Is this old news?

Yes because Tule chinook are a vastly superior freshwater sport fish :sick: .

I get protecting wild fish genetics but this smacks of protecting ocean commercial fisheries ($) vs river sport fishing. Whether you love or hate hatchery fish, seeing hundreds of gleaming bright summer runs swimming in a giant daisy chain at the old steel bridge on upper Shoog is a sight I will never forget.
 
Ok, I get the sentiments. Huge strong numbers of native anything are always impressive.

Guess I could have couched this better;
Is this news that has been posted before? If so, I'll delete it .
 
Those Skamania fish are (were?) some badass hatchery brats. My first steelhead was a Skamania hatchery fish of about 9 pounds on the Kalama in June 1999, and I'll never forget it. Came all the way to my feet silently before it figured out it was hooked, and then all hell broke loose. Screaming run across and up the Beginner's Hole led into a 20-foot tailwalk, followed by a massive back flip, and then a whole lot more pulling before it finally surrendered.

Hatchery steelhead don't screw up wild genetics (especially not THOSE hatchery steelhead). Unfortunately, they cost a lot to produce (many years ago, the estimate was well north of $1,000 to return a single adult, and it's probably 5x that now), and in the current budget environment, they just don't pencil out anymore. Super sad, though. It means the effective end of summer steelhead fishing in the Kalama, Washougal, and several others rivers. The wild fish their genes came from are all but extinct.
 
Just what I'd expect from the Washington Department of Salmon. Not enough funding to continue operations at both hatcheries? Obviously keep the salmon hatchery open to feed commercial fishing and close the steelhead hatchery. Why does WDFW hate steelhead? Oh, because they are a recreational fish, not a commercial food fish (for NT commercial fisheries, that is). And because of this 2-year cycle budget shortfall, WDFW will incur $8 million in costs to deconstruct and remove the hatchery from some future unknown capital construction (deconstruction) appropriation. The economics are astounding! Get rid of highly prized summer steelhead in order to continue producing tule Chinook, which is basically pissing your tax dollars down the toilet. The Toutle hatchery also produces coho salmon, but tule Chinook are its main product. Good grief, it's so hard to find something good to say about WDFW.

Skamania summer steelhead are the finest product ever to come from WA state fish culture. Nothing else even comes close, and I am one who does like to eat hatchery produced coho and spring Chinook.
 
So if I did the long-term math right, it would cost about $10M to operate the next 9 years. Since they didn't get the first $1.1M for that this year they will spend $8M to close it down over the next 9 years.
A difference of only $222k per year. Unfortunate outcome.

Having said that, I'm sure Skamania probably needs some major work to keep it going. It's 75 years old! So add that on top of the $10M.

For all the bad things that have come from this hatchery, it and its strain have also provided millions of angling opportunities. Probably more than any hatchery in the country. The good with the bad...such is life with anadromous fish management.
 
I am conflicted on this one.

1. I don't love hatcheries.
2. They just raised the cost of our fishing and hunting licenses by 30%

Plain and simple WDFW leadership think we are their pee ones

Failed organization.
 
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