Is the ocean out of Westport still open and hot? (pretty accurate topic title, aye? :D) If yes, how much longer is it expected to remain open? Thanks.

Yes my friend it is still screamin'!!! As of last week the catch had filled somewhere around 15% of the Coho quota and 30% of the Nook' quota. They are predicting that it will be open at least through the end of August.
Good luck and tight lines, Jeff

Westport is fishing really well right now. You probably have a good month, if not more, left before things get close to being shut down.

The better king fishing is a little farther out but we've been nailing very nice silvers just past the jettys. Minus nasty water conditions on some days, it's been a very convenient fishery. Drop me an e-mail if you want more info.

I'm booked on the advantage on the 5th of august. Can't wait.
Good luck,
STRIKE ZONE

Fished yesterday (Tues) at Westport. Fishing was good. Fished about 12 miles out in front of the harbor. Mixed bag, 2 nice kings, quite a few small feeders, Silvers where about 3-7 lbs. Fishing overall for me was a little slower than the week before, when it was wide open. Hogs will be on the beach in a couple more weeks.

Hey thanks much Jeff and guys! That is good news. I've never fished out of Westport and would like to experience it. And it could be a much nicer alternative to the long launch lines and boat crowds at bouy 10. The Oregon ports have closed for silvers. When I get back to fishing again after returning from our trip to Central Oregon next week I would love to go out of there. Is your boat big enough for that Jeff - if so, let's go. If not, I'll be a fishin ho. Will bring bait, gas (and buy some boat gas too ), and beer for a ride in a bigger boat. In fact I have a couple friends that can help me fill a boat out of there and take care of all expenses plus bring the beer and snacks. Thanks. - Steve

westport is redhot, got our fish in about 2 hours sunday.

Been hitting a 270 and heading up to 12 miles out with lots of Kings and silvers with a few Kings over 30 pounds. Lots of wild and marked silvers, as well as smileys.
I keep on hearing a rumor in town that because the sporties are catching so many kings, the season will end soon and then reopen with marked coho only regs in place with maybe even a bump of an extra coho. This does not make us sportboat guys very happy, because many of us feel that this is Charterboat driven. I know they have to keep the town running, but believe me we leave a huge money trail every trip.
Even though we have not reached the King quota yet and if you were to project it, we would have a while to go, I have heard that they were going to close it to kings with the quota unfilled to make up for the so called hooking mortality that supposedly will happen with the coho fishery still open.
By the way RT, the lines have gotten longer every week at Westport, but at least its a big ocean. Feel free to E-mail me if you are looking for a ride out to the deep blue, I try to go every Sunday and sometimes Monday, and often have a spot open. Just bring foo foo drinks as I leave the beer for my brother Ben......and he is in Alaska.

Hey there my friend!!!
I'd take the FishNg1 up on his offer. My boat will handle the ocean, but I just don't have the time right now to get out there. Looking for that buoy 10 action in a few weeks. I'll see you there!!!
Good luck and tight lines, Jeff

Does anyone know of any Westport charter boats that are owned by guys that supported I-696?? I've heard that most of those boats are owned by commercial fishing interests, and that they, through the Westport Chamber of Commerce, funded the "No on 696" campaign (along with all the other gillnetters, seiners, trollers, trawler, etc.) I'd like to know of someone out there that I can send people to and feel good about it.

-N.

I did e-mail Steve (FishNg) already Jeff. That was a nice offer. And let's keep in touch about fishing bouy 10 together. - Steve

Hi Norman,

Here's part of the story, but not all, as to why "some" of the owners and charter offices, and the Chamber of commerce asked others to vote against I-696.

1. It was a flawed initiative. It would have only impacted non-tribal commercials. There were no provision on how the charters were to get their herring for fishing, your herring as well. Try to supply all of the herring used in this state using only herring lampara and dip nets.

2. Many of these folks also fish commercially, or have friends and famiily who fish commercially. Fishing is an industry, be it sport or commercial. They decided to stand together instead of falling divided. (Think PETA chipping away at your hunting rights, Sarah Brady going after your guns.)

3. There are very few living wage jobs in western Grays Harbor County, so eliminating one of the major employers in the area would have meant even worse economic consequences. Timber took a huge toll in the 80's and 90's, the shipyard only provides so many jobs, and many of these folks (not all) are not suitable to work for the corrections facility. This bill would have pretty much been the death blow to their economy. Westport, as you know it today, would not have survived. This bill meant putting their neighbors, families, and friends out of work.

4. Commercial trolling, no nets involved, would have been banned within 3 miles of the coast.

5. There was no provision for paying the commercials for their licenses. How would you like to put money and effort into your house and then have someone take it away, even though you were following the rules. That is a huge investment to walk away from as some of these licenses are sold a lot like negotiable securities.

Think how you felt, if you hunted with hounds, after the hounds intiative passed. Think about how you felt after the trapping intiative passed. It may not have affected you directly, but I had friends who hunted bears and cougars with hounds. I knew trappers, too. This is how these guys felt. Someone else from out of town was coming in and saying "I don't like what your doing, so you can't do it anymore!" The folks of Westport took a Libertarian stance.

Our intiative process is certainly flawed, just look at that joker, Tim Eyman.

I voted for 696, but there were a lot of problems with it. There were many far ranging effects to this intiative, depending on where you lived, so it wasn't a clear cut issue if you lived or worked in western Grays Harbor county. I am not supporting what these folks thought, just reporting it.

Andy

P.S. If you are looking to refer someone to a boat that isn't fished commercially, except for charters, I would go on the Gold Rush 2, out of Westport or Washington Charters. I think that they use the same office. Kevin is a schoolteacher by trade who fishes on his summer break. Best of luck.

[ 07-26-2001: Message edited by: Dogfish ]

Come on Dogfish, do you really think that those of us that put in long hours getting signatures and donating time and money to the BAN initiative are going to lie down and listen to some of your retoric about the poor commercial boys. I will let a few other members chime in on some of your comments, but come on now.....who do you think is driving the economy in Westport as we speak......sportsfishing dollars! It is great to see the ocean alive once again with abundant salmon, and charters fishing for them, as well as the sporties. Okay, lets all net the hell out of them and destroy the runs so we can stop this fishery, and lets not use the old "Oh BAN would not have impacted the Indians" sob story, you know that is another issue.
I myself do not entirely disagree with commercial fishing, and if one would check the records you would find my name as a past holder of such, but it must be managed in a non-biased and proper manner. I don't think that is how it is always done now. If you have been to Westport lately, you would have noticed that most of the commercial trollers have been doing their thing about 12 miles out, right alongside the charters and sportboats......and peacefully at that.
The BAN iniative might have had a few flaws, but it would have been a step in the right direction. As for herring, it would have still been allowed to have been harvested as bait and guess what, even though I am a moocher by heart, I can troll an apex, a plug or other hardware with great success for salmon. And if you have a strong arm, my jigging stick with the old "dart" is great fun too! And then there is always the old herring jig that is always rigged on my old ambassadeur setup!
Sorry for all the ranting, but my heart started pumping hard when I read your post and I just couldn't resist the reply.....and yes I did note that you voted for 696.....if we did it wrong the first time lets do it again and do it correctly. If they can pass those sorry trapping and cougar iniatives, why can't we see the light when it comes to Salmon and Steelhead?

Oh man, I just got back from thte ifish Roadhouse party and chugging contest and am seeing double right now - but I can see that I agree with Steve on the I-696 issue! I have a lot more to say anbout it thwan that, but I will wait until my mind is clearer. - RT

Thanks for the info, Andy... there are some things in there that I hadn't heard.

I've got a couple of points, though.

1. Show me an recent State Intitiative (doesn't matter if it's one that has passed or hasn't) that isn't flawed. Tell me how you would propose affecting the Tribal (federally governed) fisheries with a State Initiative. 696 made provisions for bait fish fisheries... plus, why, when herring was scarce this past spring, was everyone saying that all of our bait herring here comes from Canada and Alaska?? and let me take you out some time and show you how to catch salmon with spoons, no bait.

2. Historically, when fishing becomes an "industry" someplace, it lasts, at most, three or four generations. These days, with the technology we have at hand, it rarely lasts more than two generations. (examples: cod in the eastern North Atlantic, striped bass off the New England coast, lobsters in Maine, cod off of Newfoundland, Atlantic salmon in New England, what was it, redfish in Florida, the list goes on) Why? Because when it's an "industry" people get greedy.. they need bigger and bigger boats to compete, they need to catch more fish, they get inrooted in the political structure and lobby and pass laws to allow them to try to get rich... all at the expense of the resource. So now the tought time has come for the "industry" here, for some of these people to go out of business... I say good riddens.

3. If there are no living wage jobs in an area, there is probably a pretty darn good reason for it... like all the freakin' resources have been exploited for 100+ years and there's nothing left!!! No trees, no fish. Move, or figure out something else to do, like everyone else has to do.

4. The trollers troll way offshore as it is, and if they can't target chinook anyway, what's the big deal about the 3 mile boundary?

5. I didn't buy the "I can't put my neighbor out of work" stance then, and I don't buy it now. These commercial fishermen are the buffalo hunters of the 21st century, whether we stop them before they kill the absolute last fish, or let the business die out on its own in 10 years, doesn't matter to anyone but the fish. Actually, let me rephrase that... these commercials are not the "farmers" many make them out to be, they are the GOLD MINERS of the 20th and 21st century, and guess what, the seam has run out... maybe they should have thought about their OWN pension and retirement when they were catching all those fish back in the "Good 'ol days" why the heck should we have to support them now, what have they done for the taxpayers, other than cost us money? and I haven't ever heard someone say it, so I will... when is someone going to give me a buyback program on my sportfishing boat?

I have friends that are commercial fishermen. They all fish in Alaska, they all realize it's a dying industry here, and I think in the back of their head they realize what they're doing up in AK won't last forever, either. I think that's why they are encouraging their sons to do someting other than fish.

P.S. Was Kevin the schoolteacher a commercial troller back in "the good 'ol days"?

-N.

Hey guys,

Reread the entire paragraph where I said that I voted for 696. You will see that I said that I didn't support their views, but I was merely reporting them. So breath before you jump all over me, I can't take that much weight.

I work with many businesses in the Westport area which gives me a unique insight into their world, and their economy. I merely was explaining to Norman what the other side of the issue was for those folks who lived in Westport. Not taking a side, but trying to put it in a perspective that we could all understand. Nuff said?

As long as initiatives are put together by humans, they will always be flawed. That's just life.

There was no clearcut provision for bait fisheries in I-696. Just as there were no exemptions on mole traps with the trapping initiative. Show me where the loopole is:
I-696

But I agree that we need to get the nets out of the water, with the exception of "SUBSISTANCE ONLY" fisheries for tribes with properly negotiated treaties.

Do you understand what I was saying now? Other than that, have a marvelous day, and catch some fish this weekend, 'cause I'll be doing that too.

Finally, I am not sure if Kevin V. was a full time commercial fisherman before his teaching carreer began, but I can say that he is one heck of a nice guy, can get you to fish most every time, and he keeps his deckhands running.

Andy

[ 07-27-2001: Message edited by: Dogfish ]

Hey Dogfish,

I didn't mean to jump all over you, sorry. I saw that you said you voted for 696, what bothers me is that people still think that the supporters of 696 didn't know what effects it would have had (had it passed) on certain towns and economies... I was pretty well aware, and I think everyone else was, too. At the time, I was working on West Commodore Way, right behind the Fisherman's Terminal in Seattle. I talked with a lot of commercials about the initiative, both there and "in the trenches" while gathering signatures that summer at a bunch of public events (street fairs, parades, etc.) and rallying at places like Husky games. I learned a lot from those guys, all about what kind of ramifications it would have.
Like I said, no initiative is perfect, including that one... I personally had a conflict with it including trollers, but the people that wrote the text were advised (I think by lawyers) to include trollers in the wording.

BTW, I'm pretty sure that link you posted doesn't have the entire text on there...

Again, thanks for the info on Kevin, and good fishing.

-N.

Dogfish, what bothers me, is that when the general public reads the kind of thing that you posted, they tend to believe it and side with the poor guys family issues, etc. I believe it is because of similar misinformation like that printed in the papers and on the news, is the real reason that 696 failed.
BTW....great perspective Storm, thanks for helping spell out the issues. And like I stated before, Andy I read your post thoroughly and know that you are a sportsman and indeed voted for 696, but like they say, fish come first! or something like that?

I tend to provide a little more info than others, just in case someone out there didn't know what the meaning behind the whole discussion was. Plus, you never know how much info the other guy has, so always assume they know just a little when trying to educate. I wasn't trying to talk down, just educate. Sorry if I came across that way.

The initiative as posted was the final draft as submitted to the Secretary of State's office. Section 3 leaves some leeway if part of the initiative had been struck down had it had been approved by voters. But then you have to trust the lawyers to figure that one out, no thanks. That is the complete text. There is no other wording.

Take care, and have a good day. Andy

Hey FNG,

How's it going? Thanks for the input. I am sure that had the intiative addressed some of the points that were given to me by the Westport folks, the initiative would have had a better shot as passing.

If a new initiative were to be drafted that included funding for retraining programs, license buybacks, along with short term economic assistance for heavily impacted areas, it would have a much greater chance of passage.

Most initiatives are somewhat shortsighted. They only address part of the issue, and often lack key pieces that would draw more support. Bargaining should be done on a compromise basis, and I-696 had no room for compromise in it. In the next net-ban initiative, I would highly suggest that some of these issues be addressed.

Tribes are off-limits in the referrendum process because they are primarily a Federal issue. So we just have to keep on top of that one. Those who voted against Slade but were for fish made a big mistake. He was our biggest ally in the issues with the tribes. Do you think Cantwell or Murray will have the balls to stand up against them? (Sorry, they don't have balls, and I didn't mean to offend any ladies, just democrats.)

If you have concerns about how the general public percieves the issue, then educate them, and allow for concessions. But to draw a line in the sand, or in this case water, and say "I'm not budging!" will do nothing but make the line drawer look belligerent. Address the issues fully, and we will succeed.

Anyway, best of luck, and keep catchin'. Andy

Dogfish, you made some good points and a lot of sense in your last two posts. This is a great way for us to come to a meaningful conclusion, maybe someday many of us on this board will be able to get together and hash things out in friendly manner.
In the meantime enjoy the great season we're having and see ya on the water!

Hey Dogfish,

I took another look at that link, it looks complete now, I think it was my browser messing up earlier, some of the text was truncated.

I agree that any future initiative will need to be more compassionate towards the affected parties to have a better chance at passing.

-N.

[ 07-27-2001: Message edited by: StorminN ]

Thanks guys,

That is exactly what I was trying to get across. When we focus on more than just what we want, we will get more support. Andy

I'm elated to see that the "sportsman's" picture of the commercial fisherman has not changed one bit. The sportsmen need to be aware that all commercial fishermen are greedy, watershed destroying trolls who leave a path of unregulated destruction and dead fish in thier oily, garbage enrshounded wakes. The damn commercials are ten times worse than the sportsmen who never ever think about leaving bait cups, miles of discarded fishing line, beer cans, and other very sightly and beautifull heaps of trash for others to enjoy on our rivers, lakes and, estuaries. Sportsmen would never think of yarding a wild fish onto a gravel bar and tearing hooks out just prior to kicking it back into the water to continue it's spawning journey would they? And those thousands of outboards puking oil and gas mix into our coastal and inland waters? Not even a problem for guys so pure and pristine! Can't say any 18 foot Alumaweld with a jet pump ever tore up a redd on a river.
As far as contributions back to the economy, commercials probablly never paid a damn dime into our government coffers. Twenty-eight percent tax brackets amount to chump change as do state licencing fees. These guys are no good all the way around. They don't contribute DICK to any economy, especially Westport's in the summer. The landing fees from millions of pounds of shrimp, crab, and tuna, and oh yeah even a scant few salmon don't have any type of impact on an area that just whines and pants year long for the sportsmen to flock to town and bail them out of thier pitifull existence. Thank God for all of the Seattle/Tacoma residents who save the Grays Harbor/Willapa area every year!
Actually, it would be very interesting to see what would happen if Boeing, PACCAR, and the rest of the major industries in the urban areas would have the rug pulled out from under them for various reasons. Possibly some good ole' voter intitiatives would force them to leave town and see how the recipiants of those actions would feel about not having a viable income for supporting thier families. I bet there wouldn't be hordes of new Powerstrokes towing sleds and Arimas past Montesano every Friday and Sunday.
Look, I agree that conservation is of the utmost importance now. But before everyone jumps on the I-695 bandwagon and hangs the commercials in effigy (some of the more rabid sporties would go for the real thing) why can't you look at the statisics of the last 8-10 years and see that the commercial (non-treaty) fishermen are not the culprits. Have you looked at the amount of actual fishing time commercials recieve now? The Willapa, Grays Harbor,Columbia, and Puget Sound get to fish a tiny fraction of the time (during periods preceeding or after the bulk of any in-question run is not around) that thier impact is minimal on protected fish. The commercials pay taxis and licence fees. They are entitled to a share of the fish just as the sports groups. What, you think you'll catch more fish if the commercial killer nets are all drawn out of the water? The sportsmen's success rate wouldn't bump up enough to notice. If you read your fishing and hunting news they'd tell you in black and white that only a potion of the fish bite (isn't everything Shangle prints the God-given truth?) The commercials don't have the impact that they had in the 70's or 80's. They HAVE NO FISHING TIME! GAWD, give it a rest, look at the time alotted and look at what the sportsmen get as opposed to the commercials. Case in point, the springer fishery in the Columbia last spring resulted in less than the 6000 fish quota set for the commercials in the few days they got to fish. The state shut it off when there was a remote chance of them coming near to or going over the quota...very tightly regulated. But all I could hear in the early season was *****ing and whining about them damn nets are choking off the run. Well, what happened? Weren't Ya'll happy with yer big ole' stringers of fish?!!! What, you want more???? Well, my friends, quit beating a dead horse and figure out how to stop the point of impact fishing IN our rivers. Stop wearing the tread off your Nike's and stop bolstering Bic's bottom line running around getting thousands of signatures to stop them damn gillnetters and their foul ways. Yes, they are the most visible deterrent to saving our salmon. But, ever looked at the cycles of returns over the last 50 years? Ever considered what oceanic conditions might mean to our run's heath. Ever considered what conditions preclude a good outrun of smolt from our rivers? Based on what I've heard on this board and from the mouths of other sports groups( Joe Shangle and the anti-tangle rhetoric) most are way to uninformed to be blathering about the evil ways of todays commercials. Try educating the hordes on how to C&R a wild salmon or stealhead (no, kicking it up on the bank is not correct, nor is putting it in an unnatural position in a dipnet, picking it out by the gills or tail, tearing out the hooks and tossing it back in the crick good for survival, sure didn't see any of that on the lower Columbia last spring), and possibly teaching some of the "sporties" to pick up trash would be a nice touch.
Look, I've been a member of this board for over a year, practice C&R and clean conservation practices (and emphasise them around everyone I fish with) and put the health of the fish runs before all things. Shut the whole damn thing down if we have to! I haven't spoken out much on this issue before. But, I'm tired of the fanatical and ill placed negative energy going into efforts such as 695. It failed because its a crock of crap. And so is everything directed at bombing the commericals off the map. Ever taken time to see what areas have been close off to non-tribal netting during the abbreviated fishing periods???? No consideration is given to the fact that the commercials have put forth many dollars, and years of time into rearing and releasing fish and restoring stream habitat that not only benefit them (increasingly less and less) but benefit the sportsmen who get to catch the salmon produced by those commercial efforts as well. Just remember, when you are sitting at Ray's Boathouse or some swank joint on the Seattle Waterfront and are watching a bunch of gillnetters "rape" the chinook, it shouldn't be the "non-tribal" commercials you are getting pissed at.
I gillnetted for salmon in Puget Sound and the Willapa system in the late 80's, Istill gillnet Bristol Bay Alaska and I crab fish in both Alaska and out of Westport. I'm retooling my life and career (with substantial impact to my family and lifestyle) and most others in the changing world of commercial fishing are also. Yes, partially in response to the negative image we have recieved from unbased propaganda from sportsmen's groups (so yes, you are having an impact if that makes you feel good), partially due to the changing market conditions in the seafood industry (if I were looking to head up an intiative to help protect our wild salmon runs I'd look seriously into our little "triploid" buddies running up the rivers to spawn). I guess what pisses me off is the stuff I hear and read that is totally void of factual statements. I mean, where do you guys get you stats and facts, off a McDonald's monopoly game piece?!! Go to your regional fishies office and get some hard facts before you spout off. Don't rely on the boys at Cooter's Worm Bin to pat you on the back about the survival rate of C&R's wild steelhead and salmon. I've seen the public in action on that one and its not pretty.
There are positive efforts being made on both sides of the ball, we need to erase the line and drop the "HolierThan Thou" attitudes, read the facts, face the realities, cut through the propaganda and figure out what works. I'm for the fish and just plain tired of the crap slinging that doesn't have any merit anymore. Guess I'll have to take it if I want to be a part of this board.

ChuckNDuck, our hearts bleed for you......while some of what you say is true about the sporties, its time to do things differently and quit fishing in the same detrimental ways of old. Remember, I don't really want to completely shut down the commercial boys, there is a place and need for commerce as well as food, but the way we do this can and eventually will be very different in the years to come.

Chuckn'Duck, I have to first agree with you about the shameful practices of some "sportsmen". It's disgusting sometimes. This year, on the salt, I've seen more people mistreating fish they've then released, than I ever have in the past. Some education is definitely in order.
However, you also said, "The sportsmen need to be aware that all commercial fishermen are greedy, watershed destroying trolls who leave a path of unregulated destruction and dead fish in thier oily, garbage enrshounded wakes." I agree, I think all sportsmen, as well as the entire general public, should be aware of this. All commercial fishermen ARE greedy. They DO destroy habitat, especially the trawlers. They DO leave a path of (regulated, but rarely observed) destruction, again, especially the trawlers, who basically clearcut the seafloor. Commercial fishermen do leave a lot of dead fish and other dead sealife behind, they even have a polite term for it, it's called "incidental bycatch". I'm not sure that their wakes are that oily, but I know those big diesels aren't the cleanest engines, either. I wouldn't say they leave behind that much garbage, unless you count all the discarded fishing gear, cut loose for one tangled reason or another.
I'm sure since you've been gillnetting for 15 years or so that you've heard of a gillnetter losing all or part of their net, perhaps this has even happened to you. It's an expensive mistake, but it happens. How do you think a discarded gillnet compares to the "miles of discarded fishing line" you talked about? Do you think that net keeps killing fish?
As far as contributions to the economy, are you talking the past or the present? I'm sure when the business was good, your commercial fishermen friends paid their fair share of taxes, but no more than they would have paid if they were employed in some different, licensed occupation. These days, of all the trollers and gillnetters docked at the Fishermen's Terminal in Seattle, how many do you think paid taxes LAST year? How many of those guys are just using them as a tax writeoff, and waiting for a buyback? How many do you think have actually fished in Puget Sound in the last 5 years?
There have been studies done, (and I wish I had links to them) that prove that each fish caught by a commercial fishermen in this state these days COSTS the taxpayers money, (I think about $2.00) and each fish caught by a sportsmen brings about $5.50 back into the economy, through tourism, fuel, equipment, etc. They did a similar study in BC, the difference being that their Fisheries Department made the decision to go after the sportsmens' bucks, and this is a major reason why they don't have the large commercial troll fishery on the west coast of Vancouver Island any longer, and why they are advertising in all of our magazines: "Come up and fish". We can credit our much better coho returns recently to the lack of that west coast Vancouver Island commercial troll fishery, so I wouldn't say, as you do, that "the sportsmen's success rate wouldn't bump up enough to notice".
The issue for me is not how much fishing time the commercials get now, it's how much they have impacted the resource in the past, and how wasteful their practices are now when they ARE allowed to fish. Why is it that the salmon catch counts in this state peaked in the 1910's and 20's? Do you think all those canneries had anything to do with it? This was long before the big dams, a bit before any major deforestation... habitat was not the issue, harvest was, and the greedy commercial fishermen took what they could.
For every "tightly regulated" commercial fishery, (acually just means "observed") there seems to be some other almost unobserved fishery... how about the thousands of chinook (some say 40,000+) killed & thrown back in 1996 in the San Juan sockeye purse seine fishery? All "incedental bycatch". That's some botched "catch & release", don't you think? I don't think there is any room for this sort of wastefulness with today's fish numbers. You kill 40,000 in the San Juans, and then we wait for 3,000 escapement to return to the Green river. It doesn't make sense. You speak of the bad catch & release practices of the sportsmen, well how good are your commercial buddies at doing it? When that purse seine is pulled, how many of the unwanted fish at the bottom of that purse do you think will make it out alive? How much of the sealife that's hosed off the deck of the trawler after the net's been emptied do you think is going to live? How about those non-targeted salmon you catch in your gillnet? Were they still moving when you threw them back, or were they long dead? Were they bleeding from the gills, or did they never even get put back, but somehow made it into one of the crewmen's coolers? (You may not do it, but don't tell me it doesn't happen.)
If you want to fish commercially in non-wasteful ways, I'll support that. You might not like it, you probably won't make a living at it, but that's how it goes. I visited Newfoundland in 1981, they were still handlining cod in small, inshore boats there then. It was a thriving, fairly sustainable fishery, and had been for four generations. They had a saying there... "fish or get out"... it was the only thing to do there. Those guys worked hard, in harsh weather, just to scrape out a living. I admired them. Just about that time, in the 80's, the big offshore trawlers started up. They came in and, in less than a decade, wiped all the cod off their spawning grounds in deep water. They put the all small inshore guys out of buisiness. There hasn't been a commercial fishery to speak of there since 1994. You want to talk about economic hardship??? Go to Newfoundland.
I don't think anyone is "pulling the rug out" from under the commercials here, They should have seen this coming, it's been a steady decline for decades, if that's not enough time to shift gears and retrain for a new profession, I don't know what to tell you.
One problem I see is that commercial fishermen don't tend to view themselves as a big group... you're a non-tribal gillnetter and crabber, so you don't really equate yourself with the trawlers, longliners, seiners, or even the tribal gillnetters, for that matter. I'm sure you say, "Well, yeah, those trawler-processors are wasteful ships, but I'm not like that". I see all of you as basically the same. You are all doing it for MONEY. Because you are doing it for money, and because of the way you are regulated, you tend to adopt quick, wasteful, and sometimes insanely dangerous practices, that simply aren't neccessary.
So go ahead, keep fighting to get the right to net that last wild salmon (or hatchery, no wait, I forgot, your nets catch both!!), in the end it might just be some Chilean farmer that saves the Northwest's salmon, by stealing your market away.

-N.

[ 07-29-2001: Message edited by: StorminN ]

Howdy chuck'n'duck. I don't believe that I said anything negavtive about the commercials, but actually tried to let folks know what some of your issues were, and still are.

I am happy to see that you have a good grasp of both sides of the issue as you pointed out problems with both commercials and sports fishermen. We both need to work on our images.

That being said, best of luck in the future. Andy

Hey Chuck,

The anti-696 group could have used you to write ads for them. They could have run them along with the "20,000 jobs lost, not one salmon saved" ads.

The three biggest lies ever told in politics:

1 I did NOT have sexual relations with that woman, Ms. Lewinski.

2 Read my lips, NO NEW TAXES

3 20,000 jobs lost, not one salmon saved.

So who provides a larger positive impact(per fish)on the economy,sporties or commercials?
Who creates a more negative impact on the overall economy and industries effected by an increase in environmental regs to protect over harvested stocks,sports industry or commercial?
You're economic impact argument is great for TV ads where the commercials outspend the sporties and are more interested in the bottomline than the fish,but it's an argument used to BS the general public and not provide any enlightenment to them.
Good luck selling this argument to the sportsman.

[ 07-30-2001: Message edited by: Leadslinger ]

i have yet to meet a commercial fisherman who`s earns 100 percent of his income from netting or trolling for salmon in the state of washington.

StormN.....very well stated, everything I wanted to say and more!