Opinion on Oregon Coastal Fall Chinook Closures

This is the time of year when my fancy turns from trout to chinook.  I try to sleep but visions of chrome chinook anywhere from fifteen to fifty pounds and beyond  flit around my head and often keep me sleepless.  Now, I’ll admit it, last year was pretty bad but my skill as a salmon angler has grown and I continued to have success even in bleak coastal fall chinook circumstances.  The rest of the year, I’ve been chanting the salmon angler’s mantra: “there’s always next year.”    See, in the salmon world next year’s run always might be better than this years . . . or worse.  You just never know and have to keep hope alive.

This season is now almost upon us and the runs are generally forecast to be slightly larger than last year but the angling opportunities are fewer.  ODFW has announced closures meant to keep salmon out of our stomachs, off of our lines and on the spawning beds.  Basically, the bag limit has been reduced from twenty wild salmon to five for the season.  The total bag remains the same at twenty salmon or steelhead for the season but fifteen have to be fin-clipped.  Given that there is only extremely limited hatchery production on the Oregon Coast (I’ve caught one fin-clipped fall chinook, ever) the effective salmon bag on most rivers is five.  You’ll have to search out streams with hatchery fish if you want additional harvest opportunities.  Additionally, many rivers are closed somewhere on their lower mainstem with the hope of ensuring adequate escapement.  Fine by me.

This isn’t a rant.  I have absolutely no beef with doing my part and limiting my harvest to ensure future runs and to a certain extent I welcome these regulations though I wish they weren’t necessary.  I’m not into fighting over an ever diminishing pie, I want the salmon pie to get bigger and bigger.  I dream of a return to historic abundance though recognize that isn’t really possible.  The question I’m asking is not just will these limitations help grow the pie (they might) but what else needs to happen?  Like I said, I’m not against doing my part.  I just don’t think Oregon sport anglers should be the only group to carry the burden.  Everyone of us in the salmon nation is part of the problem and we all need to be part of the solution.

The causes of salmon decline in Oregon are complex but are generally boiled down to: habitat, hatcheries, harvest and hydropower.  The dreaded four horsemen of the salmon apocalypse.  Our dozens of magnificent Oregon Coast Range rivers from the Necanicum to the Winchuck flow freely almost without exception eliminating hydropower as a cause of this recent decline.  Very few of these rivers have hatcheries though historic hatchery practices have undoubtedly altered the gene pool.  But that is inadequate to explain the recent precipitous decline in coastal chinook and coho.  That leaves us with two H’s: habitat and harvest.

Habitat for salmon comes in two very generalized forms: freshwater spawning and rearing habitat and ocean habitat.  Looking at Oregon’s coastal freshwater habitat there is no question that generally it is better than it has been at any point in the last fifty years or so.  There is definitely a litany of problems that need to be addressed.  Lack of shade and gravel, lack of instream woody debris, nutrient starved streams just to name a few.  But, the fact is that Oregon’s rivers are producing more smolts than they have in the recent past, the salmon just aren’t making it home.  This brings us to the second general habitat prong: ocean conditions.  Ocean conditions have been poor.  There is little debate about that.  Dead zones have caused problems and global climate change is disrupting established patterns.  Yet, the Columbia Sockeye run is the biggest since 1955. and the Columbia spring chinook run is holding near the ten year average so at least some runs are persisting in the ocean.  This indicates to me that something else is at play.

Harvest.  Harvest might be the single biggest problem facing our coastal salmon stocks.  Oregon’s commercial ocean salmon fishing closed to protect California stocks that are suffering . . . Did our neighbors to the north extend this same courtesy?  NO.  I truly think that the bulk of fall chinook bound for Oregon’s rivers are intercepted and killed in the ocean by our Canadian and Alaskan friends in both their sport and commercial fisheries and with many Canadian stocks crashing due to extremely poor fish farming practices the pressure to intercept Oregon bound fish will only increase.

A quick check of Canadian ocean sport regulations found that the season is open the entire year!  Not only that but it appears the annual ocean bag limit is thirty chinook!  Even more impressive is the yearly bag limitation on coho–there isn’t one! By contrast Oregon’s and Washington’s seasons are set by the Pacific Fisheries Management Council.  This year Washington areas 2-4 have a season of June 22 to August 31 or until a cumulative quota of 8,200 chinook is attained for the combined Areas 2-4.  Area 2 has an allotment of 5,100 chinook and 7,520 coho.  Area 3 is allowed 350 chinook and 540 hatchery coho and Area 4 is open for chinook only.  In Oregon, the season is completely closed to chinook in the ocean and we have a quota of 9,000 fin clipped coho.  Meanwhile, back in BC . . . .

I’m not saying that ocean harvest is the only situation that needs to be addressed.  I am saying that we all, not just Oregon sports angler need to make sacrifices to protect what are now fragile stocks.  The harvest management regime needs retooling if there is any hope of recovering Oregon’s coastal chinook and coho stocks.

I’m not talking silver bullets here. We need a wholistic integrated, transboundary approach to protect our quality of life and the feds need to step up and do something about Canadian and Alaskan harvest of Oregon, Washington and California bound fish.