Commercial Fishing Gets Green Light to Catch Chinook Tonight

Commercial fishing for spring chinook salmon resumes in the lower Columbia River tonight after a two-week hiatus.

The Columbia River Compact on Monday approved 10 hours of gillnetting starting at 8 p.m. from the mouth of the Willamette River at Kelley Point downstream to the ocean.

The net fleet is expected to catch about 700 chinook tonight. That would bring its season total to about 1,300 salmon and 69 percent of the commercial allowance of upper Columbia wild spring chinook, protected by the federal Endangered Species Act.

State officials will meet again Wednesday to consider gillnetting on Thursday night, which likely would be the final net-fishing period of the season.

Several commercial fishermen wanted to wait one more week, when the abundance of spring chinook in the lower Columbia should be even greater.

But Jim Wells of Salmon For All, an Astoria-based commercial group, said the price paid for spring chinook is $8.50 per pound, which will drop once ocean trollers start adding their catch to the market.

Bill Tweit of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife said spring chinook numbers in the lower Columbia build rapidly in late March. By next week, there might be too many salmon to allow the netters to fish without exceeding the allocation.

Trey Carskadon of the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association urged the states not to allow the net fleet to exceed its allocation and use part of the sport share.

A teleconference is scheduled at 2 p.m. Wednesday to review tonight’s catches and see whether the commercial fleet can fish on Thursday.

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