THE PAT NEAL WILDLIFE COLUMN: Bull trout bull

A SHARP-EYED READER recently suggested a correction to my May 26 column about the Dungeness Valley Creamery. It’s one of two remaining dairies in the Sequim-Dungeness Valley.

The future operation of the dairy is being threatened by Clallam County’s plan to move the flood control dikes from along the Dungeness River to restore the habitat of the endangered bull trout.

Oops, I did it again — called the bull trout endangered.

The fact is the bull trout is not endangered. It has been federally listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.

“Threatened,” according to the government definition, the species is likely to become “endangered.”

An “endangered” species means it’s likely to become extinct.

Please excuse my confusion. I only know what I read in the fishing laws, where it says it is illegal to lift a bull trout out of the water.

Forget about eating a bull trout for dinner. You could lose your fishing license for that.

Not that anyone ever bragged about eating a bull trout in the old days. They can be soft and mushy with bland white-meat.

Who wouldn’t rather catch a fat, red-meat steelhead or a salmon than a bull trout?

They were seen as scavengers that ate the eggs and spawn of the salmon and steelhead.

Nobody really ever cared about catching a bull trout until there weren’t any salmon or steelhead, and there was nothing but bull trout left.

The idea that anyone would call the bull trout threatened or endangered is a joke to anyone who has ever fished the Dungeness, where on any given day you could catch four bull trout for every rainbow.

That was until the Dungeness, a river with two fish hatcheries on it, was closed to fishing for most of the year.

This seemed to confirm the old saying, when fishing is outlawed, only outlaws will fish.

There were so many poachers on the Dungeness last summer that they did not get an adequate return of spring chinook back to the hatchery.

The Dungeness spring chinook is a run of salmon worth saving. These are the “first salmon” of the Northwest. That means they run up the river in early spring when the salmonberry blossom.

These fish don’t spawn until August.

The spring chinook don’t feed in the river, they survive and develop into spawners on their body fat. This makes the spring chinook the richest salmon there is.

There used to be an awesome chinook fishery out in Dungeness Bay every spring when the dogwoods bloomed. Many of these fish were produced at the Dungeness fish hatchery.

Hatchery fish have been getting a bad rap for failing in recent years. Runs of hatchery fish always fail after you lay off the hatchery workers and stop feeding the fish.

The spring chinook are the key to restoring the Dungeness-Greywolf ecosystem. Their migration up into the mountains was an exchange of nutrients from the ocean to the land that endured since the last Ice Age.

Everything from the trees to the bugs fed on the carcasses of spawned-out salmon. The fact that we have interrupted this cycle is an intolerable ecological disaster.

Our salmon are overharvested throughout the extent of their range.

There is just too much nylon fishing gear in the water. We need a responsible hatchery program to mitigate this nylon pollution.

So you can take out all the dikes on the lower Dungeness and it won’t matter to the fish.

There have never been any dikes on the upper Dungeness, and the fish up there are just as endangered, oops, I mean threatened.

________

Pat Neal is an Olympic Peninsula fishing guide, humorist and author.

He can be reached at 360-683-9867 or e-mail at patnealwildlife @yahoo.com.

His column appears on Wednesdays.

More in News

Olympic Medical Center to explore outside partnership

Process to explore long-term viability

After learning about each other through a genealogy service 15 years ago and speaking on the phone for years, Steven Hanson of Montevideo, Minn., and Sue Harrison of Sequim met for the first time a few weeks ago. The siblings were placed for adoption by their biological mother about 10 years apart. (Matthew Nash/Olympic Peninsula News Group)
Adopted as babies, siblings meet decades later

Sequim woman started search for biological family 15 years ago

Derek Kilmer.
Kilmer looking to next chapter

Politician stepping down after 20 years

Jefferson County PUD General Manager Kevin Streett plans to retire next summer. (Elijah Sussman/Peninsula Daily News)
Jefferson County PUD general manager to retire

Kevin Streett plan to serve until June 2025

Port Angeles, waterfront district agree to three-year deal

Funds from parking, quarterly billing to help with public events

From left to right: Special Olympics Washington Athlete, Port Angeles Police Chief Brian Smith, East Wenatchee Police Officer Brandon Johnson, Port Angeles Deputy Chief Jason Viada, Undersheriff Lorraine Shore, Sheriff Brian King, Chief Criminal Deputy Amy Bundy and Fife Police Officer Patrick Gilbert. (Clallam County Sheriff’s Office via Facebook)
Clallam County undersheriff named Torch Run Sheriff of the Year

Clallam County Undersheriff Lorraine Shore has been selected as… Continue reading

Oliver Pochert, left, and daughter Leina, 9, listen as Americorp volunteer and docent Hillary Sanders talks about the urchins, crabs and sea stars living in the touch tank in front of her at the Port Townsend Marine Science Center. Pochert, who lives in Sequim, drove to Port Townsend on Sunday to visit the aquarium because the aquarium is closing its location this month after 42 years of operation. (Steve Mullensky/for Peninsula Daily News)
Aquarium closing

Oliver Pochert, left, and daughter Leina, 9, listen as Americorp volunteer and… Continue reading

Tree sale is approved for auction

Appeals filed for two Elwha watershed parcels

Port Townsend City Council to draw down funds in 2025 budget

City has ‘healthy fund reserve balance,’ finance director says

Man flown to hospital after crash investigated for DUI

A 41-year-old man was flown to Olympic Medical Center in… Continue reading

Signal controller project to impact traffic

Work crews will continue with the city of Port… Continue reading