So what did happen to the salmon this year?

I choke up when I sit with my boy on my lap and listen to stories my 86 yr old grandfather tells about fishing back in his day. It aint no fricken Orca, it's us. We've squandered it in a generation and robbed our children, all of us included. Don't look to the sea and say it must be out there. Look in your backyards.

I choke up when I sit with my boy on my lap and listen to stories my 86 yr old grandfather tells about fishing back in his day. It aint no fricken Orca, it's us. We've squandered it in a generation and robbed our children, all of us included. Don't look to the sea and say it must be out there. Look in your backyards.

Yep.

Wow,
 It does not portend well for the offspring of this season 3 YEARS FROM NOW does it?
 I think the salmon machine is being messed with too much to blame it on small, token seasonal events like hungrier then usual orcas or plankton hanging out to far or deep.
       Ruining habitat, dammed spawning rivers, ruining forage fish populations , relying on faux fish ladder fixes, "balancing" agriculture and lawn watering interests has us circling the drain.
 Some circling the drain years are better then others and that makes some happy.
         We need to practice the Canadian salmon ethic more here and teach bureaucrats the lost revenue total of a no-salmon future.
          Its a daunting task for us as opposed to the Canadians as they never built their biggest city in a desert. Nor do they require all the water in the world for nearby mega agriculture...
         Steve
     

Yep.

In my mind it's similar to all the whining about MLPA's.  If you can see past the end of your own rod maybe you can find a way to admit that we are the problem and we need to be the answer.  I should start a new thread:  "I support MLPA's"...

I should start a new thread:  "I support MLPA's"...

Bill! We need a smiley that chuckles

I haven't been fishing much, but on a bussines trip to Oregon last month, I stopped at a fish ladder on the Umqua river, heres a pic of there fish talley as of 10-15-07

I did see one trout, and the tail of a big fish, it went by to fast to I.D

Craigh

My dream is to someday have grandkids on my knee and be able to say, "the fish were almost gone on Big River...but they came back!   

-Matt

My dream is to put Mooch on my knee and say.....let that one go, we'll get his kids next year!

My dream is to someday have grandkids on my knee and be able to say, "the fish were almost gone on Big River...but they came back!   

-Matt

My dream is to put Mooch on my knee and say.....let that one go, we'll get his kids next year!

Dan....you'll need something more sturdy than your knee 

As my grandfather, who was from the old country, used to say: "You two, get a room."

Now that's a thread killa!

So we have biologists saying the salmon died? What does that mean for next year?

John

Smaller runs are more successful at breeding than larger runs because the parents and smolts aren't overcrowded in what's left of the rivers, so they may actually bounce back nicely - historically big runs are often begotten of mediocre ones.  There's probably a 'sweet spot' number of salmon to run up the river to produce the maximum (surviving) offspring, the question is whether we're a whole lot below that sweet spot.  If the river conditions suck this year, it may actually be good that they didn't happen to be crowded with fish.

"We need to practice the Canadian salmon ethic more here and teach bureaucrats the lost revenue total of a no-salmon future. "

Coastal Canada is a water-rich third-world country compared to California and the comparison is entirely inappropriate.  Actually I think CA would be better off financially without any salmon at all.  More clean energy, better water security, more agriculture, higher property values...  The politicians made the right call dollar-wise, and have to be dragged kicking and screaming to spend money to protect the salmon with measures that erode the economy.  You can't honestly think that the wild salmon generate even a fraction of the productivity that the diverted water does?  The question we have to ask ourselves is how much we're willing to pay for how many salmon - and the answer is a fairly large amount for not many fish.  We should have some salmon, but we should accept that past some point it's not worth it any more.   Nobody talks of restoring the Bison, eventually we'll look at California salmon the same way for the same reasons.

Smaller runs are more successful at breeding than larger runs because the parents and smolts aren't overcrowded in what's left of the rivers, so they may actually bounce back nicely - historically big runs are often begotten of mediocre ones.  There's probably a 'sweet spot' number of salmon to run up the river to produce the maximum (surviving) offspring, the question is whether we're a whole lot below that sweet spot.  If the river conditions suck this year, it may actually be good that they didn't happen to be crowded with fish.

Josh, I don't buy that.  Can you provide some published papers to support this assertion?

The reason I don't buy this is that salmon runs in general keep getting smaller and smaller.  That's seems counter to what you just said.

-Allen

Coastside claimed that with regard to the Klamath and had some graphs to demonstrate it.  They're hardly unbiased, but in this area there is no such thing as unbiased info.  It may not apply to other rivers depending on the salmon-carrying capacity of the various rivers.  It at least showed that smaller runs can spawn much larger runs.  They'll make hay if the sun shines - er if it rains and the krill is thick. 

I thought Coastside was claiming the data was uncorrelated,  meaning a small run doesn't necessarily imply a small run N years later, but it doesn't necessarily mean a large run either.

-Allen

As I recall it showed kind of a boom-bust cycle.  Certainly 2003 was a bust...

Actually I think CA would be better off financially without any salmon at all.  More clean energy, better water security, more agriculture, higher property values...  The politicians made the right call dollar-wise, and have to be dragged kicking and screaming to spend money to protect the salmon with measures that erode the economy.  You can't honestly think that the wild salmon generate even a fraction of the productivity that the diverted water does?  The question we have to ask ourselves is how much we're willing to pay for how many salmon - and the answer is a fairly large amount for not many fish.  We should have some salmon, but we should accept that past some point it's not worth it any more.   Nobody talks of restoring the Bison, eventually we'll look at California salmon the same way for the same reasons.

Better off without salmon?  Sounds like my world of beauty and your world of a healthy economy are at odds.  I'm sure, Josh, that there are groups of tree-huggers like me that DO talk of restoring the bison...

Actually I think CA would be better off financially without any salmon at all.  More clean energy, better water security, more agriculture, higher property values...  The politicians made the right call dollar-wise, and have to be dragged kicking and screaming to spend money to protect the salmon with measures that erode the economy.  You can't honestly think that the wild salmon generate even a fraction of the productivity that the diverted water does?  The question we have to ask ourselves is how much we're willing to pay for how many salmon - and the answer is a fairly large amount for not many fish.  We should have some salmon, but we should accept that past some point it's not worth it any more.   Nobody talks of restoring the Bison, eventually we'll look at California salmon the same way for the same reasons.

Better off without salmon?  Sounds like my world of beauty and your world of a healthy economy are at odds.  I'm sure, Josh, that there are groups of tree-huggers like me that DO talk of restoring the bison...

I don't think it really matters what you and I think, unless you can do something about ESA.  Millions and millions of dollars are spent on ESA salmon.

Bison aren't listed under ESA btw.

-Allen