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States Set Columbia Spring Chinook Seasons by Andy Walgamott Northwest Sportsman, February 22, 2023

State salmon managers set spring Chinook seasons featuring a somewhat more
robust catch for the Lower Columbia and its gorge pools than last year.

The decisions were in line with what staffers from the Oregon and Washington Departments of Fish and Wildlife had recommended yesterday and include:

A 38-day, March 1-April 7 season on the big river below Bonneville with an expected kept catch of 7,766 adult hatchery springers, including 6,411 of the constraining upriver-bound kings. The waters from Beacon Rock to the dam are only open for bank fishing.

And a 36-day, April 1-May 6 fishery from just below The Dalles Dam to the Washington-Oregon border above McNary Dam, where 845 adults are forecast to be bonked.

Daily limit is two adult hatchery salmonids, but only one Chinook.

For the Columbia below the dam, it amounts to almost 2,600 more kings than 2022's initial season, which ran through April 6, while above there it's 368 more.

ODFW's Tucker Jones and WDFW's Ryan Lothrop made the pretty straight ahead calls during a hybrid Columbia River Compact meeting that lasted two hours and 40 minutes. The proposals were also supported by sport anglers and industry representatives.

Making the long drive to participate in person were members of Idaho's Shoshone-Bannock Tribe, including Lee Juan Tyler, who called on the state managers representing their respective agency directors to spread the sport fishery out more so impacts weren't focused on the early segment of the Chinook return.

Bruce Jim Sr. of the Umatilla Tribe expressed concern that managers be more sure of how many salmon are coming and suggested the states allow three days of fishing and three days of letting fish go by.

Jones said he appreciated the Shoshone-Bannock and Umatilla comments -- as did the sportfishing representatives -- as he defended the state management.

"I'm not sure everyone appreciates just how carefully these fisheries are managed," he said.

Along with the 30 percent runsize buffer, which effectively initially manages this year's forecast of 198,600 fish as if just over 139,000 are coming back, there's a 1.6 percent mortality limit on ESA-listed wild Snake River spring/summer Chinook, and given nonconcurrent allocations between Oregon and Washington, there's essentially another 1,500 available mortalities on the table that won't be tapped into.

"I believe fisheries are an integral part of the conservation of this resource," said Jones, who added that he valued them whether they were commercial, tribal or recreational, held at Buoy 10 at the mouth of the Columbia or on the Yankee Fork of Idaho's Salmon River.

The season timing -- set as the run begins to build in the Lower Columbia -- also helps mitigate against potential rapid overharvests.

"We can't set fisheries at certain times of year with too many fish in the river. The fisheries become too volatile," Jones said.

After last year's fishery wrapped up April 6 with a slight overage based on the initial forecast, the run actually came in larger than forecast and that allowed for a reopener that ran all but one day from May 12 through June 15, the end of the states' spring Chinook management period.

ODFW's Jeff Whisler and Jimmy Watts outlined how going into the last few days of 2023's early season they would have catch stats from March and up through April's first weekend in case any emergency actions needed to be taken before Friday, April 7.

Jones and WDFW's Lothrop also OKed recreational fisheries in the downstream Select Area Fishery Enhancement waters.

For more on how and where to fish for springers soon to surge through the Lower Columbia, check out the March issue of Northwest Sportsman.