Police seek steelhead bandits who released 25,000 fish

[BigGoonTuna]

why do a lot of people say that st. helens eruption is the cause of the downfall of fish in wa. ?

i'm going off on a tangent here, but i know a lot of people say the spiny ray fishing in eastern washington took a big dive after the mountain blew up.  not sure if it was all the ash changing something in the lakes or if it is a coincidence with something else though.

i'd be willing that the north toutle would have been a decent river again had the army corps hadn't built that stupid sediment dam.  the south fork runs gin clear almost year round now.  the north fork on the other hand only really turns a "fishable" green for a few weeks in late summer and that's only if there's no rain.

[stevemiller]

Yeah thats what I thought,Nature destroyed the fish not people.Unless some of you think the eruption was caused by us,Then we ,The stewards of nature SHOULD be bringing back what we can when we can,Even if it is not as perfect as some would want it to be.We are only ever 1 big natural disaster away from losing more than just a fish that came from this creek verses that stream give me a break. 

[Bullkllr]

Yeah thats what I thought,Nature destroyed the fish not people.Unless some of you think the eruption was caused by us,Then we ,The stewards of nature SHOULD be bringing back what we can when we can,Even if it is not as perfect as some would want it to be.We are only ever 1 big natural disaster away from losing more than just a fish that came from this creek verses that stream give me a break. 

I'm not really sure where you're going with that idea or how it relates to the topic exactly. Nature is harsh. Most of the streams in the Cascade range (and the fish that returned to them) were shaped by eons of natural change, and volcanic eruptions were a large part of that. But picture how the fish themselves evolved though those environmental changes. They were perfectly adapted to the conditions in the streams of their origin. That is exactly what makes our native salmon and steelhead so special (and unique to each region/watershed). And it also helps explain why human efforts to "fix" things or bring runs back have largely been unsuccessful. Regardless of how bad we have screwed things up, nature will take care of things in the long run; most of us just don't have a few hundred/thousand years to wait around for that to happen, unfortunately. With enough money and will, humans can do some amazing things, but steelhead are pretty far down on the 'powers-that-be's' priority list it seems.

[Bullkllr]

why do a lot of people say that st. helens eruption is the cause of the downfall of fish in wa. ?

i'm going off on a tangent here, but i know a lot of people say the spiny ray fishing in eastern washington took a big dive after the mountain blew up.  not sure if it was all the ash changing something in the lakes or if it is a coincidence with something else though.

i'd be willing that the north toutle would have been a decent river again had the army corps hadn't built that stupid sediment dam.  the south fork runs gin clear almost year round now.  the north fork on the other hand only really turns a "fishable" green for a few weeks in late summer and that's only if there's no rain.

Agreed. It would be better to have just let it flush. The river just upstream from the sediment dam is almost unrecognizable as a river.

[snowpack]

Yeah thats what I thought,Nature destroyed the fish not people.Unless some of you think the eruption was caused by us,Then we ,The stewards of nature SHOULD be bringing back what we can when we can,Even if it is not as perfect as some would want it to be.We are only ever 1 big natural disaster away from losing more than just a fish that came from this creek verses that stream give me a break. 

I think that there are some cases where humans have some major impacts.  I don't think Puget Sound got much of an effect from Mount St Helens.  The Cowlitz and Columbia (and the Toutle as mentioned) did, but rivers change so much on their own that I think they can handle most anything people tend to do short of channeling or damming.  A half inch of rain in 24 hours raises level and flow of some of the rivers I go to enough to move more gravel/silt/trees/river banks/etc that it exceeds anything I've seen people do.
For Puget Sound fish, I've heard that the one of the more likely causes were people.  The theory I heard about is that the trawlers basically disc plowed the kelp fields all around the sound while dragging for cod, dogfish, etc.  And the kelp hasn't really grown back yet.  A few areas have some, but not like it was before.  The herring and some other fish would lay their eggs in the kelp and eelgrass, but without the kelp the herring declined.  I've read by about 90%.  So now when the steelhead and salmon leave the rivers they have to swim through more open water instead of being able to hide in the kelp and are more likely to be eaten by predators (especially returning salmon)--a smolt is about the same size as a herring.  But I don't know how well that holds, since areas outside of the sound have all kinds of fish declines too.   

[Cultusman]

Sorry, didn't read a single post in the thread...

So how are all these "wild" steelhead getting past all the indian nets to spawn?

As far as I'm aware, the Puget Sound tribes have largely curtailed their fisheries directed at winter steelhead. I couldn't immediately find any hard data for winter netting schedules (if such a thing exists), but I did this from the NWIFC website:

Steelhead

Wild steelhead stocks are depressed throughout Puget Sound, and hatchery steelhead have also experienced much lower survival in the last fifteen years. Limited commercial harvest occurs on hatchery returns to the Skagit and Snohomish rivers; elsewhere tribal harvest in Puget Sound is limited to nominal subsistence and ceremonial harvest.

Steelhead returning to the Washington coastal rivers are currently more abundant, though tribal net harvest comprises primarily hatchery returns.

The only Puget Sound rivers I see a lot during the winter are the Nisqually, Puyallup, and Green; I would concur that netting days are pretty much wrapped up after the chum seasons are done. It is hard to justify (or profit from) a gillnet season when there are almost no fish returning to catch.

   It doesn't take to many brain cells to figure out that the winter time netting is not the only time native winter steelhead are caught. Nets were in the Skagit just last week targeting springers,but nets don't target just one species,they are also killing spawned native winter run headed back to sea.
  Shouldn't be to much longer before there all gone,then some educated idiot will blame it on loss of habitat.