Inslee's Salmon Recovery Program (Chinook: real estate, 2015, rooftop)

[rkcarguy]

Will it work? Without culling some seals and sea lions, I really doubt it.
Please at least do a page turn on WFDW's study PDF below. Salmon #'s are at alarmingly low levels and the culprit is very obvious.

https://wdfw.wa.gov/sites/default/fi...s_briefing.pdf

Two big take-aways from page 9:

"-Chinook consumed by pinnipeds increased
from 68 to 625 metric tons (1970 -2015).
-Pinnipeds consumed more than killer whales
and all fisheries"(combined)

[Arcos]

Nice read. Thanks.

[MechAndy]

I am for reducing their population.
They are really hurting the orcas food source.
I’d rather have and keep having healthy orca pods.
What would you rather want healthy orca’s or thousands and thousands of sea lions?


We live near Tribal lands and they have done wonders to rehabilitate the salmon.
I know of several areas that have greatly improved.
The Elwah River area.
The Dungeness River area.
And even Jimmy Come lately Creek.

We should learn from these successes.

Keeping our salmon resources in healthy numbers will take several different things done right.

[flyingsaucermom]

It's like with cats. I love them but they are merciless bird killers and an invasive species. I only allow mine to go outside the rooftop patio and yet one has still managed to catch and kill two birds in his first year of life. Imagine that.

We manage and/or "harvest" lost of species. I don't know about here, but I recall deer overpopulation causing an ecological problem when we lived in Wisconsin. It sort of changed my mind about hunting as a sport.

Seals and sea lions are also very cute, but if they are destroying cornerstone species then they need to managed. I don't know anything about marine ecology of the area, but I trust those that do.

[rantiquity]

The Fish and Game department has been pouring millions in Salmon recovery for many many years and so far all we have seen is less and less salmon.
IMO the solutions is put a restriction on gillnets, bottom trawls and Indian tribes placing a net barricade net across river mouths. Maybe even curtailing salmon fishing for a couple years. Reopen fish hatcheries.

[rkcarguy]

For whatever reason, our Puget Sound Orca's prefer salmon. I don't know if they will start eating seals as the salmon populations continue to founder, or if they will be all that successful catching them because seals can simply run ashore when being pursued and have plenty of places to do so in Puget Sound. In the 80's when I was a kid, we used to see an occasional seal or sea lion when out in my grandparents boat. Now there are so many they fight over "real estate" as the tide comes up.
The recreational fisheries have been the low hanging fruit for cuts to fishing opportunity and limits, providing an illusion that the state was doing something to help the salmon. In reality, the recreational license fees support the hatcheries and each license pays for almost 100x more hatchery fish production than the average fisher catches. The feds have also ESA listed many fish that recreational fishers have to release. Well, I can't count how many times I've been reeling in a non-hatchery fish, rock fish, or other fish I'm supposed to release and a seal gulps it down instead. The tribes have made good progress with their hatcheries but unfortunately I suspect it's just increasing the food source for more seals and sea lions.
2016 was my last year as a recreational fisher and boater. The state simply squeezed everything so tight and there was so many people using the same handful of boat launches from the 1980's it wasn't worth it. I liquidated everything. The few of my friends that still fish, go do it in Canada. They cull their seals, even offering bounty's at times, and it makes a marked difference in salmon returns and successful recreational fisheries.
I would like my kids and grandkids to experience it though, instead of telling them stories about "how it used to be".

[ScottStielow]

Originally Posted by MechAndy

I am for reducing their population.
They are really hurting the orcas food source.
I’d rather have and keep having healthy orca pods.
What would you rather want healthy orca’s or thousands and thousands of sea lions?


We live near Tribal lands and they have done wonders to rehabilitate the salmon.
I know of several areas that have greatly improved.
The Elwah River area.
The Dungeness River area.
And even Jimmy Come lately Creek.

We should learn from these successes.

Keeping our salmon resources in healthy numbers will take several different things done right.

Agree with this .

[grega94]

Salmon hatcheries are a double edged sword. On the one hand they help increase populations, but on the other they reduce genetic diversity and interbreed with the wild population making the whole species weaker. For instance Chinook are no longer able to make it all the way up to the Elwha head waters like they used to a century ago, but the stealhead trout which are not part of a hatchery program are much stronger and have no issues making it up to the head waters and are flourishing there.

As far as the seals and sea lions, we probably need to start culling them, at least not until the transient Orcas start controlling their population, which by the sound of it, more and more are visiting each year.

[MechAndy]

I like to watch YouTube vids on the Washington outdoors.
One guy said the local Sound Orca’s don’t eat sea lions because their mouths are to weak.
I am not quite sure I believe that but it is an interesting idea.

[Ruth4Truth]

WA State has a legal obligation toward the tribes to maintain the salmon resource. Good for Inslee for coming up with a plan!