Free: Contests & Raffles.
This has been going on for years. You can blame NOAA and WDFW, but the real cause of the issue is the anti-hatchery, wild fish only groups that sue the state every time they release hatchery fish. There is tons of evidence showing that brood stock programs are highly effective at restoring and bolstering wild fish populations, but the wild fish groups will sue the pants off the state if they try to initiate these kinds of programs. The state won't fight them on it. Oddly, Oregon and Idaho don't seem to have any issues with brood stock programs, just our state.
This is an argument that has been clearly and thoroughly answered over time. Pretty much all of the evidence says the hatchery system failed and failed miserably. Don't get me wrong, there have been many culprits, fish farms that pollute and load our waters with disease, dams that block a fishes passage to his or her spawning beds, net's running from one side of a river to the other, logging operations causing erosion, oil and salt residue from our road ways, walls of tires used to support river banks, poorly thought out culverts, (boy this is fun) farming chemicals being indiscriminately used that would then flow into our tributaries and rivers that then flow to the ocean where the salmon are just trying to make a friggin living. The multi-pronged decimation of our salmon runs is and has been a manmade debacle with in your face warnings, all along the way. I mean, man couldn't have asked for clearer and more obvious clues. The simple fact is, man doesn't have the ability to change until we as a collective, are forced to. I'm sure the positive types will chime in with, what about this and what about that but the bottom line is, we've sat back and watched as salmon runs have been literally destroyed. I grew up on the banks of the Wenatchee and the Chiwawa river where we watched the runs diminish throughout the 60s and 70s until they were all but gone. Someone said, ooh', I got an idea, let's put a hatchery on the Chiwawa to protect the last remaining King Salmon. "Hello," anyone been fishing for salmon on the Chiwawa lately? I am so tired of people thinking or not, that salmon actually have a chance to make a comeback. The runs that are gone, are gone. The path between where we're at and where we need to be for the salmon runs to rebuild is littered with road blocks and potholes that can't be filled or moved in time to save even the strongest amongst them. When the hatchery system was envisioned, it was going to be the savior to our salmon runs. Not! The hatcheries were always intended to be a gap filler so the state wouldn't lose any money in license sales. The old put n take mindset. Can't pay for the hatcheries n such without selling licenses, right? The belief within the fisheries department (scientific community) is that the fish born within the hatchery system were or are inferior to the native fish in their ability to fight off disease. Some would argue that the fact that the average hatchery fish were puny in comparison to the the wild fish, is evidence of this. For the same reason, cattlemen, slaughter houses, pig and poultry producers have to maintain strict inoculation programs to protect against certain diseases, the hatchery system is forced to have the same type of approach. If you look at the beef, pork and poultry producers and their constant issues with certain diseases, they're in a constant fight with how to keep ahead of the specific diseases abilities to mutate and thus stay ahead of the different drugs that have been developed to fight said diseases. There's a reason we have recalls in our meat supply system on a regular basis. The hatcheries have an aspect they're dealing with that the cattle, pork and poultry industry don't have to deal with, a wild stock that is living amongst and breeding with the hatchery stock. Throw in the fact that, in the early days of hatcheries, the fish were being bred, hatchery to wild, wild to hatchery, hatchery to, you get the point. It didn't take very long till all of the stock were infected with anything and everything, wherever it came from. There's no point in worrying about a few hatchery fish being culled from a failing system. Most if not all of the scientific community already know we're way over the hump and the idea that the salmon are going to to swim back up and get to a point where the wild stock will be at a level, quantity wise, that they'll be able to sustain their numbers on their own, is a fairy tale. Simple math and just basic reality based assumptions don't support it. At this point, we're down to petty turf wars, finger pointing and worrying about who's gonna keep their jobs within the fish and wildlife departments and the fishing industry. I'm sorry, this a subject that I've watched through my life and it makes my blood boil. It's a damn shame and if salmon had any legal representation, criminal in a lot of ways. I'll move on, Perch are delicious, try frying them up in a nice beer batter.
While I agree with much of what chuckardog posted. I'd argue with a few things. I've volunteered at hatcheries since I was in high-school. I watched the guys bonk every oversized fish while picking a 5 or 6 pounder to breed with a 5 or 6 pounder. Small fish bred to small fish make small fish, genetically speaking. Ever wonder why the Quinault fish hatchery pumps out fish regularly over 20 pounds? But I digress, we are doomed. With the anti-hatchery folks, tribal fisheries, trawl fisheries, intercept fisheries, cormorants and of course seals, sea lions and WDFW continuously forcing all sports anglers into one stream or another until that streams run collapses we are all but done. I don't know what the fix is. I wish someone has/had a magic bullet.
Quote from: ASHQUACK on February 05, 2024, 07:55:03 PMWhile I agree with much of what chuckardog posted. I'd argue with a few things. I've volunteered at hatcheries since I was in high-school. I watched the guys bonk every oversized fish while picking a 5 or 6 pounder to breed with a 5 or 6 pounder. Small fish bred to small fish make small fish, genetically speaking. Ever wonder why the Quinault fish hatchery pumps out fish regularly over 20 pounds? But I digress, we are doomed. With the anti-hatchery folks, tribal fisheries, trawl fisheries, intercept fisheries, cormorants and of course seals, sea lions and WDFW continuously forcing all sports anglers into one stream or another until that streams run collapses we are all but done. I don't know what the fix is. I wish someone has/had a magic bullet.Man, I've spent 8 years working in hatcheries and I never once saw the attitude of picking the small fish for broodstock. Much more typically it was something along the lines of " look at the size of that guy we can use him 3 or 4 times!!"
