We haven’t seen fish returns like the last two years, in many years. Great ocean conditions are the biggest contributor of healthy returns. We were successful in bringing NOAA, Tribes, WDFW, and Federal Government for funding, together to make more fish. We had a small meeting with NOAA West Coast top officials on making more fish for the orcas. The starving orcas were used as the driver. We came out with NOAA giving us the green light to make more fish and would cover us. State, feds, and tribes all increased hatchery production through this to make fish for the orcas and us all. Having a lot more fish in the system has helped with bigger returns, I can’t think of anyone that has ever done this before.
Butch Smith, tribal members, certain people, and I came together to bring more fish returns back in Washington. We drove this bus hard, hit a lot of curbs and guardrails, but always correcting. This was through the previous WDFW commission and extending into the current commission, we were successful in getting them to vote to make more 50 million additional chinook for Orcas and us. With the help of our Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission with Lorraine Loomis, she provided us a letter to the Governor to remove HSRG (Hatchery Science Review Group) from its budget. That letter was the basis we used to remove HSRG from the WDFW Salmon Policy, that led to removing and replacing that policy with a WDFW Commission Hatchery Policy. We brought the tribes and state together to make the first ever Comanager Hatchery Policy.
Wild Fish Conservancy sued to stop the program we made to make more fish in 13 hatcheries to feed the orcas. We came together for two years with many organizations and tribes to save our orcas. We had people from all over the world at these meetings asking us, crying, and pleading to us to save our local orcas. We came together for over two years to save them and feed them. So what is Wild Fish Conservancy’s message? Orcas should starve rather than eat hatchery fish?
Why are our natural origin fish not making it? Honestly, I cannot stand the term Climate Change. But the environment is always changing and is not just because of man. It has been changing before we were here. The Puget Sound was carved by a big glacier that is no longer here. That is change. A recent NOAA study has revealed the loss of about 85% of historical tidal wetlands in California, Oregon, and Washington. Columbia River is at 74% and Salish sea is at 85.2% loss.
Take a look at the Skagit River picture that is only an example of what all of Western Washington used to look like in the 1880s is when industry took off in our area. They straightened and channelized rivers for transportation, flood control, and made more use of the land for farming and whatever else was needed. There was no looking back and no thought that there could be an end to salmon.
The rivers were straightened and channelized increasing velocity. Increased velocity tears trees and logs from the rivers and banks. See Everett trestle picture. With this turbidity, salmon eggs will not stay in the gravel and under rocks. Trees alone dragging down the rivers will disrupt the bottom and eggs. Prior to rebuilding the rivers, water flow was slower. Flood water simply overflowed the banks. Redds or salmon egg beds were not affected as much. With channelizing the rivers, it increased speed and velocity and 99% of the eggs get washed down the rivers. Only 1% of those 1% are what make it back. But hatcheries are not as affected as the naturally spawning fish. Hatchery workers can adjust the flow of the water in the hatcheries as needed and clean sediment off the eggs to keep them from suffocating. This is why hatchery fish have greater returns percentagewise. Realistically we need to step up broodstock in hatcheries. Change to integrated from segregated hatchery programs could help. This uses the broodstock from the rivers instead of the returning hatchery stock. This is providing there is enough
broodstock left. This way it’s the same stock that is already in the rivers and a better match for natural spawning.
We are fighting for more hatchery fish for all fishers and orcas. These hatchery fish also provide protection from predators as well as massive food for the entire ecosystem. When hatchery production gets cut, there are less fish for birds, seals, sea lions, orcas, etc., to eat. The lesser ESA natural spawners or “wild” fish are now exposed more than ever to higher predation. This could easily finish off their runs. The preservationist’s answer is to cut hatchery production. Washington state cut chinook and coho hatchery production by 163 million fish annually since 1992 through 2016. If chinook and coho were going to rebound by cutting hatchery production, wouldn’t this have been the time they would have rebounded with such massive cuts to hatcheries? In the graph, you can see the orca decline follows the hatchery decline. They cut 63 million in the Puget Sound alone. With our terrible return rate of ½ of 1%. That would be 315,000 more fish swimming in our waters for us to catch and go spawn.
The Chasco scientific paper states that “by 2015, pinnipeds consumed double that of resident killer whales and six times greater than the combined commercial and recreational catches.” We also know that avians or birds eat massive amounts of smolts besides pinnipeds. At least 30 million salmon smolts don’t make it to the Puget Sound saltwater. The same with Columbia River. There should be some sort of allowance for this loss, but isn’t. I was accepted to be in a WDFW Avian salmon predation work group to figure out how many smolts are getting consumed.
I find it very irritating that judges award the wild fish people money by using PHOS. We don’t even know if our fish are even making it to the ocean. They could be dying before they get there. But these lawsuit decisions are made from the lack of natural spawners on the spawning beds. It’s not the hatchery fishes fault for surviving. One other fact that most do not know is that chinook head to the river mouths when born. They live there for the first 1½ years. What else lives there? Seals and sealions.
The only reason we have fish is because of hatcheries. Rivers with no chinook hatcheries, have had their chinook go extinct, with possibly the exception of the Lewis River. Where are our mitigation fish that were supposed to cover for the destruction of habitat?
Tribes were guaranteed fish and game in trade for millions of acres of their land, under tribal treaty rights. A Treaty Right- “inescapable conclusion is that if hatchery fish were to be excluded from the allocation, the Indians’ treaty secured right to an adequate supply of fish the right for which they traded millions of acres of valuable land and resources would be placed in jeopardy.” From Judge Orrick, US vs Washington, 1980.
Legacy of Mitigation for Lost Habitat and Fisheries, “Hatcheries are intended to replace the production of streams destroyed by dams, diversions, pollution, or obstructions, and to build up the runs and streams that are not producing at full capacity…” From Washington Dept of Fisheries, US vs. Washington 1980.
This binding treaty was all before ESA. Where are these fish? It’s time we start educating each other and work to remove PHOS from policies. Some Hatchery and Genetic Management Plans have started writing out PHOS that was installed by HSRG. While the general public is blaming WDFW on the loss of fisheries, you should know it’s the preservationist’s lawsuits forcing this. They force hatchery production cuts and closures. Federal judges are forcing WDFW to do this. Hatchery fish are what we catch! They
fight to make us as many fish as they can. It’s a very complicated mess overall. Just remember in your day-to-day job, if you have a customer always complaining, calling you names, and talking down to you, how hard are you going to work on their behalf. Will you stop answering the phone? It’s time to take a good look at WDFW and you can build relationships within and help them get to a better place for all of us. I do this. I try to bring ideas to the table and it helps. Remember they are just people too.
If there were a simple answer, we would have already done it. You need to know who your fishery enemy really is and some of them are working over some of the WDFW Commissioners to get rid of hunting and fishing. Tribes and us spent hundreds of hours working with our new commission and got a 6 to 3 vote to make the new Comanager Hatchery Policy. What does that say about the 3 that voted no?
Politics are not fun but if we are not at the table we are on the table. I have lots more info and if we don’t come together to save our fisheries, then we won’t be fishing anymore. Do it for your kids and grandkids. We need for all fishers to know the information I just gave you to build on. The more people know the easier we can move forward.