Southwest Fisheries Science Center (U.S.)

"The ocean fishery consultation standard for threatened California Coastal Chinook (CC-Chinook) salmon is specified as a cap on the preseason-projected age-4 ocean harvest rate for Klamath River fall Chinook (KRFC). Since the listing of the CC-Chinook Evolutionarily Significant Unit (ESU) under the federal Endangered Species Act in 1999, this consultation standard has frequently constrained ocean salmon fisheries in California and Oregon. Low levels of spawner and ocean fishery data have precluded development of a CC-Chinook-specific management strategy and necessitated use of the KRFC proxy. The purpose of this Technical Memorandum is to examine the spawner escapement and ocean fishery data that currently exist for CC-Chinook and address questions regarding whether there is now potential for the development of an alternative ocean fishery management strategy. At the current time, sufficient data do not exist to derive ESU-level estimates of spawner escapement. Recently collected genetic stock identification data from the ocean commercial fishery has allowed for inference about the ocean spatial distribution for CC-Chinook, yet these and other ocean fishery data are not sufficient for estimating total CC-Chinook ocean harvest. The current data are not sufficient to perform cohort reconstructions. Until more comprehensive spawner escapement and ocean fishery data are available, few prospects exist for developing management strategies that are based directly on CC-Chinook data"--Abstract.

Technical Memorandum