Coho Get Clipped For Catch

Almost 50 million young coho salmon at Washington and Oregon hatcheries will get a fin clipped in the next few months, the start of a long-discussed shift in Northwest fish management.

When the fish return to spawn as adults in 1998, angling regulations in many waters will permit only the harvest of the fin-clipped, hatchery-origin coho. Any unmarked coho caught will have to be released.

Washington and Oregon lawmakers passed bills in 1995 directing the respective state departments of Fish and Wildlife to begin mass marking of hatchery coho and selective fishing regulations.

The need to protect weak, wild runs of coho in the past decade has resulted in significant reductions in the chance to catch hatchery coho, said Lee Blankenship of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Most of the time, wild and hatchery fish are in the same waters at the same time.

Sport fishing in particular has been hard hit. The number of fishing trips off the Washington and Oregon coasts, at Buoy 10 at the mouth of the Columbia River and in the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Puget Sound has plummeted.

Without a chance to catch a hatchery fish, continued public and legislative support for the large amount of money spent on Washington hatcheries isn’t likely, Blankenship said.

When chances to go fishing evaporate, so does public and lawmaker support for habitat protection and restoration needed by wild salmon, he added.

The chance to catch a salmon isn’t just recreation at communities like Ilwaco and Westport, but a major source of tourist spending.

Clipping of the adipose fin, the small fin atop a salmon or steelhead just in front of the tail, has been standard practice for steelhead released from Washington, Oregon and Idaho hatcheries for more than a decade.

Mass marking of coho won’t eliminate the need for a variety of season and bag limit restrictions, but it should allow for significant increases in sport fishing, Blankenship said.

For ocean seasons off northern Oregon and Washington, the goal is to increase the number of fishing trips from the average of 30,000 in 1994-95 to 140,000.

Marking 50 million coho doesn’t come cheaply. Washington has bought 13 special marking trailers at a cost of $60,000 each. Oregon is buying three trailers.

Unfortunately for researchers, the adipose clip has been used as a way to mark salmon they use in tagging to study fish movements.

Since millions of coho will have a missing adipose fin, the states have to buy special electronic equipment to detect the wire tags inserted in the fish’s flesh. That adds $657,000 for Washington and $389,000 for Oregon.

Marking and sampling also will cost the states more than $1.3 million.

It is expected that only 90 percent of the lower Columbia coho will be clipped, and 73 percent of the coho coming from upstream of Bonneville Dam. Ninety-two percent of Oregon’s coastal hatchery coho will be marked. All Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor coho would be marked, but only 35 percent of the north Washington coast fish and 57 percent in Puget Sound.

Neither Alaska nor Canada plan to require the release of unmarked coho. Net fishing in Washington and Oregon also would be excluded, as would trollers off Washington and northern Oregon.