Opinion

Billy Frank: Washington tribes work to protect and produce salmon

Monday, February 7, 2011

"Producing and protecting salmon go hand in hand for the treaty Indian tribes in western Washington, and we are doing a lot more of both lately.

At a time when state and federal funding for salmon is scarce, tribes are increasing production of salmon for harvest and expanding the use of hatcheries in recovery programs for weak wild stocks.

We all know for a fact that hatcheries are no substitute for good habitat and natural salmon production. But the small amount of poor quality habitat we have left can’t support harvest. If there were no hatcheries there would be almost no salmon fishing at all in western Washington.

Tribes produce an average of 40 million salmon and steelhead every year. These fish are harvested by everyone. The Suquamish Tribe added to that average recently by re-starting its Agate Pass coho salmon net pen operation. Funding and other factors had forced the tribe to stop the program seven years ago.

Net pen operations can be strong contributors to fisheries. In the first 20 years of the Suquamish project, the tribe released more than 600,000 hatchery coho, all marked for harvest with an adipose fin clip."

Get the Story:
Billy Frank Jr: Salmon recovery: It takes all of us to make it happen (The North Kitsap Herald 2/4)