Plan hatched to return coho salmon to Coquitlam River after 105 years
- Thread starter agentaqua
- Start date
I understand the concept of parental based tagging but don't see how this alone would be applicable to sports anglers who would release wild fish. Surely a visible mark identifying the fish as hatchery origin is necessary, no?
Good question Dave. As you are likely aware - all methodologies have some pros/cons. The problem w the CWT tagging and/or adipose removal is that it is labour intensive and expensive and because of that - it is generally only used to tag a proportion of the total released hatchery stock. There is no guarantee that the particular fish you catch can be identified as a hatchery fish unless that hatchery does CWT tags and/or adipose clips on every single released fish. That is rare for that to happen most hatcheries most years - particularly the smaller community-driven coho hatcheries.
So if one doesn't do any tagging/clipping due to COVID or financial restraints - what is the other methodologies that can be used? Well, the PBT technology can be used - but does require more effort in the catch end verses the hatchery release side of this equation. And the costs are mostly in the DNA work afterwards. In an ideal world - those costs can be provided outside of a hatchery realistic operating costs & capacity - used later for the DNA lab.
And the PBT can also be used to identify best practices for both feeding and release strategies by a hatchery if a hatchery can be set up to release a couple different batches of cohorts using separate feeding and release strategies as a "measure of success". There's some real opportunity here.
So if one doesn't do any tagging/clipping due to COVID or financial restraints - what is the other methodologies that can be used? Well, the PBT technology can be used - but does require more effort in the catch end verses the hatchery release side of this equation. And the costs are mostly in the DNA work afterwards. In an ideal world - those costs can be provided outside of a hatchery realistic operating costs & capacity - used later for the DNA lab.
And the PBT can also be used to identify best practices for both feeding and release strategies by a hatchery if a hatchery can be set up to release a couple different batches of cohorts using separate feeding and release strategies as a "measure of success". There's some real opportunity here.
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
Not just anglers but commercial and first nations also need to be able to identify hatchery fish. Part of the reason of using selective techniques like fish wheels is the added benefit of be able able to retain hatchery mark fish.
trophywife
Crew Member
wouldnt most be "wild" hatchery? meaning returned spawners that make it.spawn out. are they then considered wild?
Using the Chilliwack as an example, anglers can legally retain hatchery steelhead and coho. Hatchery is determined by a missing adipose fin ... fish with adipose fins are considered wild. Whether these fish in this system are actually wild is another debate.
Summer and fall chinooks are mainly unclipped but nearly are all hatchery produced.
Whitebuck is right, imo .. if all hatchery coho and chinook were adipose clipped, our wild populations would be dismal.
Well if I understand you point - you would like adipose clips so you can retain more hatchery steelhead and coho that are hatchery fish but not clipped that show-up in your watershed.
Wrt PBT - I believe I am seeing it from a larger perspective - looking for what a "measure of success" is for stock enhancement for all fisheries. There are some glaring issues with large-scale, long-term stock enhancement. Some of those issues could be mitigated somewhat using PBT while changing both feeding regimes and release strategies @ low-cost to the hatcheries - but some $ needed for increases in DNA work.
Wrt PBT - I believe I am seeing it from a larger perspective - looking for what a "measure of success" is for stock enhancement for all fisheries. There are some glaring issues with large-scale, long-term stock enhancement. Some of those issues could be mitigated somewhat using PBT while changing both feeding regimes and release strategies @ low-cost to the hatcheries - but some $ needed for increases in DNA work.
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
No what he’s saying is that most anglers think they catch and retain wild fish that are really just unmarked hatchery fish. That of all hatch fish were marked anglers would get a huge eye opener on how rare an actual wild fish is. In some areas/times catching a wild fish would become a pretty rare event.
for example on WCVI otolith marking showed that the hatchery catch was 50-80% depending on area and times including off shore. How ever adipose mark rate was 0-30% depending on area and time. For chinook
Last edited:
G
gone fishin
Guest
Is what Wildmanyeah posted what you are saying Dave?
First, it's not me who wants hatchery fish, if it was my decision the steelhead component of the Chilliwack River hatchery would be axed and the roughly 100k it costs be allocated to habitat restoration and maintenance.
Regulations on the Chilliwack state all wild coho and steelhead must be released. The only practical way to determine hatchery origin, for an angler, is a readily identifiable mark, hence the fin clip. All hatchery coho and steelhead are fin clipped on this system so this works well for the sportfishing community. Anyone who does not understand this management technique is obviously not a freshwater salmonid angler.
If angling is to continue for these species, as it surely will, adipose clipping is necessary or, we open it up to full retention.
gone fishing, what wmy posted is not what I meant, but he and whitebuck are correct in that there are far less truly wild fish than most anglers think.
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
PBM for the chum fishery would be interesting, Figuring out the amount of hatchery fish in the mix stocked JS commercial fishery would be beneficial.
I agree all hatchery fish should be marked. How you mark coastal chinook which usually go out to sea after about 90 days and are too small to mark by clipping the adipose fin, is a question. On WCVI it's thought most of the native stocks outside the Stamp have been pretty much eliminated by genetic drift from Roberston Creek hatchery stock. As for coho, whenever I check rather than just mouth assumptions, almost all coho hatchery smolts released that go out into the Gulf of Georgia are marked. Last year I asked a couple of people from a community hatchery in Langley and they said they are all marked. Not too many years a go a poll of community hatcheries in the Gulf of Georgia reported they are all marked. They may not have been in the past due to staff shortages or funding issues but now they marked.
Also I can't help but be astonished that Sport fishers would describe a plan to reintroduce salmon to what may be the most pristine waters left in the Lower Mainland would describe it as a 'bad idea'. Life sure is surprising. After 60 years why has nothing been done to fix the sediment problem on the lower Coquitlam? Likely because little or nothing can be done and if it could be done it would cost many times more money than a plan to reintroduce coho (and maybe steelhead if there is proof of concept) to the River above the dam.
Similar threads
