A friend and I were fishing the Highway side of Reiter Pond last summer. We witnessed a guy fishing the hatchery side chase all of the fish out of the hatchery creek and back into the river. Last fall I witnessed locals on the Skagit during closed Humpy season killing fish by the dozen's. When I had an incidental catch of a 30# Chinook which we C&R'd, we were scoffed at by these same locals. They would have preffered that we killed the fish and shared it with them! I am not a proponent of taking native's, but that is my choice, and not one I will impose on others. I feel the choice to keep or release is best left up to the individual as long as the reg's allow it. I feel that the bigger issue here are the Pillagers who are raping our waters daily, some without so much as a license. How do we curb this problem? Maybe this is what we should concentrate on.........

[This message has been edited by Cracker (edited 04-05-2000).]

good point cracker, i fish kennedy creek for dogs and i usally fish brlow the highway bridge, can be a mad house, but what fun. tons pf people keep going up the creek and fishing or just scaring the fish on the other side of the closed water line.
sure at first it send a few fish back down and those of us may get lucky, but it not like when the tides changes and a whole herd of big nasty dogs coming rushing up creek and hit and tear at everything in their way, 5-10 fish on at a time from both banks, what a blast. to bad some idiot has to be around and spoil things.
yeh, more enforcment has to be in line to help the fish. gee isn't that what i spend my license money on?

elmtree

[This message has been edited by elmtree (edited 04-05-2000).]

Cracker, it's not only locals that do the pillaging. A lot of "legal" guys pillage as well. Have you ever fished for salmon on the Carbon River at Voight Creek? Or the Satsop? These are 2 examples of places where so-called sportsmen go to snag for salmon, not fish for salmon. I've witnessed it too many times and I will not fish at the "snag holes". I prefer to fish either out of a boat or at my favorite spots on the bank on the 2 rivers that I mentioned. I'm sure it happens on lots of other rivers too.

I agree that each one of us has to make the choice as to whether to c&r. I will keep a hatchery brat to put on the bbq or put in the smoker, it's my choice, but I won't keep a native. To me they belong in the rivers spawning.

As to what we can do about the pillaging?
There aren't enough game wardens to enforce the rules & regs. It's a funding problem. I fish the Nooch a lot and have talked to the guys there at the Montesano office and thats what they've told me, that you can't hire people if you ain't got the money to pay 'em. The last thing that I would say 99% of us want is a confrontation when we're out on the river to enjoy a day of fishing, so we tend to just keep our mouths shut when we see guys doing something illegal. It's too bad that that's what it's come to(the fear that some of these guys are carrying guns).

Fish hard or go home!

One of my favorite spots to fish on the Elwha was closed because of snaggers. Doesn't stop the snaggers only stopped the legal fishermen.....sigh

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Marty
www.steelheader.net
marty@steelheader.net

There's nothing not to agree with here, but the Rieter example is not all that appropriate. The Reiter reach of the stream is not open to summer running until the hatchery reaches its brood stock goals (usually 500 fish). Thats why the reach doesn't usually open until August 1 while the rest of the river opens June 1. By the time the Reiter reach opens, the hatchery has its fish and can spawn no more because of their budget. Remaining fish are either caught or spawn in the river; the latter is not desirable.

Although kind of dumb and desperate, chasing fish out of the hatchery creek doesn't really harm the resource.

Sorry for the inclination that only "locals" pillage. Not true. You know, I used to do a lot of four wheelin'. Got out of it because I got tired of seeing refrigerators and garbage in the trails. I contacted King County and asked them to have a "free" dump day for four wheelers who belonged to a club and would pick up trash from the trails. Our then King County Exec blew me off. I would gladly spend my rowing time not fishing, but taking notes on violators if I thought it would help. If any stater's are up for my offer, email me and we can contact offline. I'm sure there are many more of you out there that would like to see our resource remain a resource, and not a memory........
Tight Lines.................