[7] Big Fish Days At Bonneville Dam

The fall chinook run in the Columbia River has finally picked up, abating concern that the run might be more than just late this year. Nearly 124,000 fish were counted going past Bonneville Dam in the past week alone, along with several recent 23,000-plus days, adding up about 276,000 fish so far. Last year, about 350,000 chinook had passed the dam by Sept. 12.

Harvest managers originally expected 677,000 chinook to enter the mouth of the river, about 477,000 of them brights headed for spawning beds and hatcheries above Bonneville Dam. On Sept. 12, they revised their estimate of upriver brights headed for the Hanford Reach to 312,000 fish from 354,600 pre-season.

Warm inshore ocean temperatures have played havoc with the timing of this year's salmon runs. The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife even reported a sports fisherman hooked a marlin 40 miles off Westport two weeks ago, only the third time one had been reportedly caught in the region. The state stopped chinook retention on Sept. 9, but offshore waters are still open for coho.

The average water temperature in the Columbia during August was the warmest since 1998, but has begun to cool, while sport catches in the river have picked up.

By the end of the month, sporties had caught nearly 27,000 chinook in the lower river, with commercial gillnetters landing 11,430.

Tribal fishermen have begun fishing above Bonneville Dam and announced they were selling fish to the public from several sites along the river.

North of the border, Canadian harvest analysts said their summer sockeye run was still showing signs of life, coming in much later than usual. Pre-season estimates of 11 million fish had been downgraded to 3 million at one point, but the late-returning bluebacks made managers boost their estimate to five, six and now seven million fish.

However, concerns over another late-running weak stock has kept British Columbian commercial fishers tied up all summer. The political fallout is continuing from that decision, and a small group of commercial gillnetters protested by setting their nets in defiance of the season-long closure -B. R.

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