Reply With QuoteI stand corrected as Chris73 is correct.Originally Posted by chris73
Should have fact checked before I posted.
thanks Chris73 for catching that.
Let's not exaggerate, GLG, it was 35 Millions. There used to be 100 Million Socks regularly > 100 years ago. But your point was made.
I stand corrected as Chris73 is correct.
Should have fact checked before I posted.
thanks Chris73 for catching that.
"There are in fact two things , science and opinion,The former begets knowledge , the latter ignorance " Hippocrates
The Harper™ Government©: Winging it since 2006
Think about those MILLIONS of “young” Fraser Sockeye smolts that “DIE” passing those Norwegian fish farms and don’t even make it to the feeding grounds? Might I add… there is absolutely NO problems with "overpopulation" or “Ocean Conditions” on the Fraser River feeding grounds!
Which btw, DFO knows exactly where those Sockeye go (and have for years), it isn’t even close to the areas discussed in those studies:
Numerical Simulations of Fraser River Sockeye Salmon
Homing Migration Routes in a Dynamic Marine Environment
Dale Kolody and Michael Healey
Department of Earth and Ocean Sciences, Oceanography
University of British Columbia, 6270 University Blvd.
Vancouver, B.C., V6T 1Z4, Canada
http://www.npafc.org/new/publication...28(Kolody).PDF
common urban legend. fire up google maps, look for Portland, OR. then trace the willamette river from its confluence to the head waters. what you will find is urban development, coupled with agriculture grass fields with their pesticide and fertilizer run off. the Portland harbor was a super fund site not that many years ago due to WWII ship building, mercury, lead and all sort of other nasty stuff. you will also note that the upper forks are all dammed 'flood control'.
stocking of springers was stopped decades ago, decades.....a totally impacted urban river with a self sustaining run of spring and fall chinook and a very healthy run of fall steelhead, all on their own, no hatcheries involved, on an eco system that has been blasted by mankind over the centuries.
urban legend says this can't be done. think again. mankind has zero clue regarding fish DNA and what they are genetically programmed to do. all WE have to do is get the hell out of the way and let them return on their own. hatcheries are what is keeping these runs from returning and the justification, as noted above, is not only urban legend but also a PR job supreme by the commercial fishing interests to keep your and my tax dollars involved with producing hatchery zombies for these folks to harvest. now do the ROI, <1% return rate is considered stellar for hatchery returns. so how much/pound are you willing to throw at hatcheries???? step right up 'cause the days of a free ride are rapidly diminishing as budgets are slashed down this way.
[QUOTE=reelfast;235192]common urban legend.
Your somewhat extreme environmental religion is showing. But glad to hear you have one urban river with a modest salmon recovery despite being totally devastated.
I can tell you with certainty that where I am right now we would have no Chinook fishery at all if it were not for US Hatcheries and commitment to river restoration.
I am thrilled and thankful for the huge efforts and financial sacrifice that the American people have made towards the rehabilitation of your rivers, wild salmon and pacific salmon enhancement and wish we could get our government to do the same.
It goes without saying that I dread the future should your position on this ever prevail; luckily that would seem unlikely.
Last edited by Rockfish; 05-16-2012 at 04:59 PM.
[QUOTE=Rockfish;235199]Rockfish, I am not sure Reelfast's environmentalism is that extreme. I accept that hatcheries are probably required on some rivers for now. But I consider it extreme hubris and arrogance to believe that mankind can "do better" than nature. Nature has had thousands of years to "perfect" the system in the case of salmon and millions of years before that in the case of fish in general.....
Yeah run augmentation is required and valuable for now, but the ultimate long term goal should be to restore rivers to enable natural production and get the hell out of the way.
[QUOTE=Englishman;235215]We are certainly on the same page with the need to protect and restore fish habitat and on the importance of hatcheries in the short term and I think most likely in the long term.
50 years ago there were 3 billion people on the planet and in thirty years there will be 10 billion. Some theorize that human population growth may begin to stabilize at that point as the entire planet becomes developed (developed countries have slower population growth than undeveloped countries) but many others do not think so.
In Canada with our current governments we seem hell bent on poisoning our rivers, extracting water and spawning gravel and turning every salmon river and stream into a power plant while introducing alien species such as Atlantic salmon.
I do not subscribe to the environmental dogma that man should never intervene in nature and should just stay out of the way and nature/other species will recover although I acknowledge it is a widely held belief.
This belief seems to be based in guilt for all the negative impacts on other species humans have caused because we evolved to invent technology and as a species cannot control our own population growth which has lead to a great many negative consequences for other species.
Man will never become just an observer of nature. We are a pinnacle predator and will continue to be a part of nature. We will continue to grow our population most likely until we exhaust resources and food supply and in so doing continue to negatively impact most other species. Most other species on the planet (plant and animal) are or will become a food source or other resource for humans. Dig up a copy of an old movie called "Soylent Green". It was thought provoking even in its day and the premise may be even more relevent in todays world now that our population curve is almost vertical.
I believe not only that we should in some circumstances further intervene in nature, but that we have an obligation to attempt to do so where we can to mitigate, reduce or at least delay the damage to other species our own species uncontrolled population growth has caused.
In fact we have done it successfully many times and are doing it daily. For example, the endangered Vancouver Island Marmot captive breeding and release program. In doing so we have brought back a significant number of species from the brink of human caused extinction and captured, transported and restored some species to ranges they were once eradicated from by man such as wolves in Yellowstone Park which was an attempt to restore historical balance to that ecosystem.
Perhaps we should not have intervened and let some of those species go extinct but I disagree with that point of view.
Sure nature will eventully rebalance for mans population curve but I think it is going to take one of histories largest mass extinctions including possibly that of humans to do it. That is natures way; it won't be pretty and it won't be the planets first mass extinction. 99+% of all species that ever existed on this planet are now extinct.
Last edited by Rockfish; 05-17-2012 at 05:13 AM.
Well I hate to inform anyone who doesn't like hatcheries, but when it comes to salmon “wild” or “hatchery” “clipped” or “unclipped” really should not be the question anymore, here in the Pacific Northwest! Just for simplicity sake, you might as well consider any salmon in the Columbia River Basin, Puget Sound, or even the Fraser a direct result of some type of a hatchery production!
It is currently believed (I do believe) that over 80% of the Chinook population in the Columbia is now a direct result of “hatchery” production. Even the so-called “wild” Chinook listed on ESA are currently enhanced by “hatcheries”! The Puget Sound Chinook were mismanaged and crossbred so much that IMHO there cannot be any “wild” Chinook left in Puget Sound; to include, those listed on ESA. Most of the Fraser populations have been enhanced and cross bredding with the remaining "wild" has been going on for years.
So, the real questions should be: 1) Do want salmon spawning in their natural habitat were they support other species of life that depend on them for existence? 2) Continue hatching them in cement ponds where they can’t support the other forms of life, that is except us humans? 3) Let them, and the rest of the other species that rely on them just die off and leave us eating “farmed Atlantic salmon”?
Concerning DNA… You just touch a salmon and that is subject to change its DNA. Think about loading those “wild” Snake River ESA Chinook on barges and transporting them – don’t think that changes their DNA? Everything changes and modifies a salmons DNA it is how they have evolved over that 50 million years of their existence.
IF… we humans were to get out of their way giving salmon a chance, meaning we do not continue to poison, block and/or destroy their spawning grounds – they WILL adopt and survive! Until then, if we were to “just get out of their way” without those hatcheries there simply would be NO salmon, including on the Willamette River.
I am also for protecting and restoring salmon habitat and doing just that; however, those hatcheries are going to be around for a LONG time! What we humans are doing has nothing to do with “nature.” Unfortunately, one needs to remember salmon need access to spawning grounds to survive! Once we humans destroy their environment and habitat in an area there really is only a few choices left. 1) Restore their habitat 2) Build a hatchery 3) Let that particular salmon race go extinct. Make your choice, as the choice really is yours. It has nothing to do with what “nature” can or can’t do!
Not so sure I would have used the Willamette River as an example of “totally impacted urban river with a self sustaining run of spring and fall chinook and a very healthy run of fall steelhead”? Don’t know about the “common urban legend” comment either, but if you do “fire up” Google, point it in this direction:
http://www.cbr.washington.edu/dart/hatch.html
Total Released in 2011 was 1,660,426 “Spring” Chinook yearlings and breaks down as follows:
Willamette Hatchery, Dexter Pond, Released 539,469 on 01/28/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, Dexter Pond, Released 654,437 on 02/11/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, South Fork Santiam River, Released 126,169 on 02/23/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, Mollala River, Released 103,809 on 03/01/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, Dexter Pond, Released 236,542 on 04/13/2011 byODFW
Total Released in 2011 was 157,401 Steelhead:
Willamette Hatchery, Santiam River & N Fk released 65,516 on 03/08/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, Willamette River released 30,870 on 04/11/2011 by ODFW
Willamette Hatchery, Dexter Pond released 61,015 on 04/13/2011 by ODFW
The Willamette River Chinook and Steelhead is currently and has been enhanced, since 1925. That is currently to the tune of over 1.5 million Chinook yearlings annually. The reason is simple, salmon need spawning grounds to survive. Build a dam that obstructs their return and/or destroy the spawning grounds, they simply cannot exist in that area:
“This facility was built and annually funded in part by the US Army Corps of Engineers to compensate for the loss of spawning and rearing areas above the dams on the South Santiam River.
Hatchery is located downriver at north end of Foster Dam.”
http://www.santiamriver.com/
Want to take a look at their visitors center?
http://www.dfw.state.or.us/resources...exter_pond.asp
Decades and self-sustaining?
FYI… Salmon have been around much longer than most think and will probably outlast us? Atlantic and Pacific both originated from one species. Here is part of an article I put together a few years ago:
There are five species of Pacific salmon (Onchorhynchus spp.) of what we refer to as Pacific Northwest Salmon they are: Chinook, Coho, Sockeye, Chum, and Pink. However, in the Oncorhynchus family you will also find Steelhead and Sea-run Cutthroat trout. So, if someone happens to say seven different species, they would be correct in that statement!
Salmonidae have been around for Eon(aeon), in comparison our primate ancestors showed about 4 million years ago - The oldest salmon fossil is Eosalmo, (which actually lived in fresh water) and lived about 50 million years ago. Think about that, salmon have lived on this Earth over twelve times longer than “humans”! Ten to fifteen million years ago salmon grew to ten feet and actually had fangs, some weighing in over 500 pounds. Now that is a “salmon”!
The salmon’s ancestral species Oncorhynchus is believed to have evolved during the Meiocene Epoch.
No links for that, as I wrote it based on some research a few years back; however, if interested information can be found by “firing up Google” and looking under and for the names: ‘Smilodonichthys rastrosus’, ‘Sabretooth’, ‘Eoslmo’ all followed with salmon.
Last edited by Charlie; 05-17-2012 at 04:06 AM.
"So, the real questions should be: 1) Do want salmon spawning in their natural habitat were they support other species of life that depend on them for existence? 2) Continue hatching them in cement ponds where they can’t support the other forms of life, that is except us humans? 3) Let them, and the rest of the other species that rely on them just die off and leave us eating “farmed Atlantic salmon”?"
There you go. Good job Charlie. Rendered to the bare essence of it all.
"Some could care less if there's any fish left for our kids!"
you are huddled down sitting in your favorite comfy chair, snacks at arms reach, all is well. the big yellow hatchery bus pulls up in front of your place and 100 noisey clones jump out and pile into your favorite room. in an eye blink, anything that can be eaten is gone, you are pushed into a corner by your well fed but clueless new room mates............so what to do, you leave town never to be seen again.
the DNA is still embedded down deep in anadramous fishes. where i sit and type was under 1,500' of solid ice. over the eons it took for that ice to recede, the salmon came back. from where? how? only the arrogance of mankind would attempt to control this event. only the fish know how and mankind needs to get comfortable with not knowing.
environmentlism? no i don't think so, just willing to read and understand the science involved is enough to convince me that hatcheries are THE major deterent to anadramous fish recovery. sure the environment has been screwed sixteen ways from sunday, but somehow, and this is the sticking point, the anadramous fishes survive, repopulate, spawn and come back another year. we can't explain this and never have been able to, only the fish know and all mankind needs to do is give the fish a break and let them do what they are programmed to do.
fish farming is here forever, sorry, the reliance on this food source has grown to astromical proportions as the world population of humans has expanded. what can be argued is responsible fish farming but that is another matter entirely. what the super markets need is an 'everymans' fish, cheap to produce, not too fishy in taste, nice white meat......that is the role atlantic cod used to play but we all know what happened with that fishery. so enter the vegetarian fishes, talapia as a great example. salmon, in all of its forms, is too expensive to fill this role and i believe will eventually assume the position of 'dinner treat' fish.
so lets all give the anadramous fish a break, start cutting hatchery production by 50%/year until we reach zero zombies released anywhere. is that going to impact my rec angling? well of course. will this basically close down commercial fishing for anadramous fishes? i believe it will. but our grandkids will give us thanks along with their kids as the fish survive and come back. think about it.....................
Last edited by reelfast; 05-17-2012 at 05:52 AM.
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