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I chose the 20 year time frame because the the initial releases from the mission bay facility, pre Carlsbad hatchery, were small. I do not have the release and rrecovery data right in front of me. But I have seen it recently. The majority of recovered tagged wsb are juveniles that have come from the Hubbs gill netting survey and from fish killed in power plants rather than adult legal sized fish caught by anglers. I believe tagged fish recovered peaked '08 at 30 fish. Over the last 4 years the recoveries have been in single digits. I dont know the total number of wsb released since 1986. More than 2 million I'm sure. It's a big ocean and this is a complicated program. But after 2 million fish released to recover less than 10 for four years straight indicates very low survival.
Clearly I do not have access to all the data nor the expertice to analyze it all. The low numbers of adult fish recovered in relation to the numbers of juveniles release is a bad sign. Factor in the mortality, euthenasia, and levels of deformity and is appears the program is producing low quality fish with very little chance of survival. I'll be looking forward to the SAC final draft.
I have nothing to do with the coast keepers and haven't heard any thing they have to say about the program. Mike
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