Saltwater anglers take note of a March 4 meeting to kick off the public participation portion of the annual salmon season-setting process for Washington state fisheries known as North of Falcon.

From 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. that day, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife will present initial forecasts developed by departmental and tribal fisheries biologists.

State and tribal forecasters use a suite of scientific data, including watershed sampling and monitoring, ocean indicators and previous year returns, to estimate the number of salmon and steelhead that will return to Northwest waters and how many fish will be available for harvest.

Input from anglers, commercial fishers and others interested in salmon fishing will be considered while state fishery managers partner with tribal co-managers to craft this year’s fisheries.

Fish and Wildlife plans more than a dozen public meetings during the process.

Other planned meeting dates to circle include a March 16 discussion of statewide proposals and a March 23 meeting to discuss Puget Sound, coastal fisheries, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Hood Canal. The March 23 meeting is typically referred to as “the Sequim meeting,” but COVID-19 will again cause the meeting to be held virtually.

Fish and Wildlife also has made some changes to gather more information from anglers.

Comments concerning potential fisheries can be made online at www.tinyurl.com/PDN-NOF.

Conference calls and daily briefings after the closed-to-the-public negotiation sessions also are planned by Fish and Wildlife.

The inability to know what occurs in those negotiation rooms has long been a frustrating staple of North of Falcon as tribes cite their status as soverign nations in refusing to open the meetings to the public.

Native fisheries and recreational fisheries are intertwined because it’s easier to get a permit to fish for chinook under the Endangered Species Act.

The Federal Bureau of Indian Affairs handles tribal fisheries management activities.

The Marine Fisheries Service described the issue in 2016:

“Non-Indian fisheries are included within the consultation because, under a North of Falcon agreement, they are interrelated and interdependent with the tribal fisheries.”

If the state and tribes can’t agree on Puget Sound fisheries through North of Falcon, such as in 2016 when the season was delayed due to disagreements, then non-Indian fisheries, i.e. recreational, would lose that “interrelated and interdependent” status with tribal fishers and would not be eligible for a Section 7 consultation.

Recreational anglers could breakaway from the tribes and seek their own permit, but there would be a host of hoops to comply with regarding the Endagered Species Act — so many that it would take more time to determine compliance than conduct the fishery.

It’s up to you, really. If anglers believe that breaking away from tribal-dominated negotiations and going it alone is the right move, it would definitely hurt in the short term, but the benefits could be far greater than the current method of a death by a thousand cuts.

Tribes still would seek their permits through the BIA and conduct fisheries.

The North of Falcon process occurs in tandem with Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) public meetings to establish fishing seasons for salmon in ocean waters 3 to 200 miles off the Pacific Coast. The PFMC will discuss preliminary options for ocean fisheries during its March 8-14 meeting and is expected to adopt final ocean fishing seasons and harvest levels at its April 6-13 meeting.