What does it take to make fish?

In February, Larry Engel had an article in the Frontiersman titled “It takes fish to make fish.” While that is a catchy headline, it doesn’t mesh with the realities of salmon management.

Engel takes great pleasure in claiming responsibility for the largest coho escapement in the Little Su since 2006 and Fish Creek’s largest coho run since 2002. He fails to take credit for the really lousy runs in future years that will be the result of the 2014 excessive escapements.

Overescapements of salmon lead to smaller returns in the future. In Mat-Su Valley streams, where coho are counted, there were significant over-escapements in 2014.

The Little Su was about 7,000 coho over the top end of the escapement goal, and Fish Creek was about 6,000 coho over the top end of the escapement goal. The results of overescapement, otherwise known as density dependent effects, will be seen in a few years when the offspring return. Coho are especially vulnerable to these effects.

At the 2014 Cook Inlet Board of Fisheries meeting, Bob Clark, chief fishery biologist for Alaska Department of Fish and Game, testified that “escapement goals for coho are problematic, returns are based on the number of juveniles leaving the system, not the number of spawners. Some of the best coho returns come from the smallest escapements.” Clark also made this clear in a paper published in 2007, “Over-escapement, in general, is not sustainable ...”

Few know these issues better than Carl Walters, a fish biologist and professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia, who has studied Fraser sockeye and other salmon species for five decades. “Fish aren’t healthy when they’re over-abundant,” Walters said. “Survival rates are better when there are fewer fish.”

The purpose of an escapement goal is to ensure sustainability and maximize yield (harvest). Fish and Game managers evaluate fisheries on a daily (sometimes hourly) basis to assess run strength and escapements.

In times of low abundance, managers close or restrict fisheries to provide for escapement needs and, therefore, ensure long-term sustainability. When the run strengths are strong, managers must liberalize the harvest to fully utilize the surplus stocks and prevent overescapements. Real-time management by local biologists is a key ingredient to sustainable salmon runs and sustainable fisheries.

Engel’s prescribed strategy of deliberate overescapements and inflexible management plans with pre-determined time and area closures is contrary to what good fishery management requires and will absolutely ensure diminished returns in the future.

Engel says the drift fleet average catch per year for the last decade has been more than 100,000 cohos, and he calls that a “hearty bycatch,” as compared to the sport fishery. His use of the word “bycatch” is deliberately misleading, and the terminology is incorrect.

Fish and Game estimates the commercial harvest of coho at about 10 percent of the total run. Therefore, a commercial catch of more than 100,000 cohos would indicate a run size of a million fish or more, leaving at least 900,000 for sport harvest and escapement.

On a good coho year, the commercial harvest could exceed 200,000, indicating a total return of more than 2 million coho, leaving about 1.8 million for sport harvest and escapement. A commercial harvest of 10 percent of the total coho run is a very minimal amount. To manage for sustained yield, as required by the Alaska Constitution, the percentage should be much higher, at least around 40 to 60 percent.

Engel says the sport harvest was only about 65,000 per year. Creel surveys and other reports indicate that anglers release about half the coho they catch, so the actual sport catch was around double the number he reported.

What is especially troubling about that information is the mortality rate of hooked and released coho can be as high as 69 percent, according to 1993 Fish and Game research. The mortality rate is highest during osmoregulation, which is when the salmon are transitioning from saltwater to fresh water. Other factors that contribute to mortality include exposing caught salmon to air while releasing, any handling that removes the salmon’s protective slime layer and high water temperatures.

Just factoring in the studied mortality rate doesn’t tell the whole story. We don’t know if a hooked-and-released coho can still spawn successfully. Recent research indicates that salmon blood chemistry is significantly altered, and reproductive hormones are depressed by stress events such as being hooked and released.

This is relevant due to the essential role that reproductive hormones play in the final stages of maturation and reproduction of spawning salmon. If the released salmon is unable to spawn successfully, for all practical purposes it should be considered and counted as a dead salmon.

What does it take to make fish? It takes healthy spawning and rearing habitat and professional, science-based, real-time management without political interference.