Quote:
|
Alot of reason that the late stock cohos didn't makes as good of showing is that they were getting pounded on by the gillnetters hard this year (7 day a week openings) Also does anyone know how that native coho are accounted for by gillnetters?
|
<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">
The late strain (type N) coho were forecast to be weak in 2003 and the earliy strain (type S) were forecast to be strong and both strains came in as predicted.
The Cowlitz for example (type N) had a rough estimate of 26,000 coho and received 30,000 almost right on the money.
The Toutle which is an early strain had a return of 30,000 which was very impressive.
The late’s across the table were weak as forecast and I don’t understand why the gill nets were given so much extra time but even so 30,000 coho escaped the ocean fishery, bouy 10, lower Columbia and Cowlitz fisheries and the gill netters to return to the Barrier Dam in 2003.
In 2002 73,000 excess coho escaped the onslaught and returned to the Barrier Dam and 67,000 hatchery coho were released up river from there.
The Kalama on the other hand had a dismal return of only a couple thousand late’s if I remember correctly and thanks to the gill nets provided a poor fishery on them.
I would be very interested in seeing the numbers of both hatchery and wild coho harvested by the gill-netters!
(And every other creature they kill in their death traps).
Quote:
I may be wrong but to me it seemed like for all the carnage that was happening in the ocean on coho's last year that when they hit the river the numbers just werent there.
I fished the umpqua a several times and there was never any big numbers of coho there I never even got a single hatchery fish. I could be wrong but it seems like the increased ocean quota left very few fish for the river.
I kind of left me feeling shafted and like I was penalized because I couldnt afford an ocean going skowl.
Quasi
|
<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">I’m not sure what took place there in the Umpqua Quasi, but as finclipped stated most of the coho caught off the Oregon coast are Columbia River stocks from both Oregon and Washington and of course the Oregon coastal wild coho and some (small percent) Oregon coastal hatchery coho.
Those Columbia River stocks we catch off the Oregon coast are the early strain from both states as the late strain coho produced in Washington migrate north off the Washington coast.
The Oregon coast still has some hatchery coho but they have been reduced in smolt releases in recent years from an average of a million per hatchery to 100,000-200,000 and a closure of the hatchery coho program at Fall Creek hatchery to help the Oregon coastal wild coho rebound.
Appears to be working.
I get time I will look up last year’s return of Umpqua hatchery coho for you, unless it is that step program I’m thinking about.
As far as carnage is concerned, more than enough hatchery coho (early’s) returned to the Columbia River hatcheries and more could have been harvested out in the salt except for the incidental mortality on the OCN’s.
This is real crictical and there is a lot more work to be done educating the public and charters on proper handling/releasing of the wild coho and their importance to the fishermen and their fisheries.
Quote:
|
I didn't hear about a 7 day a week coho gillnet season this fall. The columbia season was the same as the year before. My catch went from 30 in oct to 10 this year.
|
<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">I don’t know but several locals told me that there was a larger gill net season in 2003.
This absolutely makes no sense to me when the Type N’s (late’s) were forecast to be weak in 2003.
I was also told by several Longview area residents that there were articles stating record coho returns in 2003 which is total nonsense.
A friend of mine is supposed to get me a copy of the article from the Dailey News.
Quote:
Quasi,
Most of the hatchery fish caught out of Winchester or the entire coast for that matter, are Columbia origin hatchery fish. You are going to need to come up to here if you want to catch one. Otherwise wack em in the Ocean.
|
<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">There are some hatchery coho fisheries in some coastal bays and rivers still but as mentioned earlier they have been reduced in size to help the wild fish recover.
The good news is with the phenomenal rebounding of the wild coho stocks happening, you will see more and more fisheries on individual coastal wild coho stocks that have become healthy.
Some of those would probably be the Yaquina, Siusalaw and Coos wild stocks.
Quote:
Native coho runs are index's by the spawning ground surveys.....
So systems w/o dam's have a very rough "index" at best and historically these "index's" have only been taking place for roughly 20 years with some consistancy.
With the great return over the lasr six years of coastal coho, I believe all fisheries managers are left believing that after ocean harvests where cut back and in some cases eliminated completly, left the primary culprit outside ocean survivals to mixed stock fisheries and poor hatchery practices that lead to the crash of coastal coho.
|
<font size="2" face="verdana,arial,helvetica">I don’t know about consistency of the spawning index’s but the preseason predictors for wild coho aren’t working!
The model simply doesn’t work and the predictors were under predicted by roughly 400% and 300% in 2002 and 2001 respectably.
Last years return of the OCN’s (escapement) were probably at least twice as large as the preseason predictor for 2003.
A little update on OCN's & Hatchery Coho 2004
[img]graemlins/applause.gif[/img] 
illbfish
Linear Mode
