NOAA approves plan to release hatchery steelhead into five Puget Sound rivers this week despite threats to native fish

Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) began dumping 500,000 hatchery steelhead smolts into five Puget Sound rivers this week after receiving the go-ahead from the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The Nooksack, NF Stillaguamish, Wallace, Skykomish and Snoqualmie rivers have not seen hatchery plants since 2014, when the Wild Fish Conservancy filed a lawsuit claiming the hatchery programs were in violation of the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

The ESA lists native steelhead runs on all five rivers as threatened. Biologists have also proven that hatchery fish are genetically different and inferior to wild stocks and NOAA and WDFW both admit hatchery steelhead pose risks to native fish by competing with them for space and food and when interbreeding occurs. Regardless, NOAA approved WDFW hatchery plans and found that they met ESA regulations.

WDFW says it’s happy to be back in business: “We are pleased that NOAA-Fisheries agrees our hatchery plans are scientifically sound,” says deputy assistant director of WDFW’s Fish Program, Kelly Cunningham. “This means that we can again produce fish for harvest in fisheries throughout Puget Sound.”

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Tom Bie
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Tom Bie is the founder, editor, and publisher of The Drake. He started the magazine in 1998 as an annual newsprint publication based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He then moved it to Steamboat, Colorado (1999), Boulder, Colorado (2001), and San Clemente, California (2004), as he took jobs as managing editor at Paddler, Senior Editor at Skiing, and Editor-in-Chief at Powder, respectively. Tom and The Drake are now both based in Denver, Colorado, where The Drake is finally all grows up(Swingers, 1996) to a quarterly magazine.

Category: Daily Drake
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Author: Tom Bie

Tom Bie is the founder, editor, and publisher of The Drake. He started the magazine in 1998 as an annual newsprint publication based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He then moved it to Steamboat, Colorado (1999), Boulder, Colorado (2001), and San Clemente, California (2004), as he took jobs as managing editor at Paddler, Senior Editor at Skiing, and Editor-in-Chief at Powder, respectively. Tom and The Drake are now both based in Denver, Colorado, where The Drake is finally all grows up(Swingers, 1996) to a quarterly magazine.

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