net 4 2 6
Treaty Net 15 11 26

IN-RIVER:
Treaty Commercial 7,137 5,277 12,414
Non-treaty commercial 1,269 821 2,090
Non-treaty sport 4,137 4,797 8,933
Chehalis Tribe 554 1,403 1,956

Summary
Treaty 7,771 5,719 13,490
Non-treaty 7,580 9,782 17,362
US Non-treaty 7,147 8,928 16,075
WA Non-treaty 6,710 8,512 15,222



Model Run: 1417 (May-April, Age 2-5 AEQ Total Mortality)

GRAYS HARBOR CHINOOK
PRIORS WILD HATCHERY TOTAL
SEAK 7,232 2,929 10,162
CANADIAN 4,196 1,714 5,910
SUS NON-TREATY 275 112 387
SUS TREATY 72 28 100

IN-RIVER
TREATY 2,307 859 3,166
NON-TREATY 1,609 1,861 3,470

TOTAL TREATY 2,378 888 3,266
TOTAL U.S. NON-TREATY 9,116 4,903 14,018


SUMMARY
NORTHERN FISHERIES 11,428 4,644 16,072
SOUTHERN US (SUS) 4,262 2,861 7,123

SUS TREATY 2,378 888 3,266
SUS NON-TREATY 1,883 1,973 3,857

Another "bend over and take it" year.

OK this is a notice for a couple of meetings for the Willapa commercial trap that WDF&W is moving with. Kinda controversial for some folks.


July 5, 2017

The Willapa Bay Salmon Management Policy (C- 36 22) seeks to achieve conservation and restoration of wild salmon in Willapa Bay and avoid ESA designation of any salmon species. While conservation of salmon species within Willa pa Bay is the paramount objective of the policy, the policy also seeks to maintain the economic well-being and stability of both recreational and commercial fisheries within Willapa Bay. Under Guiding Principle #4, the Department is to investigate and promote the development and implementation of alternative selective gear to provide an opportunity to target fishery harvests on abundant hatchery fish stocks, reduce the number of hatchery-origin fish in natural spawning areas, limit mortalities on non-target species and stocks, and provide commercial fishing
opport unities .

The Department filed a CR-101 (WSR 17-13-047) through the Rule Making process for an experimental fishery in Willa pa Bay with the use of a floating fish trap in 2017.

The Department will hold two meetings (advisory and public) to discuss and solicit public input regarding the rules (CR-102) that will govern the experimental fishery through the Rule Making p rocess .

Meeting dates and times are as follows:

Willapa Bay Advisory Group Meeting
July 19, 2017
1 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the Montesano Regional Office

Willapa Bay Public Meeting
July 20, 2017
6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Montesano City Hall

If you have any questions, please contact Annette Hoffmann by phone #360.249.1201 or email Annette.Hoffmann@dfw.wa.gov

Know if they have managed to get this project in the neighborhood of legal permit-wise?

CM it is the Bill Z answer, yes / no / what the hell? This something that Doc and others might want to do. Barbara.Mcclellan@dfw.wa.gov

Hi Everyone, The reason for my email is to find out if there is anyone that will be fishing the Willapa Bay marine area 2.1 in August and/or early September more than just one time.

I’m looking for volunteers (about 15 people) who would agree to take genetic samples (caudal fin clip) from unmarked Chinook (which are required to be released this fall) while fishing the Willapa Bay marine area 2.1in August and/or early September. I’m looking for volunteers who may go fishing in Willapa Bay a few times during this six week period.

We need more data on the recreational fishery that occurs in the Willapa Bay marine area and its stock composition during that time.

Safe handling rules would apply. The fish would not need to be taken fully out of the water in order to retrieve a caudal fin clip.

We do have a limited creel program sampling the marine fishery but since the unmarked Chinook are required to be released we won’t have access to those fish at the dock.

I will provide everything you will need. I’m just looking for volunteers to help.

If you are interested, please send me an email or contact me via my cell phone, #360.470.3459.
If you know anyone who might be interested and you feel they would make sure to follow the safe handing techniques, please give them my cell phone number and ask them to contact me.

Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Barbara

This is for the bit where WDF&W is trying a commercial trap in Willapa for anyone interested. Lot going on and I am not that familiar with it enough to comment other than it has been a Keystone Cops exercise for the ages. Remember the Adviser meetings are public watch only.


July 5, 2017

The Willapa Bay Salmon Management Policy (C- 36 22) seeks to achieve conservation and restoration of wild salmon in Willapa Bay and avoid ESA designation of any salmon species. While conservation of salmon species within Willa pa Bay is the paramount objective of the policy, the policy also seeks to maintain the economic well-being and stability of both recreational and commercial fisheries within Willapa Bay. Under Guiding Principle #4, the Department is to investigate and promote the development and implementation of alternative selective gear to provide an opportunity to target fishery harvests on abundant hatchery fish stocks, reduce the number of hatchery-origin fish in natural spawning areas, limit mortalities on non-target species and stocks, and provide commercial fishing
opport unities .

The Department filed a CR-101 (WSR 17-13-047) through the Rule Making process for an experimental fishery in Willa pa Bay with the use of a floating fish trap in 2017.

The Department will hold two meetings (advisory and public) to discuss and solicit public input regarding the rules (CR-102) that will govern the experimental fishery through the Rule Making p rocess .

Meeting dates and times are as follows:

Willapa Bay Advisory Group Meeting
July 19, 2017
1 p.m. to 3 p.m. at the Montesano Regional Office

Willapa Bay Public Meeting
July 20, 2017
6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Montesano City Hall

If you have any questions, please contact Annette Hoffmann by phone #360.249.1201 or email Annette.Hoffmann@dfw.wa.gov

I have procrastinated for sometime about trying to bring the issues surrounding Willapa salmon forward but I think it is time everyone has a general idea of what is going and the probable outcome of WDF&W's actions so here we go. Oh keep in mind this is my opinion and others have a different view. In the past few months WDF&W has been attempting to move a process forward to install a commercial trap for salmon in Willapa Harbor. The primary objective being to remove hatchery fish, primarily Chinook, from the Naselle. This is driven by the fact that WDF&W violated both the legislative mandate that the funding to increase Naselle Chinook obtained by Rep. Blake had the caveat that they must meet HSRG requirements which the Naselle Hatchery cannot due to a failing weir. Right here right now everyone get their arms around this fact. Ron Warren who heads fish management made the decision to release those smolt, with the approval of the Director I assume, and those two gentlemen own this mess and why will become apparent in a bit.

This process that was assigned to Region 6 staff who started forward and at this point I will say I cannot explain it. From starting with a request for alternative harvest methods in the bay it appears from statements that a trap concept in the bay was the preferred solution and participation was limited. Only one individual stepped forward with a acceptable plan but in short order that stumbled as it needed to be in small water to succeed so it is my understanding that Ron Warren authorized the move to fresh water. This is where I stop trying to even explain what happened and is still happening. From meetings that some call secret to changing protocols to benefit one person ( claimed by some ) to limiting input I mean folks this is ugly. The documentation for this can be viewed at http://wdfw.wa.gov/about/regulations/development.html including tapes of the meetings under Trail Fishery Willapa Bay. Key here is the jump from marine to fresh water of commercial harvest and that is a big deal. To accomplish this the process gives the word strange a bad name. I am going to ask the Advocacy to put this process and time line on paper for you folks but to call the process strange is really an understatement of epic proportions.

So putting that aside for follow up let us go to just what this means for all of us commercial and Rec. So first up let us say that the trap concept evolves through trial and error and is successful. To keep our eyes on the football success is defined as " The removal of a very substantial portion of the hatchery return with a mortality rate of between 4 & 10% of the natural production adults released ". This would bring the Naselle into HSRG compliance on straying rates which would insure the Naselle Chinook program could continue. At this point one should come to grips with this fact. While the Rec and Commercial fishers in Willapa have benefitted from the Chinook production in Willapa its purpose was to feed the ocean pool to increase the availability of Chinook for harvest in targeted marine areas well North of Willapa. So it is important to WDF&W that they solve this issue on the terminal end but the solution of ending straying does not necessarily mean to the benefit of terminal fishers or local communities but rather WDF&W's ability to feed low cost Chinook production into the marine Chinook harvest.

So the trap concept is successful but that will come with a price as only so many NOR ( wild ) impacts are available. This first year it is 24 or so for the trap which is not many but now it is successful and to be successful you need to operate darn near 7 days a week. So where do those impacts come from? Well first up is the Commercial gillnets and I doubt if they will care for that much and the hit can, could and likely will rather large down to maybe restricting their Coho fishery depending on runsizes.

Now on the Rec side the Marine fishery should be the same but WDF&W would try to chip away at things like always and don't say not because a Zebra does not change its stripes anymore than WDF&W changes its ways. In river? This will dramatic as the Naselle fisheries have benefitted greatly from the straying so if you remove the vast majority of stays you are down to fishing in a river that has not made natural escapement with the straying. My crystal ball is not that good but one thing for certain is that the C&R mortality with the vastly reduced hatchery fish in the pool would require additional NOR mortalities. In this scenario the conflict between the marine Rec, NT Commercial, and freshwater Rec would be intense to say the least and my guess is inriver would not get the gold mine but rather the shaft.

So to the second part and what happens if the trap concept is a total failure and WDF&W continues production to feed the ocean pool. Failure is defined as " The failure to removal of a very substantial portion of the hatchery return with a mortality rate of between 4 & 10% of the natural production adults released ". To be honest with this scenario I doubt the marine Rec fisher would notice much change if any. The NT Commercial would see a lot of fish but the limiter is the NOR adults and frankly I do not see long term they pursue Chinook as a target fishery. Common sense says just drop this fight of the last few years and use their NOR Chinook impacts pursuing Coho. They darn near lose their shirt purchasing and maintaining the tangle nets and it is a losing proposition when you add the Willapa Policy which dictates reducing the Commercial NOR impacts. It is a no brainer to back up and use their NOR impacts where they get a bang for the buck and have a chance to survive. What about the freshwater REC? Well now this changes with failure as they will benefit from some to hugely. The straying will likely be similar or greater than at the present so dependent on the NOR returning adults being the limiter the NOR hooking mortality would be the only harvest side issue.

So now to the fish. The Willapa Chinook wild population is rather small in comparison to the hatchery returns. Additionally I have been told than genetic sampling has shown that Willapa Chinook as a whole are genetic similar be it hatchery or wild, in other words the same fish genetically. This came about over the years with harvest and hatchery programs during times when the view how to manage the resource were much different than the present. HSRG addresses this but in a big picture sense, think of it as fundamental guidelines or a road map out of the wilderness.

That is good folks it really is but as in all things this one size fits all usually does not work every time everywhere and you could make the case Willapa is one. If you forget the past and look only at the present and future one will have questions. If the Willapa Policy succeeds will the salmon be better off? Yes / no because WDF&W is trying create a new different Chinook Salmon that resembles the past and they will fail. The greatest damage to Willapa Chinook ( and Washington State as a whole ) are the marine intercept in Alaska and British Columbia. The vastly increased ocean impacts are the primary cause for decrease in size as you reduced 5 & 6 year fish genetic input and alter the gene pool. Now hatchery practices can do that but in my life it has been the terminal harvest after the marine intercepts that have had the greatest impact.

So with all the gyrations around HSRG and hatcheries, harvest, just plain us will the effort succeed maybe yes maybe no but the most likely outcome is not much change genetically for the Chinook as they are the same fish. The reality is you could maintain the Naselle Genetics with the hatchery staying by incorporating the wild in the eggtake as HSRG requires and simply maintain the Naselle Chinook both hatchery and wild being the same. Then sometime in the future when the Naselle Hatchery is no more control harvest and over 3 to 5 generations the fish will sort themselves. Never completely due to the marine impacts but the fish will move forward to achieving greater genetic diversity.

The obvious answer is to build a bloody weir that works but that seems to elude WDF&W and I am clueless as to why other than has a dollar sign with it and they do not want to spend the money. Then why are we pursuing this approach? The fish is not benefitting from HSRG as envisioned and the citizens of Willapa Harbor most certainly are not. Then again why are we doing this? A pragmatic approach would be recognize the impacts on the fish that we have had on the Willapa Chinook, manage for production that does not make it worse, take steps to insure Chinook genetics are protected, and plan for the day when the Naselle Hatchery is no longer in production. Accept the limitations that wild Chinook present but maximize the hatchery production with genetic stability your objective both wild and hatchery with both eyes to the future when the Naselle Hatchery is gone and the Chinook truly begin the journey to genetic diversity.

Everyone needs to draw their own conclusions on what exist and what WDF&W's efforts are intended to be and will be but from my seat in the nose bleed section this approach underway is the most ill conceived, poorly managed fiasco I have ever witnessed. I will hop up and take one in the snout for the R 6 staff here. They had little to no chance to get a functioning trap as originally envisioned in the marine area. When Mr. Warren inserted himself he created a absolute disaster playing out in slow motion out of the public's eyes. R6 staff did not do this but rather they did as instructed and will continue to do so. The guilty parties are Mr. Warren and Director Unsworth and they own it lock stock and barrel.

PS: mercy on typos as tight on time

Those Willapa Hatchery Chinook are very important to ocean fisheries. At one time, I think it was Koenings who approached Canada with an offer to really bump up Willapa production for them if Canada would go mark selective on Chinook. That way, we would further buffer the wild fish. Apparently, the fish survive well and contribute plus they are not super expensive to rear. Especially if you don't put in functional wiers and such.

Anyway, I suspect that WDFW is looking at the Really Big Picture and if this trap idea is all that keeps it from working then I am sure they'll go for it. It would allow buffering for wild fish in BC, even of not mark selective as there would be more hatchery fish, it would allow for bigger WA Coastal fisheries. All that is "missing" is local, especially freshwater, fisheries. Those are probably small potatoes as far as economics.

Always wondered when WDF&W would head this way. Bottom line is they have struggled to comply with the Public Document Request as they did not set up a proper system with the funds the legislature provided to put a system in place. Now to be sure some citizens figured this out and many agencies did the same thing so the birth of a cottage industry. The other side is that the failure to govern openly and in a forthright manner fits WDF&W to a T which causes them grief, grief being defined as the inability to mislead the public. Anyhow the CR 101.

http://wdfw.wa.gov/about/regulations/2017/wsr_17-15-048.pdf

PDR....The legal way to get information from a Government agency, I know it has "snowballed" since it was passed.

Negative part....if cost is too much, then agencies can go back to doing things the old fashion way.....behind closed doors, keep the public "in the dark", until its been made law or a regulation.

I like PDR's......keeps "G" accountable to the public...

Money used for PDR's, was our Tax dollars, in the 1st place....

That's what WDFW is doing. making decisions behind closed doors, even with the ability to PDR.

Well this is a newspaper article from the Aberdeen Daily World. A post a bit back I outlined the potential impacts on Rec & Commercial but really stayed away from the process utilized. This I think a reasonable interview but it pretty much reflects WDF&W's stance AFTER being outed. As to the points made by WDF&W staff I think many would and are being hotly contested by many with the Advocacy leading the charge. Here is their contact page. http://thfwa.org/contact-us So read and draw your own conclusions.


DFW proposes a test commercial fishery using fish traps in Willapa Bay
• Dan Hammock
• Wed Aug 2nd, 2017 7:00pm
• News

Fish traps, banned in Washington in 1934 for being so effective they were singled out as the major cause of salmon declines at the time, are now being eyed by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife and wild fish proponents as a tool to allow for commercial harvest of hatchery fish while decreasing the mortality of native salmon in Willapa Bay.

“We were thinking, what kind of alternative fishing method should we be thinking about with the commercials,” said Annette Hoffman, Region 6 fish program manager. “We sent out a reminder (to commercial fishing about getting their ideas) in December 2016, got a number of ideas and pursued all those that met the criteria, and only one person followed through with the process and that was the fish trap.”

A trap is designed to be just that; fish are funneled through a series of enclosures that get narrower until they are forced into a holding pen. The person monitoring the trap can then selectively pick out the fish meant to be targeted, usually hatchery fish, and safely release the other fish, in theory reducing the number of non-targeted fish injured or killed in the process. The department currently has an experimental fish trap on the lower Columbia River.

At first, the department considered filing for a research permit to test the trap, but soon found funding for that type of fishery couldn’t be identified. “So we went down the only other avenue we had, which was an emerging commercial fishing project, an experimental fishery with limited entries,” said Hoffman. So the department had to withdraw its application for a research permit and start the paperwork and public comment required to start an experimental fishery.

“At the time we were looking to keep all commercial gear in the commercial areas and during the commercial fishery,” said Hoffman. “Then at a (Fish and Wildlife) commission meeting we were given a presentation that a trap only works well if we put it in a place where the fish are moving at the time they are moving through there. That was outside the commercial season time frame.”

The public comment centered largely around the timing of the trap and the same arguments against the trap that led to its abolition more than 80 years ago.

“Through the public comment process we got a lot of input about the concern of the unlimited nature of this fishery, and we took that to heart,” said Hoffman. “We know it’s hard to regulate and manage unlimited fish traps.” There are other concerns as well. “A trap might not give us enough data. And we want to recruit Chinook. We know the trap recruits silvers, but can it work on Chinook?”
She said she also understands the concern of recreational anglers worried about the window of opportunity for the trap to be in use. For the trap to be effective for Chinook, it would have to be placed before the freshwater recreational salmon season. The thought of a fish trap in place before or during the recreational fishery has freshwater anglers concerned that it will stop the salmon from reaching the areas they fish.

The need to redefine the fishery as experimental and the withdrawal of the individual who initially had said he would take on the major effort and expense of installing the trap has pushed the project back.
“We followed the RCW (Revised Code of Washington) about the experimental fishery (RCW 77.65.410) and convened a board of advisers,” said Hoffman. “The RCW doesn’t talk about how many fish can be taken, just how many fishing permits can be issued for this experiment and what qualifications have to be met. The process is still underway.” She said she understood the concerns out there. Commercial fishermen are unhappy with the potential of a season that favors a fish trap over other methods, but Hoffman said timing is critical to determining the effectiveness of a trap. There has also been confusion over the placement of the trap. Will it be in fresh or saltwater? Hoffman said that decision has not been made. “I recognized that people are concerned that a fish trap will absorb everybody else’s fishery, but that’s not the intention at all,” she said. “The idea behind it is to help fisheries target the hatchery fish and minimize the impacts on wild fish.” Hoffman also said the trap proposal is not an attempt to replace other commercial fishing methods.

“We have no intention to have any type of alternative gear to take over. That is not what this is about.” Since federal regulators have placed a higher value on enhancing a more robust population of native salmon than adding to the overall population of salmon with hatchery fish, Hoffman said the trap is just one idea to help grow the number of native salmon while allowing sport and commercial anglers to harvest the hatchery fish.

“Initially all we are trying to do is figure out if this gear could be a useful tool in trying to manage for hatchery reform,” said Hoffman. “How the gear would be used going forward, how it would impact other fisheries has yet to be determined.” Hoffman added the importance of public input on the issue, saying she hopes to have “deeper, more thoughtful communication” with the various stakeholders. Meetings of stakeholders, the advisory group and a public comment forum were held in late July. For more information on the proposed trap, go towww.dfw.wa.gov/fishing/commercial/salmon/season_setting.

Some thoughts from others.

Not sure this is WDFW "stance" after being outed. Likely just their "spin" after being outed. Contains untrue statements. Example that it says it will not replace current commercial fishing. Not true, some commercial quota already set aside from nets for trap experiments. Implies not to take place of fresh water sport fishing, but clearly would be put in front of it. Were it to have a significant impact on pHOS, it would have to take for example Chinook out before exposure to sport fishery. Looks like an ad seeking trappers in fresh water and looking for more suckers to risk capital and help WDFW excuse itself for planting Chinook smolts far in excess of its inability to meet hatchery minimum standards. It belies Hoffman proposal listing exactly how many Chinook AND Coho a trap in lower Naselle can have, thousands of Coho, while claiming location has not been selected. We have seen an HPA permit, for an exact location. Truth may be that tangle nets are not working out as mandatory gillnet replacements for Chinook. Netters in public meetings say this. WDFW refuses to quantify piniped and drop out mortality for tangle nets, or admit major crab mortality. Plantation of 2.2 million Naselle Chinook smolts in excess of official Willapa Salmon Management policy, in face of court decision upholding conservation first, is blowing up in Fish Dept face.

And another.

Gillnets don't fish on "moving fish"? Does she have any sort of clue?

It needs to either above or below the point in the estuary where the Chinook are sensitive to handling. You guys have already shown that. As I said on PP, I think that of the goal is to maximize removal of HORs, minimize impact to NORs (the corollary here is you want to really get a jump in NORs on the grounds) then the trap is the only way to go. Every other method, even rec, kills some NORs. I don't think WDFW has the balls for that but they may be clueless enough to develop the fishery and then get sued into having to use it.

Word came to me that WDF&W and the QIN have a tentative agreement on Wynoochee Mit that meets the additional Winter Steelhead numbers required and fish above the dam. All I have now but will get more out when I get it.

And here is the proposal. Good of Annette to get back right away.


Annual production increase at Aberdeen Hatchery of 56,300 steelhead and 125,400 coho from here going forward to 2037.
$50,000.00
Re-build T Dock
$54,400.00
4 Netpens
$41,107.00
Trucking
$271,235.70
Steelhead Feed
$268,701.10
Coho Feed
$236,210.00
Mass Marking
$115,000.00
Good and Services
$280,000.00
Planting truck/tank
$200,000.00
Safety/efficiency improvements to benefit agency staff
$785,856.32
6 SM Tech Time
$369,772.00
Overhead 30%
$2,672,282.12
20 Year Total


Regards,

Annette