Dan

I agree with you about the wild brood stock program. Basically that is what WDFW is doing on the Cowlitz with their late winter steelhead program. One thing that still brothers me, is why the CNR advocate people think so much about releasing wild steelhead, unharmed, and yet they think nothing about bonking a hatchery steelhead. Did not that same "hatchery" steelhead that they just bonked originally come from someone's wild stock of steelhead? Is it OK to kill there progeny, but not the parent?

How do you feel about hatchery fish spawning naturally in our streams? Don't wild fish stray all the time and inter-mix their gene pools with other wild stocks and hatchery fish? If a hatchery fish spawns naturally, and their progeny return, why shouldn't they be given the same treatment as wild fish? Like Flickyourjig said the good old days are gone forever, so why not adjust to reality and let the science guide our wild fish management instead of our emotions?

I am glad to see that people can discuss different points of views on this BB without getting really ****** off at each other. Maybe CRN is the way of the future, but most of the fishermen that I have talked to about it don't really fully support it. The ones that do support it, usually only support it in the rivers that truly have long standing history of wild fish, and where WDFW has not stocked them with herds of hatchery fish yet. Down this way, it is pretty darn hard to fine any such rivers that have not already been heavily influenced by herds of other hatchery genes.

So I guess the debate will go on until enough fishermen decide one way or another, what they prefer. Will it be a total CNR fishery? Will it be CNR for only wild fish? Or will it be a mixture of CNR and Harvest? Time will tell!


Cowlitzfisherman

Is the taste of the bait worth the sting of the hook????