B
bigsteel
unfortunately odds are that out of those 10 nate coho you catch and release 50% of them are going to die. coho just arent a hearty fish they expend all their energy in a 5 minute fight which leaves them susceptable to lactic acid increases and death. in all the years I have been fishing I have never once caught a coho with a hook tear in its mouth or a spinner hanging from its mouth and that leads me to believe they dont survive catch and release.
I have a hard time buying the %50 - MAYBE %?. Is there any data for this percentage? Would like to know more about the c&r mortality rate on Coho Salmon.
Was gonna say %33, roughly a third - but I have NO data to back this up whatsoever.
Curious though really..
Yeah might have opne seat come this fall for tidewater trolling.
Meeee meeee pick meee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pffff...I have bought stock in that boat LOL.
There's always PETA and their sea kitten campaign to go with the monterey bay environmentalists...
I spoke with the top dog at ODFW once and he admittied to me they know mortality is very very high possibly as high as 75% but he wouldnt put it in paper nor allow me to quote him. typical politician say one thing to one person but always leave the door open to denie it to somone else.
also if you go look at the monterey bay aquariums website there is a link to their envriomental group and they sternly suggest that oregon caught salmon be boycotted because ODFW kills more wild fish then they catch hatchery fish in the ocean fisherie.
ODFWs methods are not condusive for run growth just stagnation and decrease of wild coho populations
they are not recoverig at the rate they could be with eco friendly practices.
when they first opened the ocean fisherie the coho were thick in the rivers in early october now those early coho are not anywhere near the number they were.
ocean mortality from catch and release kills a huge percentage of the early season coho there for not letting that portion of the run recover.
early season coho are the hardest hit because the ocean gets ruff as the season progresses so the later returning fish arent hit near as hard .
ideally they would make you keep the first 20 ocean caught fish and get off the ocean then numbers of early run coho would increase.
the growth in coho numbers are mostly late season because they have far less ocean mortality, so even though the overall numbers are up certain segments of the coho population are not growing
The chinook populations on the Alsea and Siuslaw are in far better shape than the coho. This is about maximum opportunity. I think the coho populations should rebound more, less than 2 decades ago they were listed as threatened. There is likely going to be a season on the Nestucca, and possibly the Wilson and Trask. I think it is too soon, so I'll do my part and not retain any wild coho. It's up to anglers to protect a resource when odfw wants to gamble. My .02
Why do we fish for the Coho at all ?