I'd add, too, and it is maybe because I am chronologically gifted, that returning to places of my younger days to fish, hunt, just look around brings much joy in the memories, even if the success is not as great.

Go row. Maybe go in the summer during trout season and explore the waters; something will be there even if it isn't an Oregon 20...

TLDR; to be very honest. It’s like climate change or recycling, you can only do so much, grassroots uprising change is important in politics
but won’t equal to more fish at least in the short term. Keep being you, babbrr, even if Melanie is your Eleanor Roosevelt side and put on your high heels while you tie some leaders.

bobr aka Sybil is lashing out because he's stuck with 45 years of boat payments and nowhere to fish.

More dickwads from the dark side

By the way, our boat and house are completely paid off, I go out in the ocean in our 20 ft. new duckworth, while the losers from the darkside are paying off their trailer park shithouses and fishing from the banks of rivers with no decent fish left. Who gets the last laugh? Someone who's life consists of posting the kind of shi* you've just posted or me? I'm happy with my wife, my life, and my family and friends. What do you have besides a gutful of hate?

Bob have you totally lost your mind ? PP is about fish and this thread has remained true by being only things about fish in the Chehalis. If you morons want to act like a two year old being dragged through a grocery store by its mother screaming kindly do it someplace else. Your last post was so improper that to say it is beyond any reasonable boundaries would be the under statement of the year! You need to seriously chill out.

You know, you're right . I shouldn't even respond to the kind of shi* these folks spew. I'll try to not take these a-holes seriously. But I didn't start this [Bleeeeep!], it's been going on for years, if the mods would just ban these mental morons the site would be improved.

Bob seems angry.

I'm pissed too.

The thought of another winter of few fish is extremely frustrating.

I miss the glory days of the Baby Doll Hole on the creek.

RIP

RG-thanks-it needed to be said!

bobrr-sadly your post puts you in the "mental morons" group

Doesn't just apply to the Chehalis but last Sunday I was at the Steelhead Trout Club's annual banquet. One of the members has (legally) takes a steelhead from 78 different streams in WA. And I know at least one he missed. That is what we had, a myriad of streams to fish. A question to ask WDFW is will we ever fish for anadromous fish in all the GH rivers? If not, why is that not the goal? That is, actually, a good question for them. What, very specifically, is your vision for GH? What seasons, what limits?

Yeah, I agree. I should have sent it as a P.M. or maybe just put these folks on ignore. You know, I'll do that right now so I won't see their posts, good or bad. Sorry to derail a thread so many read.

Good idea BUT try to get WDFW to put anything in writing....or even answer questions they don't want to answer....

Most probably missed the WDFW Tuesday, Dec. 14 - Coastal Washington with Regional Director Larry Phillips, 6 - 7 p m Zoom meeting...

Remember meeting was set to be a "question from public meeting", ya right!!!! Time was mostly spent by WDFW asking for budget help, patting themselves on the back for the great job that is being done.

4 questions from call in, you could type in questions to be answered.... I sent 4 in, did a screen shot with my IPhone of mine, they won't allow you to see questions.. someone ask about when can we starting killing wolfs, another was on bear hunting, another was about getting white tail deer started in Western WA.

Only 1 of mine, was even mentioned.....then it was WDFW partial answer....

No fishing for me, lots of computer time, like email over talk on phone, PDR can help on Wynoochee Mitigation, other question had to do with FISH, wild steelhead and 1300+ Coho placed above Wynoochee Dam...didn't want to answer those...grrrrrrrr

I also liked how James sidestepped the question on whether or not the Steelhead Harvest Management Plan had been signed yet or not...

But they were quick on the response that they will have the PREVIOUS years agreements up toot sweet. I was able to find last years, maybe I'm missing something?

I agree with Drifter that WDFW, and probably any manager, does not like to be pinned down. But we have to. They want us to lobby the Leg for more money, or increases in fess, or whatever. The quid pro quo is that they commit to a management structure and work towards it.

I think it is past time where we allow our leaders (not just in natural resources) to make decisions with no consequences. You want to remove culverts? Fine. How many more spawners will we see in that stream? You want to keep boats away from SRKWs? Fine. How many more SRKWs will we have in 4 years?

Glad the dark side closed down. Divert your energy elsewhere. For the better I hope.

I'll never forget the day when the Babydoll floated down stream and got caught in a log jam. We brought it back up a placed it close to where it originally was. Unfortunately after the next high water it was gone forever. Every year after that pressure doubled until that stretch of river became the new Blue Creek.
So sad you can't escape the people on the rivers anymore. So sad the fish are gone.
The commercialization of the resource ruined the fisheries we all loved.
Guides, magazines, advertising, mens egos, and the internet were just the tools.
I hope those that tried to make money on our fish runs are happy with their end game.

We actually do have (Rivrguy has a copy) a mosel for both GH and WB that would allow the collective "us" to build the runs out from the individual stream escapement through fisheries out to the ocean. Including rec, commercial, and tribal fisheries. Every "wish" can be included. At that point, we would have an estimate of how many fish would need to escape the ocean.

We would have an idea if all our inside wants are even doable production-wise. We would have an idea of whether or not the ocean fisheries were possible and at what level.

Knowlege. Maybe imperfect as it would just be a model, but ....

Every year I request the preseason forecast models for salmon and Steelhead and staff provides as quickly as possible. I then send them to over 250 folks on my list and let everyone else know the best I can they are available. Staff for the Chehalis in R-6 have been very good at trying to get information out to folks the best they can. With all that info I and others were totally focused on the the total escapement and just plain blew it as we did not look into the numbers for individual streams, our bad!

Frankly other than staff spoon feed us information I do not know what more could have been done to make us understand just how dire the situation has become. This is a tide water / bay harvest issue and frankly must be addressed as such. What should not happen is the upper basin community be punished for the continuing over harvest of Coho by tide water and bay fisheries be it QIN, NT Commercial. or Rec.

I agree RG, but for as long as I have known them, the WDF/WDFW salmon folks have been tied to marine harvest. I remember trying to get a fishery in the river for Dungeness Pinks and it was hard because the push was for marine areas. That, and the agency wanted to leave the freshwater salmon alone so they could spawn in peace.

As many have noted, there simply are not enough fish for everybody to get every fish they want. Somebody gets cut off.

[quote=Rivrguy
Frankly other than staff spoon feed us information I do not know what more could have been done to make us understand just how dire the situation has become. This is a tide water / bay harvest issue and frankly must be addressed as such. What should not happen is the upper basin community be punished for the continuing over harvest of Coho by tide water and bay fisheries be it QIN, NT Commercial. or Rec. [/quote]
It's really easy to go after the low hanging fruit on the tree, bay and tidal fishers whether they be tribal, NT comm. or rec, when the reality is most of the fish (60 to 80% are the current number, I believe) are taken by Alaska and B.C. Not to mention the fact that all of "our fish" are taken by rec fishers from Alaska to Grey's Harbor and beyond. To state that we are the problem locally and shutting us down is going to make the decline go away is absurd. That solution is ridiculous when you consider that the Nisqually steelhead have NEVER returned to significant numbers in spite a a total shut down of the fishery to both tribal and rec. fishing for 20 to 30 years or more.
Unless comm. harvest is curtailed (which is NEVER going to happen while any meaningful amount of fish are there) the fish are doomed. But shutting locals down is the easiest thing to do, just ask the state. Curtailing seasons with minimal harvest this year and last year did not make numbers magically rise as a result. Most fisherfolk we spoke to and saw last year and this year did poorly as a general rule. We should be the LAST people to be shut down after all other interests are shut down, other than tribal. Unfortunately they (tribal) would be the only comm. harvesters left. That's what had to happen with game animals and that's the way it should be. But that's not going to happen in our lifetimes so we have boats that will take us wherever and whatever type of fish are still available to catch and will advocate for our right to do so.