Anglers May Be Reeling In King Salmon by 1991 : Fisheries: Reintroduction of the prized fish to area waters is a result of a program sponsored by a local group with help from the state.

About 40,000 young king salmon raised in pens off a dock in Oxnard will be released today a mile off the breakwater of Channel Islands Harbor, officials said.

If all goes well, by 1991 anglers could be reeling in 20-pounders from local waters for the first time since the 1960s.

After the fish are released, they are expected to remain nearby.

“On the basis of experience at other points along the coast where salmon are raised, a significant percent stay in the area where they were introduced to the ocean,” said Jim Donlon, chairman of the Ventura County Fish and Game Commission.

“They show up during all stages of development, so they don’t go away and come back.”

Reintroduction of the prized fish to area waters comes as a result of a salmon enhancement program sponsored by the Ventura County chapter of the United Anglers of California Research Institution, with $20,000 in seed money and assistance from the California Department of Fish and Game.

“The first year they’ll be jacks of five, six, seven pounds. The second year they’ll be 20 pounds and at three years, 35 pounds,” said Bill Fox, a Ventura College biology instructor and a volunteer with the program.

“They’ll be full of eggs, but since there is no river to spawn, they will reabsorb the eggs, and we’ll get 40- to 45-pound salmon at four years. There will be salmon every year after next year.”

Money for the program came from fines collected in Ventura County by the state Department of Fish and Game over the past 12 to 15 years. Up to half the funds are returned to the county by the state and must be used for Fish and Game projects within the county.

“Fish and Game has been cognizant for some years of the substantial decline of ocean fisheries. They have plain been overfished,” Donlon said. A longtime fisherman, he recalled fishing salmon in local waters in the 1950s and 1960s and was instrumental in starting the program.

“Management of fisheries is controlled by politics, and the fisheries have been allowed to decline until they’re now a shadow of what they used to be,” he said. “The concept was that a new fishery could be introduced and it could be of substantial benefit to people.”

The venture began in earnest last spring when 63,000 fertilized salmon eggs were trucked from a Seattle laboratory to a hatchery in Yountville, Calif. After they grew to 2 1/2 inches long--83 to the pound--they were on the road again to Oxnard, arriving June 2.

The seawater pens are covered by plastic netting to prevent hungry seals and sea birds from feasting on the fast-growing salmon. Fed on food pellets, they have grown to 6 1/2 to 7 inches long.

“We had to use some drug therapy because the water fluctuated in temperature and salmon are stressed when the temperature is over 64 degrees. Bacteria attacked them, and we lost 20,000 fish in that battle,” Fox said.

In spite of losses, the project has done better than expected, and plans are being made to buy 100,000 eggs for next year.

The Ventura County program was modeled after successful projects near San Luis Obispo and Sausalito.