State, tribes celebrate progress rebuilding North Fork Nooksack River spring Chinook fishery

Tribal co-managers’ support, coupled with increased hatchery production, enables first recreational fishery in 60-plus years 

OLYMPIA – Years of work by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) and treaty tribes to rebuild the North Fork Nooksack River spring Chinook salmon population resulted in the first recreational fishery on this run since 1954.
 
Tribal co-managers’ support, coupled with increased production at WDFW’s conservation-oriented Kendall Creek hatchery, helped to foster sufficient forecasted spring Chinook returns and begin to offset historic habitat loss. This fishery resulted from this year’s North of Falcon process, an annual salmon season-setting effort in which state, federal, and tribal fishery managers gather to plan the Northwest's recreational and commercial salmon fisheries. 

“Without the collaboration of the treaty tribes in the Nooksack River basin we wouldn’t have been able to offer this fishery,” said Edward Eleazer, north Puget Sound regional fish program manager. “It’s an incredible testament to our work together to improve Chinook salmon populations and support orca recovery — and brings an added bonus for recreational anglers.” 

The Endangered Species Act listed Nooksack spring Chinook run is recognized as a critical part of the Southern Resident Killer Whale diet.

“Nooksack Tribe and Lummi Nation are working hard to address habitat problems that are limiting recovery of the wild population” said George Swanaset Jr., Natural and Cultural Resources Director for the Nooksack Tribe. 

"Working together will provide more fishing opportunity for everyone," said Gerald James, Lummi Nation senior ESA policy analyst.  "We are focusing on what we can actually accomplish instead of what we wish we could do. The 10-year management plan for the watershed that we signed last year with WDFW is working well with agreed goals and outcomes."

This fishery follows efforts to ramp up spring Chinook release goals at WDFW’s Nork Fork Nooksack River Kendall Creek Hatchery, which is releasing 1.3 million juvenile Chinook, an increase from 800,000 previously. On the South Fork Nooksack River, Lummi Nation’s Skookum Creek Hatchery saw its first release in 2010 with 1,989 fish and has now ramped up and seen releases as high as 1.6 million with an eventual goal of 2 million.

One of 35 WDFW conservation hatcheries, Kendall Creek Hatchery’s operations focus on supporting the recovery of wild salmon under the guidance of a federal hatchery genetic management plan currently in progress, designed to ensure that the increase in production can occur with minimal impact to wild fish populations. 

This year’s season provided anglers with more than 7,600 hours of fishing opportunity with few impacts to wild Chinook.