Fish theft means chinook season closes on Icicle River

Thieves have struck a huge blow to the sport and tribal spring chinook salmon fishery on the Icicle River in Leavenworth, which means that both fisheries will close Wednesday.

Sometime late Friday night or early Saturday morning, someone broke into the Leavenworth National Fish Hatchery and stole 200 adult spring chinook in the holding pens. With each fish averaging about 15 pounds, that adds up to 3,000 pounds of stolen fish.

"That was basically all the spring chinook we had return up to this point," said Travis Collier, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife acting hatchery manager in Leavenworth. "The early returning portion of the fish are the larger 4- and 5-year olds, and that is roughly 20 percent of the production goal that is now missing."

Collier said a return of 1,100 spring chinook is necessary to collect enough eggs for production of 1.625-milllion smolts.

"The good news is that more fish are coming in right now, and while the fisheries will be closed it looks like we'll get our goal of fish,'' said Corky Broaddus, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife public affairs officer. "We have 314 fish in the holding ponds today so 257 more came since the incident."

The predicted in-season run size for the Icicle this year is about 3,000 fish, who make the long 500-mile migration from the ocean, past seven dams and many other obstacles before reaching the hatchery.

"This impact is the fact that the tribal and sport fishery will be closed starting [Wednesday], and it was scheduled to remain open through July," said Corky Broaddus, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife public affairs officer. "That is huge, and people invest a lot of time and money in both of those fisheries."

Chinook fishing will be closed just below the fish hatchery on the Icicle River down to the confluence with the Wenatchee River.

Anyone who witnessed the incident is asked to call the U.S. Fish and Wildlife enforcement service at 509-371-1801.

Mark Yuasa: 206-464-8780 or myuasa@seattletimes.com