Salmo, nice to hear from you my friend...it's been a while!

Hmmm...I thought about whether or not I would respond to the "net" threads, and decided that it wasn't worth it. However, this one brings up some points that are well worth discussing. Here goes...

It seems that the impetus behind these posts is tribal fishers taking more than 50% of the harvestable portion of fish runs (real and/or perceived).

It looks like there are quite a few opinions out there that don't realize that the Boldt decision does indeed divide harvestable portions 50/50, but that the 50/50 split is not between tribal fishers and us on the riverbanks with rods and reels. It's a 50/50 tribal/non-tribal split. Therein lies the answer to your questions, G-Man.

If there are, say, 1000 harvestable fish in a particular run on the 'Sack, and 250 are caught in Neah Bay, and 100 are caught in the San Juan Island's commercial fisheries, and 150 are caught by sporties in Puget Sound, how many are left for you to catch up in Deming?

That's 500 fish for the Indians, and 500 for the rest, all of which were caught before they even reached the Nooksack. No season.

If you don't like that scenario, don't blame it on the Indians. Blame it on the North of Falcon process that allocated the non-tribal share to offshore fisheries that caught them all. Be sure to blame it on the sportfishers who did not participate in the NoF process and try to get a bigger allocation, too.

As far as a sport season being 30 or 60 days after the Indians fish, there are similar reasons. If there is not a large harvestable portion, then the tribes and the hatchery are going to get their shares first. Then comes ours. It's the price we pay for being the last ones in line, geographically, to harvest the resource (off shore sports/commercial fisheries, tribal off shore fisheries, tribal lower river fisheries, hatcheries, then us). The solution, again, is participate in the NoF process to take a chunk of that allocation from the users earler in line.

The tribal fisher's ability to use monofilament nets, power boats, etc., is absolutely protected by the Boldt decision. There is no question that it is perfectly legal, even encouraged to make sure they catch their share.

I have lots of opinions about the Boldt decision. My emotional opinion is to not like it (I want more for me...and I think that's the great majority of opinions on this subject..be honest). Legally, however, it is one piece of amazing jurisprudence. Years of research from all the parties involved infused more fact into a case than I've ever seen. The great majority of it was a body of stipulated facts, agreed to by all or most of the parties. It went back and forth throughout the 9th Circuit and the Supreme Court, and by the time they were done with it, it is pretty much untouchable. It is indeed seen in the legal world as part of the body of civil rights cases that shaped our nation throughout the sixties and seventies.

Here's another observation about the Boldt decision. It came about due to the same type of ignorance, anger, and blatant racism that has been displayed on this BB over the last several days.

Before the Boldt decision, Indians (3% of the population) were harvesting 6-10% of the salmon and steelhead in Washington. Sportsfishermen, commerical fishermen, and charter boat captains were bent out of shape, and sought restrictions on net fishing for the Indians. They displayed the same emotional bias and lack of respect for the cultural heritage and financial well-being of other people that I've been hearing my whole life.

The state bought into it, and placed restrictions on the tribal fishers. When the Indians ignored them and fished anyway, they were arrested and their gear was confiscated. When the courts (federal) ordered the state to return the gear and respect the treaty rights to fish, they in turn ignored the courts, repeatedly.

Finally the federal courts had had enough, and along came the Boldt decision. As noted above, it is an incredible piece of work.

Since then, those 3% are now taking a federally protected 50%, more or less.

If we don't learn from the past, we are bound to repeat it. Look what happened last time...

There are abuses in all fisheries. Non-tribal commercials, sports fishers, and tribal commercials all do it. It's impossible to measure how much abuse takes place, but the tribal abuses are much more obvious since they take place in near shore or in river situations at well-known and easily accessed places.

There are a pretty finite number of tribal fishermen out there, and there are abuses. There is a massive amount of non-tribal sport fishers out there, hundreds of thousands, and their abuses take place everywhere, often in places where enforcement is all but impossible. Instead of tossing hay bales, why aren't we calling for slashing all the tires of "sports" men out there in the woods? Tossing hay bales is just as cowardly and just as much a waste of time.

Let's clean up our own act, and police the actions of others within the bounds of the law. Report abuses by all user groups. Break the law to get back at them makes you no better than them.

Sorry this is a bit rambling and disjointed, I'm trying to do a few things at once right now...I'll probably have more later!

Fish on...

Todd.