No Salmon Fishing This Year: Radical Step Considered by Officials to Increase Coho
As the officials face diminishing Coho runs due to poor ocean conditions, state and tribal fish officials recommend that chinook and Coho fisheries in the ocean should be shut down in 2016. The decision on this matter will be made by Pacific Fishery Management Council (PMFC) in a meeting in April. Several options will be considered by the commission, including closure of Washington coast.
"In many instances returns will likely be far below minimum levels needed to produce the next generation of salmon," said Lorraine Loomis, chair of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission, which commonages salmon runs with the state. "Conservation must be our sole focus as we work to rebuild these stocks."
Since tribes are only permitted to fish in their legally defined areas, they will suffer the most due to closures. "We won't have fish on the table, it really hurts the whole community," Loomis said.
The reason for this drastic situation has been attributed to Queets, a wild river, that expects to see only 3,500 Coho return this year. A minimum of 5,800 are required to allow fishing. It doesn't matter how calm and pure a river is, if the ocean lacks food, the fish will not be able to return home. To make matters worse, the conditions in the ocean have been worse than ever.
"It's the marine conditions, and it could start happening more often," said Kyle Adicks, a salmon-policy analyst for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Climate change is just one of the many factors in combination with decadal ocean cycles that is degrading the natural fresh water habitat for the fish.
Warm water in the ocean suppresses cold-water plankton population. These are the nutritious animals at the bottom of the food chain that salmon need for their growth. Coho that swam into the sea during The Blob, a large strip of warm water stretching from Baja to the Gulf of Alaska that began in 2013, either didn't live or became much smaller in size when they came back.
