By Bob Brown For the past couple of years, forecasts of returning salmon to our local rivers have been shy of the mark, and nobody seems to know the reason. It has been suggested the shortfalls could be the result of poor ocean conditions, increased mammal predation, climate change, pollution, and possibly overfishing. It has also been suggested it is a combination of all of the above. David Troutt, director of the Nisqually Indian Tribe Natural Resources program, recently wrote an article in the tribe's October newsletter regarding this year’s late chum small return to the river. Troutt said over the past five years, "We have seen some trends in the late chum run that are concerning. The run seems to be getting smaller and entering the river earlier. We are investigating both of these issues and attempting to determine if there is a particular cause that can be corrected." The 2016 predicted Nisqually chum run size was slightly over 29,000, with an escapement goal of 27,000. Troutt said the tribe's experience over the past five years is that "our pre-season forecasts tend to be high. That means the margin for error to make our escapement this year appears to be very small. Added to the concern is that we have been short of escapement in two of the past five years and both of those years are the parent escapements that make up this year’s run. Also the south sound chum run was much smaller than predicted this year and appears to have collapsed." Based on the smaller than expected chum run, the Nisqually Fish Commission decided not to open a commercial chum fishery this year. The tribe’s last coho fishery closed Nov. 16, where upon the Nisqually River was closed to fishing until further notice. The WDFW also closed their Nisqually recreational fisheries at the same time. So what can recreational anglers expect in the near future for then Nisqually River? Tim Wilson, Nisqually stock assessment biologist, said he doesn’t expect the river to open to fishing for the remainder of the season. Meanwhile, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife's 2017 forecasted adult spring chinook returns to the Cowlitz, Kalama and Lewis rivers don't look that great, but who knows? forecasts are educated guesses, at best. The actual returns this year and the forecast for 2017 are as follows: • Cowlitz: 22,500 in 2016, 17,100 in 2017. • Kalama: 4,000 in 2016, 3,100 in 2017. • Lewis: 500 in 2016, 700 in 2017. Totals: 27,000 in 2016, 20,900 in 2017. In other fishing news, activity on the Cowlitz has been kind of light, according to Karen Glaser of Barrier Dam Campground. Weather has been a factor. Creel checks Dec. 5- 11 counted 20 bank anglers with two adult coho and released one. No boats were sampled. During that same period, Tacoma Power employees recovered 1,225 coho adults, 82 jacks, three fall chinook adults, two summer steelhead, nine winter steelhead and six cutthroat trout during five days of operations at the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery separator. The employees also released 331 coho adults, 13 coho jacks, two fall chinook, two cutthroat trout and one winter steelhead into the Tilton River located at Gus Backstrom Park in Morton. Bob Brown lives in Roy and is a freelance outdoors writer. He can be reached at robertb1285@centurylink.net.
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