500 Steelhead back to Reiter Ponds

I thought they were shutting down winter-steelhead production at Reiter and moving to a South-Fork-broodstock program for summer runs, and shifting production to the Wallace as of a couple of years ago? Is there a summary of what's going on at Reiter and/or the entire Snoho system somewhere? Tokul is still shutting down the winter program and going to some sort of a late-spring broodstock?

Anyway - glad to learn of the good news.
 
JayB said:
I thought they were shutting down winter-steelhead production at Reiter and moving to a South-Fork-broodstock program for summer runs, and shifting production to the Wallace as of a couple of years ago? Is there a summary of what's going on at Reiter and/or the entire Snoho system somewhere? Tokul is still shutting down the winter program and going to some sort of a late-spring broodstock?

Anyway - glad to learn of the good news.
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There is a thread on this somewhere but Reiter is very much not going away, and I believe was in fact actively being refurbished.
 
Here's the info I was looking for courtesy of the much-maligned ChatGPT - might save those interested a bit of Googling....
"Here’s what I’m seeing in the most recent official WDFW material about Reiter Ponds (Skykomish River) hatchery steelhead production and how it ties into the Quicksilver Portfolio, plus the post-2025 funding wrinkle.

1) How Reiter Ponds fits into the Quicksilver Portfolio

WDFW’s Oct 28, 2024 Quicksilver implementation update (covers work completed 2021–23 and plans for 2023–25) describes two distinct steelhead “lanes” in the Snohomish Basin that involve Reiter Ponds:

Summer steelhead (Skykomish) — “wild broodstock” / integrated program

WDFW says it initiated a new summer steelhead wild broodstock program out of Reiter Ponds to replace out-of-basin Skamania stock, with permits in place and broodstock taken from Sunset Falls; they also note hatchery infrastructure upgrades to support it.

Early-winter hatchery steelhead (Skykomish) — continued production + fishery + monitoring

WDFW says it continued early-winter hatchery steelhead production and fisheries in the Skykomish, alongside season-long monitoring to assess wild steelhead.

2) What “current (2025 and onwards)” looks like in WDFW’s own stocking data

WDFW maintains an annual “Winter and summer steelhead smolt stocking” page. For release year 2025, the Puget Sound section lists for the Snohomish basin:

Skykomish River (listing shows “SKYKOMISH R 07.0012”)

Winter: 139,964 smolts

Summer: 117,672 smolts

Wallace River

Winter: 27,233 smolts

This is the clearest, “2025+” indicator that steelhead smolt releases associated with the Skykomish program are still planned/occurring in 2025 per WDFW’s published stocking report. (The stocking table doesn’t, by itself, spell out “Reiter Ponds” on that line, but it’s the same Snohomish/Skykomish program context WDFW discusses in the Quicksilver update.)

3) The big caveat for 2025–2027: monitoring funding wasn’t provided

WDFW’s Puget Sound steelhead management page explicitly states that the Legislature did not fund WDFW’s request for Puget Sound freshwater salmon & steelhead monitoring in the 2025–2027 biennium, and notes that this funding had previously supported implementation of the Quicksilver Portfolio and other monitoring programs.

A WDFW Region 4 “Regional Director’s Report” slide deck (Nov 2025) echoes that the Quicksilver Portfolio for Puget Sound Steelhead was not funded in the 2025–2027 biennium, and that WDFW was still seeking $1.6M to restore that package.

Practical takeaway: Based on WDFW’s own pages, the hatchery release numbers are still posted for 2025, but the monitoring / fishery evaluation capacity that Quicksilver relies on is under budget pressure in 2025–2027.

4) The most “authoritative” places to keep checking for updates

If you want to track “plans” as they evolve beyond the 2023–25 window covered in the 2024 Quicksilver update, these are the highest-signal WDFW sources I found:

Quicksilver Portfolio: Restoring Puget Sound Steelhead & Fisheries (2024 update) (the basin-by-basin section is where Reiter/Skykomish is discussed)

Puget Sound steelhead management page (WDFW’s running status page; includes the 2025–27 funding note)

Steelhead smolt stocking report (by release year) (hard numbers for what is being released/planned each year)"
 
Checked the co-manager's future brood document of 2026 which shows planned program for this year. At Reiter the goal remains 116,000 summers and 140,000 winters and at Wallace 27,600 winters. These fish would be released in 2027 with adults returning mostly in 2029.

Also programed to take the same number of eggs for the 2027 cycle (release in 2028).

Curt
 
Smalma said:
Checked the co-manager's future brood document of 2026 which shows planned program for this year. At Reiter the goal remains 116,000 summers and 140,000 winters and at Wallace 27,600 winters. These fish would be released in 2027 with adults returning mostly in 2029.

Also programed to take the same number of eggs for the 2027 cycle (release in 2028).

Curt
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Kinda sad to read the report closer and see only 67 of those 537 fish were spawned.
 
Ponds at reiter are full. I think 6 tanks/above ground pools next to the garage or work shop. Everything looking much better & cleaner now even after the flooding this year.
It’s a crime they are limited to so few plants due to the communist elites lawsuit BS.
 
skyrise said:
Ponds at reiter are full. I think 6 tanks/above ground pools next to the garage or work shop. Everything looking much better & cleaner now even after the flooding this year.
It’s a crime they are limited to so few plants due to the communist elites lawsuit BS.
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There is only 1 group to blame...

Wild Fish Conservancy

Fuck them!
 
They have a new guy managing the hatchery there. He has been there for 2-3 years now, but he does a fantastic job and cares about the place, which is the most you can ask for.

Tragic though that those Skamania brats are gone. I wish I can experience another June/July of fishing up there (with actual fish around).
 
johnnyboy said:
They have a new guy managing the hatchery there. He has been there for 2-3 years now, but he does a fantastic job and cares about the place, which is the most you can ask for.

Tragic though that those Skamania brats are gone. I wish I can experience another June/July of fishing up there (with actual fish around).
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I mean they are still there. They are using skamania summers from the south fork that successfully spawned above the falls for part of their spawning pool (other part are good old reiter returning skamania fish). Has taken a couple years to get the smolt plants back to about 100k which is the new normal.

I also heard the low plants from the last few years was partialy because they were raising chinook at reiter while the Wallace got a tulalip face-lift.
 
the_chemist said:
I mean they are still there. They are using skamania summers from the south fork that successfully spawned above the falls for part of their spawning pool (other part are good old reiter returning skamania fish). Has taken a couple years to get the smolt plants back to about 100k which is the new normal.

I also heard the low plants from the last few years was partialy because they were raising chinook at reiter while the Wallace got a tulalip face-lift.
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This is incorrect, they haven't released Skamaina summer runs in over ten + yrs. The broodstock from the South Fork are genetically NF summer runs now that the Skamaina genetics have been breed out. Hence the pathetically lower and lower counts every year since the change.

If anyone thinks this an improvement is woefully uninformed or just stupid!
Like those fucktards from the Wild Fish Conservitory, they deserve to be keel hauled!
 
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