If you are hosting out-of-town visitors this Thanksgiving
weekend, it might be a good time to take them salmon-watching — or
go by yourself if you get the urge to see one of nature’s marvelous
phenomena.
Rainfall in Hansville. Blue
line shows current trend.
Graph: Kitsap Public Utility District
Kitsap County’s Salmon Park on Chico Way near Golf Club Road
tops my list of places to watch salmon. Expect to see plenty of
dead fish as well as live ones, as we have apparently passed the
peak of the run.
Dogfish Creek near Poulsbo also has a fair number of chum at
this time, with a good viewing spot at the north end of Fish Park.
Gorst Creek and other streams in Sinclair Inlet are known for their
late runs of chum salmon, which are likely to be spotted right up
until Christmas at Otto Jarstad Park.
OK, I’ll admit that I used this line once in a story many years
ago when I first observed the Skokomish River overflowing its
banks. I was amazed at the number of chum salmon swimming through
farm fields and across pavement in the Skokomish Valley as they
tried to get back to their spawning grounds.
Despite extensive work in the Skokomish River estuary, the
waters still back up and fish still swim across roads during heavy
rains and floods.
I was not the first to bend the old joke to ask, “Why did the
salmon cross the road?” And I was definitely not the last, as two
new videos went viral the past few days, resulting in news reports
across the country. Hundreds of thousands of people must have been
surprised to see Puget Sound salmon skittering across the pavement
in a most unnatural way.
Washington Department of Ecology has agreed to take steps to
protect wild salmon eggs incubating in gravel by developing
entirely new water-quality standards to control fine sediment going
into streams.
The new standards, yet to be developed, could ultimately limit
silty runoff coming from logging operations, housing construction
and other operations that can affect water quality. The idea is
maintain adequate oxygen to salmon eggs, thus increasing the rate
of survival as well as the health of the young fish.
The legal agreement with Ecology grew out of a lawsuit brought
by Northwest Environmental Advocates against the federal
Environmental Protection Agency. NWEA claimed that the EPA had
failed to consult with natural resource agencies while reviewing
changes in state water-quality standards, as required by the
Endangered Species Act.
We’ve just gone through one of the driest five-month periods on
record in Kitsap County, yet the total precipitation for entire
water year was fairly close to average.
Water year 2018, which ended Sunday, offers a superb example of
the extreme differences in precipitation from one part of the
Kitsap Peninsula to another:
In Hansville — at the north end of the peninsula — the total
rainfall for the year reached 35.2 inches, about 3.5 inches above
average.
In Silverdale — about midway from north to south — the total
rainfall was recorded as 43.1 inches, about 5 inches below
average.
In Holly — near the south end — the total rainfall came in at
82 inches, about 3.3 inches above average.
The graphs of precipitation for the three areas show how this
year’s rainfall tracked with the average rainfall through the
entire year. The orange line depicts accumulated rainfall for water
year 2018, while the pink line represents the average. Click on the
images to enlarge and get a better view.
Salmon have a tough life. Not only must they escape predators
and find enough food to eat — as do all wild animals — but they
must also make the physiologically taxing transition from
freshwater to saltwater and then back again to start a new
generation.
In a four-part series being published in the Encyclopedia of
Puget Sound, I explain some of the latest research findings about
how chinook, coho and steelhead are struggling to survive in the
waters of Puget Sound.
The first part is called “Opening the black box:
What’s killing Puget Sound’s salmon and steelhead?” It
describes the Salish Sea Marine Survival Project, a major research
effort involving more than 200 scientists in the U.S. and Canada.
The effort is coordinated by Long Live the Kings in the U.S. and by
the Pacific Salmon Foundation in Canada.
The second part, titled “Size means survival for
salmon,” takes a look at salmon and steelhead’s place in the
food web from the “bottom up,” as they say. Specifically, what are
the fish eating and what is limiting their access to a healthy food
supply?
Still to come are discussions about predation (“top down”) in
Part 3, and other factors that affect survival, such as disease and
chemical exposure, in Part 4.
Our goal for this project has been to describe the important
research findings in careful detail without getting lost in complex
scientific analysis. I also describe, at the end of Part 1, some
new findings regarding potential competition among salmon for food
in the Pacific Ocean.
Higher standards of “sustainability” for salmon — recently
developed by the Wild Fish Conservancy — are designed to put salmon
on people’s tables with virtually no impact on depleted salmon
runs.
The new standards, which could become part of a certification
program, are built upon the concept that fishing should take place
closer to streams with abundant runs of salmon. The standards call
for fishing methods that can take a portion of the fish from the
abundant runs while allowing fish from depleted runs to pass on by
and spawn naturally.
“We want to get away from open fisheries, where you are
capturing multiple populations all at once,” said Nick Gayeski, a
scientist with Wild Fish Conservancy whose studies have raised the
bar for sustainable fisheries.
“If you fish much closer to the estuaries, the fish will sort
themselves out,” Nick told me, “and you can fish with much more
confidence about taking fish from a specific population.”
This idea of “placed-based fishing,” as described by Wild Fish
Conservancy, would surely be good for the wild salmon, including
Puget Sound chinook and steelhead, which are listed as threatened
under the Endangered Species Act. It would also be good for a dozen
listed species in the Columbia River system. But, if carried out to
its full extent, the idea would just as surely create an upheaval
for fishermen and fishing communities from Alaska to
California.
“Most Puget Sound Chinook stocks are subjected to very low or
zero mortality in Southeast Alaska,” the report says, “but there
are notable exceptions. On average since 1999, 48 percent of the
fishery-related mortality of Hoko, 7 percent of Stillaguamish, and
23 percent of Skagit summer Chinook occurred in Alaska.”
Those last numbers are significant for the listed Puget Sound
chinook, considering the distance that these fish are from home.
Although salmon managers have taken significant steps to reduce the
take of listed chinook, the fish are still caught in significant
numbers along the coast and in the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Despite the ongoing harvest of threatened and endangered
species, many of the fisheries taking these fish are certified as
“sustainable” by the Marine Stewardship Council, an international
group. Most are also listed as “good alternatives” by Monterey Bay
Aquarium’s Seafood Watch program.
Nick Gayeski acknowledges that the “placed-based fishery” he is
promoting cannot be accomplished overnight. Much of the salmon in
Puget Sound are caught in fairly long gillnets, which ultimately
kill the mixture of salmon caught in open waters.
Key criteria for place-based fishing include an assurance that
essentially no fish are killed except for the target stock. If
fishing close to the stream cannot offer that assurance, then the
fishing gear must allow the non-target fish to be released without
harm, according to an article by Nick along with Misty MacDuffee of
Raincoast Conservation Foundation and Jack A. Stanford of the
University of Montana. The paper, titled “Criteria for a good
catch: A conceptual framework to guide sourcing of sustainable
salmon fisheries,” was published this week in the scientific
journal “Facets.”
Carefully managed set nets, which are gillnets usually attached
to the shore, may allow for survival if the fish are removed within
an hour or so, Nick told me. The big purse seines may also are able
to save the non-target fish from harm if the net and the fish
remain in the water while the crew removes and releases the
non-target fish. Obviously, these aren’t the most efficient methods
from a fisherman’s perspective.
Fixed gear that catches fish with little handling, such as reef
nets, work well to protect the non-target fish, Nick said. Reef
nets harken back to a time when fixed gear along the shore was more
common. (See the first video above.)
Wild Fish Conservancy has been working with Patagonia, the
sustainable clothing manufacturer, to find fishing operations that
meet strict standards of protecting non-target fish. Because of the
huge impact that food production has on the environment, Patagonia
decided to go into the business five years ago with a line of food
products called Patagonia Provisions.
The video below is a short preview for a longer
video called “Unbroken Ground.”
The first product sold was sockeye salmon caught with a set net
in the Situk River estuary in the Gulf of Alaska, where nearly all
of the sockeye are associated with the river. Other species are
released unharmed.
More recently, Patagonia Provisions began buying pink salmon
from a company called Lummi Island Wild, which operates a reef net
on Lummi Island in northern Puget Sound. The reef net allows fish
to be lifted gently out of the water. Any chinook or sockeye caught
during the process are returned to the water unharmed.
The pink salmon taken in the operation are bled out immediately
and placed on ice to produce the freshest fish possible.
“We think this is a good place to begin the educational
process,” Nick said. “The fishers are handling the fish less and
getting more money. We hope that restaurants and other retailers
will see the value.”
Other fishing operations are under review by Wild Fish
Conservancy to see if they can meet the stricter criteria.
Even if the fishing industry does not change overnight, when
enough people purchase fish caught in place-based fisheries, it
could reduce the pressure on endangered salmon trying to make it
home to spawn while also providing some chinook to feed Puget
Sound’s endangered killer whales.
“This is part of a transition,” Nick said. “It’s not only a
down-the-road reconfiguration of West Coast salmon fishing but it
involves long-term recovery of the wild runs.”
Salmon harvests in Puget Sound have been shared between Indian
and non-Indian fishermen since the 1970s, when the courts ruled
that treaties guarantee tribal members half the total catch.
Now a third party — Puget Sound’s endangered orcas — could take
a seat at the negotiations table, at least in a figurative sense,
as their shortage of food becomes a critical issue.
It isn’t at all clear how fishing seasons could be structured to
help the Southern Resident killer whales, but the issue was
discussed seriously at some length yesterday, when the 2018 salmon
forecasts were presented to sport and commercial fishers. Thus
began the annual negotiations between state and tribal salmon
managers to set up this year’s fishing seasons.
General areas, in blue, where
fishing closures in British Columbia are planned to provide extra
salmon for Southern Resident killer whales.
Map: Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Penny Becker, a wildlife manager with the Washington Department
of Fish and Wildlife, said a steady decline in the body mass of the
Southern Residents has been observed, as the population fell to a
30-year low of 76 animals. People are calling for emergency
measures, she said, noting that both Gov. Jay Inslee and the
Legislature are working on ideas to protect the whales. See
Water Ways Feb. 23 and
Water Ways Feb. 17 and the
Encyclopedia of Puget Sound, Nov. 2, 2017.
Concerns are running equally high in British Columbia, where the
orcas spend much of their time in the Strait of Georgia. The
Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans has proposed an
experiment with fishing closures this year in four areas frequented
by the orcas:
Mouth of the Fraser River
West side of Pender Island
South side of Saturna Island, and
Strait of Juan de Fuca
“The primary objective of the proposed measures is to improve
chinook salmon availability for SRKW by decreasing potential
fishery competition, as well as minimizing physical and acoustic
disturbance in key foraging areas to the extent possible,” states a
“discussion paper” (PDF 1.9 mb) released Feb. 15.
The closures would be in place from May through September this
year, with increased monitoring to measure potential benefits to
the whales. Comments on the proposal are being taken until March
15.
Canadians also are working with ship owners to see if noise can
be reduced significantly by slowing down large vessels moving
through the Salish Sea. Previous studies have shown that noise
reduces the ability of whales to communicate and to find food
through echolocation. Experts are compiling the results of the
“Haro Strait Vessel Slowdown Trial” conducted last year.
One bill in the Washington Legislature would require boaters to
slow down to 7 knots when in the vicinity of killer whales.
Limiting fishing in specific areas of Puget Sound, such as the
west side of San Juan Island, could be implemented through
state-tribal negotiations, Penny said. The closures would occur
during summer when chinook salmon — the orcas’ primary prey — are
in the area. One option would be to implement the closures on
certain days of the week.
Some people have talked about giving the orcas a clean break
from whale watchers, and that could involve excluding whale-watch
boats from salmon-rich areas at the same time as the fishing
closures.
“We’re looking for creative solutions to make this work within
our constraints,” Penny told the group.
One fisherman at the meeting said every person on the water
should automatically turn off his motor and sit still when whales
are approaching. It’s a courtesy to help the killer whales find
fish, he said, and anyway the fish are not going to bite on one’s
line while whales are around. Generally, they don’t stay long in
one place.
One bill in the Legislature would help the Southern Residents by
increasing hatchery production of chinook salmon in Puget Sound.
Reaction to the idea has been mixed, because hatchery salmon have
been known to affect the fitness and genetic makeup of wild salmon.
If approved, the boost in hatchery production would likely be a
temporary solution.
Sport fishermen generally like the idea of increased hatchery
production, because they would be encouraged to catch all the
hatchery fish not eaten by killer whales.
The hatchery bill, HB
2417, was approved unanimously by the House Agriculture and
Natural Resources Committee. No further action has been taken so
far, but its provisions could be attached to the supplementary
budget with funds specified for hatchery production.
Tuesday’s meeting in Lacey launched the beginning of the
negotiations between state and tribal salmon managers, a process
known as North of Falcon. The name comes the fishery management
area from Cape Falcon in Oregon north to the Canadian border. The
full schedule of
meetings and related documents can be found on the WDFW
website.
Forecasts approved by WDFW and the tribes predict poor returns
of several salmon stocks this year in Puget Sound, the Pacific
Ocean and the Columbia River, resulting in limited fishing
opportunities.
“We will definitely have to be creative in developing salmon
fisheries this year,” Kyle Adicks, salmon policy lead for WDFW,
said in a news
release. “I encourage people to get involved and provide input
on what they see as the priorities for this season’s
fisheries.”
Warm ocean conditions and low streamflows in recent years
affected several salmon stocks returning this year. As ocean
conditions return to normal, experts hope for improved salmon runs
in years to come.
A total of about 557,000 coho returning to Puget Sound is about
6 percent below the average over the past 10 years. Extremely low
numbers predicted for the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Snohomish
River are expected to force managers to limit fishing in those
areas.
While hatchery chinook returning to Puget Sound are expected to
be 38 percent higher than last year, the need to protect
“threatened” wild chinook could mean ongoing fishing restrictions
in many areas.
Next month, NOAA, which oversees threatened and endangered
species, is expected to provide guidance for managing this year’s
fisheries, including possible discussions about protecting Southern
Resident killer whales.
Plans for protecting Puget Sound chinook and Southern Resident
killer whales have begun to overlap in major ways, as saving one
involves saving the other.
Once again, the National Marine Fisheries Service has determined
in official findings that three common pesticides — chlorpyrifos,
diazinon and malathion — raise the risk of extinction for
threatened and endangered salmon.
A crop duster sprays pesticide
on a field near an irrigation ditch.
Photo: NOAA/USFWS
By extension, for the first time, the agency also concluded that
those same pesticides threaten Puget Sound’s endangered orca
population by putting their prey — chinook and other salmon — at
risk.
This politically and legally charged issue — which has been
around for more than 15 years — has gone beyond a debate over
potential harm from pesticides. It also raises uncomfortable
questions about whether our society will follow science as we try
to solve environmental problems.
The immediate finding of “jeopardy” — meaning that the three
pesticides pose a risk of extinction — comes in a
biological opinion (PDF 415.6 mb) that is more than 3,700 pages
long and covers not just salmon but, for the first time, dozens of
other marine species on the Endangered Species List.
The report follows a scientific methodology for assessing the
effects of pesticides that arises from suggestions by the National
Academy of Sciences. The NAS report (PDF 14.2 mb)
attempted to reconcile differing methods of assessing risk that had
been used by the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service and NMFS.
EPA’s original assessment raised no concerns about the effect of
these pesticides on the survival of salmon populations. The
original lawsuit by environmental groups forced the EPA to
“consult” with NMFS, as required by the Endangered Species Act. The
result was the first jeopardy finding in 2008. For background, see
Water Ways,
Aug. 11, 2008, in which I reported that the long wait for
regulatory action on pesticides may be about over. Little did I
know.
The biological opinion, or BiOp for short, examines both the
direct harms to species exposed to pesticides — such as effects on
behavior, reproduction and immune function — as well as indirect
effects — such as whether the pesticides wipe out insects needed
for the fish to eat.
The new BiOp is considered a pilot study for future pesticide
assessments.
“Notably,” states the document, “this Opinion represents the
first consultation using newly developed approaches and the first
to assess all listed species throughout the U.S., its territories,
and protectorates. Future Opinions regarding pesticides may utilize
different analyses and approaches as the interagency consultation
effort proceeds.”
The next step is for the EPA to restrict the use of the
pesticides to reduce the risks for salmon and other species. Among
suggested measures, the BiOp says those who use pesticides must
limit the total amount of chemicals applied in high-risk areas,
such as streams. No-spray buffers or similar alternatives are
suggested.
Interim no-spray buffers, established by the courts, will remain
in effect until the EPA takes action. The interim buffers were put
on, taken off, and are back on as a result of the lengthy court
battle between the agencies and environmental groups. Pesticide
manufacturers have weighed in, arguing about the need for
pesticides without undue restrictions.
The Trump administration asked the court for a two-year delay in
the release of the BiOp, but NMFS ultimately met the deadline when
the judge failed to rule on the request in time to make a
difference.
I discussed some of the ongoing intrigue and a bit of history in
a
Water Ways post last August, after EPA Administrator Scott
Pruitt reversed course on an impending ban on chlorpyrifos. The
proposed ban, approved during the Obama administration, came in
response to studies that showed how the chemical could adversely
affect children’s brains.
Although it took legal action to get to this point, agency and
independent scientists have worked together to study the problem
and come up with solutions. The question now is whether
policymakers and politicians will take reasonable steps to reduce
the risks based upon these findings, which are complex, evolving
and rarely definitive for all time.
As I was going back through the blog posts I’ve written about
pesticides, I recalled that President George W. Bush wanted to
limit scientific consultations in an effort to streamline the
regulatory process — much as President Trump’s people are doing
today. Check out
Water Ways from March 4, 2009, which shows a video of President
Obama reversing the Bush policy and speaking out for increased
input from scientists.
When it comes to human health and the environment, it is good to
remember that without the work of scientists, many species
throughout the world would have been wiped out long ago. Human
cancer, disease and brain impairment would be far worse today
without regulations based on scientific findings. Science can tell
us about the risk of pesticides and other threats to salmon and
orcas. But knowledge is not enough. People must take reasonable
actions to protect themselves and the environment. And so the story
goes on.
Last week, Earthjustice, which represents environmental groups
in the legal battle, released the biological opinion, which had
been sent by NOAA as part of the legal case. The group posted links
to the document and related information in a
news release. As far as I know, nobody in the Trump
administration has spoken about the findings.
Much has been said about the decline of Puget Sound Chinook
salmon. Often the discussion focuses on how to increase the salmon
population, but I believe a good case can be made for increasing
the size of these once-mighty “kings.”
Chinook salmon // Photo:
NOAA Fisheries
There are plenty of reasons why we should strive for larger
Chinook, not the least of which is the pure joy of seeing — and
perhaps catching — a giant salmon. But I’m also thinking about our
endangered Southern Resident killer whales, which don’t seem to
find Puget Sound very hospitable anymore. As we know, the whales
favor Chinook over any other food.
While it might take more energy for a killer whale to chase down
a large Chinook versus a smaller one, the payoff in nutrition and
energy far outweighs the expenditure, according to Jacques White of
Long Live the Kings, who has been thinking about the size issue for
some time.
In terms of competition, a giant returning Chinook might be
difficult for a harbor seal to handle, and that could give the
orcas a special advantage. Still, we are learning that harbor seals
create problems for the Chinook population by eating millions of
tiny smolts migrating to the ocean before they get a chance to grow
up.
Perhaps the major reason that Chinook have declined in size is
the troll fishing fleet off the coast of Alaska and Northern
Canada, Jacques told me. It is almost simple math. It takes six,
seven or eight years to grow the really large Chinook in the ocean.
Today’s fishing fleet goes out into the middle of the
Chinook-rearing areas up north. The longer the fishing boats stay
there, the more likely it is that they will catch a fish that could
have grown into a really big one.
Years ago, the fishing boats did not travel so far out to sea,
Jacques said. There was no need to travel far when plentiful runs
of salmon came right into the shore and swam up the rivers.
“In the old days,” he said, “you didn’t have people risking
their necks off Alaska trying to catch fish in all kinds of weather
and seas.”
In additional to the trollers, plenty of sport fishermen have
taken the opportunity to catch and take home nice trophy fish,
putting extra pressure on the biggest members of the fish
population. Fishing derbies, past and present, challenged people to
catch the biggest Chinook.
Long Live the Kings, a conservation group, once held fishing
derbies, Jacques noted. But, after giving it some thought, everyone
realized that the effort was counterproductive. “Long Live the
Kings is now out of the derby business,” he said.
Gillnets, once common in Puget Sound, entrap fish by snagging
their gills. Gillnets tend not to catch the truly giant salmon,
because of the mesh size, but they do catch the larger salmon.
Often only the smaller ones make it through to spawn — and that
breeds another generation of small fish.
Fishing is not the only factor that tends to favor the survival
of small fish, but it tends to be a big factor, according to Tom
Quinn, a University of Washington professor of aquatic and fishery
sciences. The issue is complicated, and every salmon run has its
own characteristics, he said.
Hatcheries, dams and habitat alterations all tend to favor fish
that can compete and survive under new conditions, and often those
conditions work better for smaller fish. Changes in the food web
may create a nutritional deficit for some salmon stocks, and
competition at sea with large numbers of hatchery fish may be a
factor. Check out the study in the
journal Plos One by researchers for the Alaska Department of
Fish and Game.
With the removal of two dams on the Elwha River, I’m hoping that
experts can make sure that the conditions will be right for larger
fish — if they can survive to make it home.
Quinn, along with doctoral student Michael Tillotson, recently
published a paper showing how fishing seasons alone can alter the
genetic makeup of a population along with the behavior of
individual fish.
Although these characteristics are not necessarily related to
the size of fish, it directly affects the fitness of the
population. When people are fishing on wild stocks during open
season, a fish has the best chance of survival if it shows up
before the fishing season begins or after the fishing season is
over. But that is not nature’s way.
Through evolution, the greatest number of fish tend to come back
when environmental conditions are optimal for migration, spawning
and smolt survival. If fishing seasons are timed for the peak of
the run, that will reduce the percentage of fish taking advantage
of the best conditions. Over time, the population gets skewed, as
more fish come back during times when conditions are less than
optimal.
The result is likely a lower survival rate for the overall
population. The real crunch could come in the future as a result of
climate change. If temperatures or streamflows become more severe,
the fish may be in a no-win situation: If they show up at the most
optimal time, they are more likely to get caught. if they come
early or late, the environment could kill them or ruin their
chances of successful spawning.
“We are reducing the ability of fish to find good environmental
conditions,” said Michael Tillotson in a
UW news release about the new paper. “We’re perhaps also
reducing the ability of fish to adapt to climate change.”
Certain behaviors are bred into wild fish over many generations,
and some traits are connected to their timing. Whether they feed
aggressively or passively can affect their survival. Some salmon
will wait for rain; others will wait for the right streamflow or
temperature. Some smolts will stay in freshwater for extended
periods; others will move quickly to saltwater. It’s not a great
idea when fishing seasons, rather than environmental conditions,
dictate fish behavior.
The move to mark-selective fishing — which involves removing the
adipose fin of all hatchery fish before they are released — can
help solve some problems for wild fish, Tom told me. Under
selective fishing rules, fishers are allowed to keep the hatchery
fish with a missing fin, but they must release the wild ones that
still have all their fins. Some of the wild fish die from injury,
but most of them survive, he said.
The key to the problem is a better understanding of the genetic
makeup of the individual stocks while increasing the effort to
maintain a high-level of genetic diversity. That’s an insurance
policy that allows the fish to survive changing conditions.
The genes for giant Chinook have not been lost entirely, as I
pointed out in
Water Ways on Nov. 25. If we want to have larger Chinook, we
must protect the individual Chinook that are larger. That could
mean reduced ocean fishing, selective fishing for hatchery
populations, and requirements to release fish larger than a certain
size. Perhaps it would even be possible to selectively breed larger
Chinook in a hatchery for a limited time to increase the size of
the fish.
It won’t be easy, because these notions involve messing with
billions of dollars in the fishing industry, not to mention
complicated international relations. I will save discussions about
the Pacific Salmon Treaty for another day. I will just say that
this treaty is supposed to be between the U.S. and Canada. But
negotiations involve tradeoffs among Washington, Canada and Alaska.
Even the Endangered Species Act can’t always protect wild Puget
Sound Chinook from being caught in Alaska, with the ultimate
outcome that fewer fish make it home to spawn.
Giant Chinook salmon of 50 pounds or more have not yet faded
into legend, as operators of a salmon hatchery in Central British
Columbia, Canada, can tell you.
Ted Walkus, a hereditary chief
of the Wuikinuxv First Nation, holds a Chinook salmon caught this
year for the Percy Walkus Hatchery on the Wannock River in Central
British Columbia.
Photo: Percy Walkus Hatchery
The annual spawning effort at the Percy Walkus Hatchery on the
Wannock River involves catching Chinook as they move upstream
rather than waiting for them to arrive at the hatchery. This year,
fishing crews brought home a remarkably large fish that has lived
long and prospered. The progeny of this fish will be returned to
the river from the hatchery to continue the succession of large
Chinook.
These big fish compare to the massive Chinook that once made
their way up the Elwha River and other major salmon streams of
Puget Sound. Knowing that these big fish still exist provides hope
that we might someday see such large salmon on the Elwha, following
the recent removal of two dams and ongoing habitat restoration.
Large, powerful Chinook are suited to large, powerful streams.
Big chinook can fight their way through swifter currents, jump up
larger waterfalls and protect their eggs by laying deeper redds.
Experts aren’t sure that the conditions are right for large Chinook
to return to the Elwha, but many are hopeful. I explored this idea
in a story I wrote for the
Kitsap Sun in 2010.
As for the two-year-old Percy Walkus Hatchery, big fish are not
uncommon in the Wannock River, as you can see in the hatchery’s
Facebook photo gallery. By spawning both large and smaller
salmon, the hatchery hopes to rebuild the once-plentiful numbers of
Chinook in the system. Involved in the project are the Wuikinuxv
First Nation along with Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans
and others.
Ted Walkus, a hereditary chief of the Wuikinuxv and the man
featured in the photo on this page, said the largest fish need to
remain part of the gene pool for the hatchery and the river. That’s
why volunteers go out into the river to take the brood stock. This
year, 47 males and 47 females were spawned to produce more than
300,000 fertilized eggs.
“If you catch a 60-pound salmon and you keep it without
breeding, that part of the gene pool eventually gets wiped out,”
Walkus was quoted as saying in a
CBC News report.
For similar reasons, some anglers choose to release their catch
alive, if possible, after getting a photo of their big fish. The
hope, of course, is that the fish will continue on and spawn
naturally. In the hatchery, the genes will be passed on to more
salmon when the progeny are released. Unfortunately, I was unable
to quickly locate a facility management plan for the Percy Walkus
Hatchery to see if anyone has projected the long-term effects of
the hatchery.
Chet Gausta, middle, shows off
the big fish he caught off Sekiu in 1964. Chet's younger brother
Lloyd, left, and his uncle Carl Knutson were with him on the
boat.
Photo courtesy of Poulsbo Historical
Society/Nesby
Big fish are genetically inclined to stay at sea five, six or
seven years rather than returning after four years. They must avoid
being caught in fishing nets and on fishing lines during their
migration of up to 1,000 miles or more before making it back home
to spawn.
Perhaps you’ve seen historical black-and-white photos of giant
Chinook salmon taken near the mouth of the Elwha River. Like the
giant Chinook of the Wannock River, some of these fish are nearly
as long as a grown man is tall. Catching them with rod and reel
must be a thrill of a lifetime.
Some of those giants — or at least their genes — may still be
around. The largest Chinook caught and officially weighed in
Washington state dates back to 1964. The 70-pound monster was
caught off Sekiu by Chester “Chet” Gausta of Poulsbo, who I wrote
about upon his death in 2012. See
Water Ways, Feb. 3, 2012. His photo is the second on this
page.
There’s something to be said for releasing salmon over a certain
size, and that goes for commercial fishing as well as sport
fishing. Gillnets, for example, target larger fish by using mesh of
a certain size, say 5 inches. Smaller fish can get through the
nets, spawn in streams and produce the next generation — of smaller
fish.
The genetic effects of removing the larger fish along with the
effects of taking fish during established fishing seasons
artificially “selects” (as Darwin would say) for fish that are
smaller and sometimes less fit. Some researchers are using the term
“unnatural selection” to describe the long-term effects of fishing
pressure. I intend to write more about this soon and also discuss
some ideas for better managing the harvest to save the best fish
for the future.
