The 1998 fishwheel project on the Nass River, BC / prepared by Richard F. Alexander and Michael R. Link.: Fs97-4/2556E-PDF

"Four fishwheels were operated on the lower Nass River from 12 June to 13 October 1998. The fishwheels operated for a total of 9,874 h and captured 38,155 salmon. Catches of adult salmon included 19,176 sockeye, 10,624 pink, 3,869 coho, 3,507 chinook, 707 steelhead, and 272 chum. Of these, 4,030 sockeye, 2,766 coho, 1,606 chinook salmon, and 635 steelhead were tagged. Totals of 388 chinook, 1,752 sockeye and 1,148 coho salmon from the catch were successfully aged using scales. A total of 3,297 tagged fish were later recovered in fisheries and on tributaries of the Nass River. Counts of marked and unmarked fish from the Meziadin fishway and in-river harvests were used to compute net escapement estimates for sockeye (266,458) and coho salmon (42,320). The coho estimate represented only a portion of the total coho escapement because the fishwheels did not operate through the entire coho run and recovery efforts were confined to an early run stock (Meziadin River). The net chinook escapement (23,213) was derived by a mark-recapture estimate (spawning ground surveys) minus estimated in-river harvests. The four fishwheels combined caught an estimated 12.6% of the chinook run, 8.9% of the coho run, and 6.2% of the sockeye run. Including subsequent in-river harvests, an estimated 32,548 chinook and 304,888 sockeye salmon entered the Nass River in 1998. Daily tag release (at the fishwheels) and recovery data (at the Meziadin fishway) were used to reconstruct the sockeye abundance in the lower river and assess the within season variation in the portion of the sockeye run caught by the fishwheels"--Abstract, page x.

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publications.gc.ca/pub?id=9.964398&sl=0

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