That looks perfect to me! Wash that sediment out and uncover the spawning gravels again. It will clean itself out and rebuild a beautiful estuary at the mouth of the river. As noted in the video from Atlas, the first fishery to recover on the Elwha was Dungeness crab at the river mouth when the sediment deposits built huge sand bars.
Chinook eat fish and are bottom-adjacent in the open ocean. Sockeye and pink are midwater krill/plankton feeders. Trawling bycatch is the biggest problem with King salmon numbers, as even the “midwater” trawlers have more than 50% bottom contact. Yet bycatch allowances keep increasing even while Yukon River subsistence fishing is closed.
Along with this point - something to consider. SST = sea surface temperature. Figure from Sabal et al. 2023
Great pictures! I have spent some time on various Klamath tributaries. The streams in that part of the world are so beautiful, if hurts! Looking at Clear Creek is making me want to go back...
I've browsed quite a few different state/region focused outdoors forums, and I've always been impressed by ifish. Lots of good discussion over there. Always interesting to get their perspective.
But at the same point we need to be real about the benefits of dam removal. If we advocate under the guise that removal will do all these wonderful things for salmon populations, while the actual controlling or limiting factors are elsewhere then we as a society aren't able to make based on the best costs/benefit analysis.
Maybe? I'm not always convinced of that.
The tribal play on the Snake River dams right now is to develop alternative energy resources on their own terms to make the dam power generation a non issue. Yes there will be some other collateral issues. To me the worst offenders are the dams with no fish ladders. I guess some folks think that that removing the lower four Snake dams would make a large spawning run but I would still be focused on the Hell‘s Canyon complex and Grand Coulee. I think there is political fear of advocating for removal of Hell’s Canyon complex because of the Federal hatcheries that were mandated because they couldn’t figure out the ladders. Those hatcheries are the only reason there is a viable fishery right now. Again it doesn’t matter if the fish never make it back to the Columbia although the smolt survival should increase over time without the dams for the wild fish that do spawn.
globalnews.ca
YepThousands of Chinook salmon caught accidentally by B.C. trawlers: Report - BC | Globalnews.ca
DFO's report suggests over 20,000 Chinook were likely thrown overboard, while 3,700 may have been tossed onto land, according to Pacific Wild.
Now add in the Mericans’
Because people want fish sticks
$$$ buys political influence
That's what perch and walleye are for.
We’re talking about an industry so jacked up that the huge fishing businesses fund the policing agency in America, and then they invented a scam to enlist native coastal communities to be “partners” in the fishing operations which is actually attributing some of the bycatch to be utilized by coastal native communities. I think there is serious corruption at ADF&G that supports commercial over sport fishing and native subsistence fishing. It is absolutely big business gaming the system to make it “legal”. There is no reason to support trawling. Pot fishing and long lining are for more sustainable and it distributes the wealth throughout the fishing community rather than a few big businesses. Yes the McDonald’s fish sticks will cost more should you choose to eat them. I will cook fish for you that is infinitely better! I challenge you to call out your local grocery store too. You literally have to look at each package. I showed my wife the other day at Super 1 that each bag of scallops varied from caught in Japan, to caught in China, to caught in the USA. Judging from international press I consider all Chinese caught fish to be stolen from other countries. OK I’m stepping down from the soap box for a Monday!
www.businessinsider.com
