In article ,
rw wrote:

JR is right on the money here, but you are too. The problem os that only
some of the hatcheries actually take wild fish for their brood stock. Most
of the rivers have two distinct runs of fish, the early run is the hatchery
fish, they are smaller, and the descendants of hatchery fish first
introduced from other rivers many years ago. The later run natives are the
vestige if the original stock and need to be protected.

I don't think the problem is that hatchery steelhead (bred from wild stock)
have inferior genetics at conception. They have the same genetics as wild
fish. The problem is that they're raised "in bulk," protected from the
vissicitudes of nature, such as predators, weather, and disease, until
they're smolts., and then they're released. They haven't gone through the
culling that they're wild cousins endure, so they have inferior genetics
when they're released.

IMO, of course. I'm just an armchair fisheries biologist. :-)

Well why dont they just release the steelhead into the river at a
earlier time? I guess it would be preety hard to implant the eggs into
redds, but they could release the salmon fry. Of course they would have
to release alot more (something like 100 times more salmon fry than 1
year old's?)

--
"He that would exchange liberty for temporary safety
deserves neither liberty nor safety. Ben Franklin
"Those who are ready to sacrifice freedom for security
ultimately will lose both" - Abraham Lincoln