Video of Squaxin Island Tribe Fish Techs Danny Snyder and Bear Lewis sampling the Tribes coho commercial fishery.
Video recorded and provided by Emmett O’Connell, South Sound Information and Education Officer, NWIFC.
Author Archives: Joseph Peters
Chinook Spawning Begins at Tumwater Falls
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Lee Pilon of WDFW collecting Male Chinook milt.
On Monday September 21, WDFW staff with some help from Squaxin NR staff began spawning approximatly 100 female and 100 male Chinook at the Tumwater Falls Hatchery.
Will Henderson sorting male and female chinook for spawning
Joe Peters sorting male and female chinook
An estimated 500,000 eggs were taken and milt from 100 males to Minter Creek Hatchery for fertilization. Eventually these fertilized eggs will return to Tumwater Falls Hatchery as Fry.
All spawned fish and surplus fish went to a food bank.
If you have time go check out the spawning of the Chinook Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays around 8 am to 11 am at the Tumwater Falls Hatchery for the next couple of weeks.
Joe Peters and Will Henderson taking a break from sorting fish
Rare catch in Squaxin coho fishery
Ocean sunfish or Mola mola are a rare find in the Puget Sound. These fish are generally found worldwide in temperate and tropical seas. They feed primarily on jellyfishes. Although the photo above is a small Ocean sunfish, they can get up to 2 meters in length and are known as the heaviest bony fish reaching over 2 tons.
For more information on Ocean sunfish (Mola mola):
Phil Anderson Chosen As Leader of WDFW
From Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission Website:
Anderson Good Choice to lead WDFW
The treaty tribes of western Washington look forward to continuing to work with Phil Anderson as director of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW).
Anderson was named the department’s permanent director Saturday by the nine-member commission….(read more at NWIFC website).
First Salmon Ceremony
Jim Peters traditionally cooks Chinook at the Squaxin First Salmon Ceremony. Photo by Emmett O'Connell-NWIFC
Shelton Mason County Journal Video Slide Show
The First Salmon – As told by Cecil Cheeka
Once there was a little boy, and he loved salmon. He played with salmon and he swam with salmon. Finally the salmon people decided to take him home with them. He wanted to go, so they took him to the land where the salmon people live.
He lived there for several months or maybe even years. The boy began to get homesick, so the salmon people agreed to take the boy back to visit his family. The salmon people knew they were coming for two reasons – to bring the little boy back to his family and to bring them food. Messages were sent so the family would know what time of year the salmon people were coming.
And so they prepared real carefully, cleaning the streams and cleaning the beaches, preparing for the salmon boy and the salmon people to come. The family had the ferns and the moss all ready and waiting. And they caught the first salmon, cleaned him real carefully, made sure everything was taken care of real nice, and then cooked the salmon.
But before they cooked the salmon, they took the skeleton, very carefully and very ceremoniously, back down to the beach. They placed the skeleton upstream to show the direction for the rest of the salmon people who were bringing the boy back for a visit. The message was clear that the family of the boy was taking very good care of the salmon that were coming back.
Every year they still come back to visit and it is very important for us to make sure that they are welcome, taken care of and everything is waiting for them, including clean beaches and streams.
Squaxin Island Tribe Annual Commercial Fishing Regulation Package
On Wednesday June 24th, 2009 the Squaxin Island Tribal Council approved the Annual Chinook/Coho/Chum Commercial Fishing Regulation package.
Changes to the 2009 Annual Fishing Regulations include:
Page 5&6—–’09 Annual Regulations/Chinook Regulations-
Section III.
F. Legal Gear- defined Set Gillnet, Drift Gillnet and Beach Seine.
G. Illegal Gear- defined Purse Seine.
Page 3—–2009/2010 Coho and Chum Regulations
Section V.
12. Beach Seines- requesting fishermen to release all unmarked/ wild coho (with attachment added with maps to help identify Wild vs Hatchery)
Copies of the 2009 Annual Commercial Fishing Regulation package and Emergency Fishing Regulations will be available at the Squaxin Natural Resources office or can be printed off from the Squaxin Island web page at:
If there are any questions or concerns regarding the salmon fisheries please contact Joseph Peters at 360-432-3813 or email at Jcpeters@squaxin.nsn.us.
Latest Spring Rain Wreaks Havoc on Squaxin Smolt Traps
Mill Creek May 7th, 2009
This week’s heavy rain that began falling Monday May 4th through today (Thursday May 7th) made for some high flowing South Puget Sound creeks. After Monday night, 3 of the 4 weir smolt traps that Squaxin operates have blown out.
Luckily the traps are designed to blow out in high flow events. Each trap has “blow out panels”, a section of the panel is held together by zip ties that eventually “pops” under enough pressure. At least that’s what we hope happens. Sometimes the force of the creek will bend the T-post or snap the panels all together or even scour the creek bed under the panels. We are lucky with this rain event; we didn’t have a whole lot of logs or debris washing out the entire trap.
Even the screw trap on Goldsborough Creek is not functioning properly. We are getting logs jammed in the trap and the diversion panels have been washed out.
Shelton accumulative rainfall since Monday is 3.62″, that’s a lot of water raging down our little creeks.
Below it a snap shot of how much discharge Goldsborough Creek has had in the past couple of days.
Goldsbrough Creek Discharge
The rainy weather seems to be tapering off, so we hope to have the traps back fishing in a couple of days.
Friday May 8th-
As of Friday May 8th all of our traps are back to fishing for coho smolts, with the exception of Mill Creek. Water flow at Mill still is high and appears to be a couple days until it is back to fishing.
Coho Smolt in Sherwood Creek Watershed
Schumacher Creek Smolt Trap
From NWIFC Website:
A pair of smolt traps is helping the Squaxin Island Tribe get a better picture of natural salmon production in the Sherwood Creek watershed.
“The Sherwood watershed is one of the most complicated systems in the tribe’s treaty-reserved fishing area,” said Joe Peters, fisheries management biologist for the Squaxin Island Tribe. Tribal biologists are unsure about how many coho are rearing annually in Schumacher Creek, a tributary to Sherwood Creek, which flows into Mason Lake. Sherwood Creek flows…
Squaxin Island Tribe operating 5 Smolt Traps in Deep South Puget Sound
Schumacher Creek Smolt Trap
The Squaxin Island Natural Resources (SINR) is currently collecting data to estimate the number of coho salmon smolts outmigrating from Mill, Cranberry, Goldsborough, Schumacher and Sherwood Creeks. These five creeks empty in to Deep South Puget Sound, with in the Squaxin Island Tribes usual and accustom areas.
The project objectives include using weir panel and Screw traps to enumerate and monitor downstream migration of coho salmon smolts, providing data for estimation of natural coho production and for the formation of relevant spawning escapement goals for Deep South Puget Sound region. This will be the 10th year that SINR has conducted smolt trapping studies.
Goldsborough Creek Screw Trap
South Puget Sound coho smolt outmigration timing occurs during the spring from April through June. Peak outmigration of coho smolt in the region varies from creek to creek. The peak ranges from late April through the middle of May. All salmonids captured in the traps are enumerated and measured; non salmonid species are identified and enumerated. Species other than coho encountered in the trap are: cutthroat, steelhead, chum, lamprey, sculpin, dace, peamouth, shiner and threespine stickleback.
Schumacher Creek Coho Smolt
VIDEO: SINR Fish Techs Michael West and Danny Synder Schumacher trap
For more information, contact:Joe Peters, fisheries biologist, Squaxin Island Tribe, (360) 432-3813. jcpeters@squaxin.nsn.us
North of Falcon 25 years of Fisheries Co-Management
- Photo courtesy of NWIFC
- Photo courtesy of NWIFC
Treaty Tribes, State Mark North of Falcon 25th Anniversary
From The Northwest Fisheries Commission website: (Being Frank)
We’re marking an important milestone in cooperative salmon co-management this year. It’s the 25th anniversary of the North of Falcon process for setting treaty tribal and non-Indian fishing seasons in western Washington.
We’ve sure come a long ways in that time.
The 1974 Boldt decision made it clear: Treaty Indian tribes in western Washington had reserved rights to half of the harvestable salmon returning to state waters and were equal partners […]