[Smalma]

Just reading about the 2017 upper Columbia/Snake rivers steelhead forecast; the total forecast is only 130,700 the lowest in 35 years. Of even more concern is the "B" which has a forecast of 6,300 (only 1,100 wild) and 2,000 needed for hatchery brood stock.

A discouraging continuing decline from the 2009 when 600,000 steelhead are said to have passed upstream at Bonneville.

Curt

 

[Jonathan Tachell]

Not good news for the Methow, Wetsnatchy or Grande Ronde crowd.

 

[927]

In a nutshell how do they come up with the numbers for this forecast?

 

[Robert Engleheart]

Curt, given your history with this fishery/forecasts, how accurate have they been historically? Sad news.

 

[Methow]

Oh well such is life when it comes to fishing the Upper Columbia waters. Sounds like the Snake waters may have some problems this year to.

 

[Steelhead]

Hopefully they are wrong again.

 

[Buzzy]

Not good news for the Methow, Wetsnatchy or Grande Ronde crowd.

Moving back to the OP (Olympic Peninsula), to heck with it.

 

[Big Tuna]

Moving back to the OP (Olympic Peninsula), to heck with it.

Those runs are going to hell as well. Orygun?

 

[Buzzy]

Those runs are going to hell as well. Orygun?

I was being a smart aleck; if the agencies follow form of the 2016/2017 UCR steelhead season it certainly won't help the "crowding" issues on OP rivers regardless of run size.

 

[Methow]

With a low One Salt return this last year it only reasons that the up coming 2 salt return will be low. Plus I heard that the 2018 run is going to be low also.

 

[Robert Engleheart]

Those runs are going to hell as well. Orygun?

There are no steelhead in Oregon; fable created by local Chambers of Commerce.

 

[BDD]

It is funny Curt posted this today. They put me in charge of fish counts where I work. Today was the start of 8 new fish counters reporting for their first day. Being their supervisor, I had to run the day's orientation and all that. Anyway, one of the questions I thought they might ask is what does the 2017 fish runs look like, knowing that the more fish that come up the river, the more hours they log. About 5 minutes before we started, I Googled and printed an article, summarizing this year's forecast. The title of the article was "Fish Forecast: Not Very Good". All of projected run forecasts to the Columbia River are well below last year's return except for coho. Steelhead look particularly poor, as Curt posted above. I'm glad I don't have to rely on Washington to provide summer run steelhead fishing opportunity.

 

[Buzzy]

It is funny Curt posted this today. They put me in charge of fish counts where I work. Today was the start of 8 new fish counters reporting for their first day. Being their supervisor, I had to run the day's orientation and all that. Anyway, one of the questions I thought they might ask is what does the 2017 fish runs look like, knowing that the more fish that come up the river, the more hours they log. About 5 minutes before we started, I Googled and printed an article, summarizing this year's forecast. The title of the article was "Fish Forecast: Not Very Good". All of projected run forecasts to the Columbia River are well below last year's return except for coho. Steelhead look particularly poor, as Curt posted above. I'm glad I don't have to rely on Washington to provide summer run steelhead fishing opportunity.

Maybe I need to buy a Catchercraft and have it delivered north of the border?

 

[BDD]

Maybe I need to buy a Catchercraft and have it delivered north of the border?

Keep your money. Why buy the cow when the milk is free?

 

[Klickrolf]

Just reading about the 2017 upper Columbia/Snake rivers steelhead forecast; the total forecast is only 130,700 the lowest in 35 years. Of even more concern is the "B" which has a forecast of 6,300 (only 1,100 wild) and 2,000 needed for hatchery brood stock.

A discouraging continuing decline from the 2009 when 600,000 steelhead are said to have passed upstream at Bonneville.

Curt

Any idea how these predictions are derived? Steelhead returns seem dubious to predictions. Or at least I don't understand how steelhead returns can be predicted. Interested to learn how this is done.

 

[Jmills81]

hot water 2015 in migration and the north pacific blog fucked us

 

[Smalma]

Klickrolf-

Not sure what goes into those forecasts. Do understand the return of one salt "A" fish in the Snake was very low in 2016 so they expect that the survival for the two salts for the "B" will low. My understanding with the tag tracking the managers have some pretty good information on the survival of the smolts through the dams so expect the number of smolts reaching the ocean. The missing piece of course is the marine survival once they reach the ocean. It would typical to use a recent average survival. The recent average survival method typically means the forecasts tend to laggin behind the actual returns if the survival trend is increasing and a head of the actual returns if the trend is declining.

Curt

 

[Poopy McButtfart]

hot water 2015 in migration and the north pacific blog fucked us

Don't blame the plight of our steelhead on your rival bloggers

 

[Jmills81]

Don't blame the plight of our steelhead on your rival bloggers

You win today !

 

[Carter Burke]

Don't blame poor runs on things that have happened in the last 20 years alone.

Steelhead runs are poor because we didn't take care of them when they were still healthy nor did we address issues associated with their health when they began to decline and restoration efforts have not been effective.
We harvested them to death we nuked their habitat, turned their raging migration route into a placid lake and we bred them to extinction.

We are darn lucky to have any left at all.

Blobs. Ocean conditions hot summers ehh thoes aren't the problem. Human actions are the problem.