After monitoring low Chinook counts over the Columbia and Snake River dams, Idaho Fish and Game fishery managers have decided not to have a summer Chinook fishing season on the South Fork of the Salmon River. This is due to a lack of harvestable hatchery fish.
Chinook fishing has been very limited this year, with the only Chinook fishing currently open on the Middle Fork of the Clearwater River. There was a brief fishing season on the Lower Salmon and Little Salmon rivers.
While lack of a fishing season on the South Fork Salmon is disappointing for anglers, fishery managers expect enough hatchery Chinook to return to the South Fork to meet broodstock needs at the McCall Hatchery.
Those fish will produce the next generation of young salmon to be released, which will hopefully provide fishing opportunity in the future.
