Another discussion on bait bans?

This issue has been debated for more than 20 years and there is probably no issue that divides steelhead fishermen as much as a bait ban. Below I'll attempt to lay out some of the information that is known on this issue.

Numerous studies of the last several decades have consistently shown that the use of bait results in significantly higher mortalities that artifical lures. For this discussion scents should be considered to be bait as the fish behave (bite) to scent lures much the same as other baits. The use of bait in "trout" fishing typically found mortalities in the 30 to 50% range. The majority of mortalities in the various studies were caused by the fish being hooked in "critical areas" (gullet, gills, base of the tongue, eye, and brain). When a fish attempts to ingest the bait the probability of being hooked in a critical area increases dramatically - thus the high mortality with bait.

The size of our parr and smolts means that the past studies on trout should be considered in discussing this issue. An important factor to remember is not everyone on our rivers are targeting steelhead/salmon. For an example a hooking mortality study on the Stillaguamish looking at mortality of sea-run cutthroat using night crawlers found that for every legal (at that time 14" or larger) cutthroat caught there were 18 steelhead parr caught during the study. It was determined that the mortality of the parr was more than 35%. Another thing that was noted was that going to larger hooks (as typically used in steelhead fisheries) did reduce the number of fish hooked however the mortality of those caught remained high. Those caught on larger hooks often could not take the bait deeply yielding fewer hooked in the gullet and gills however this was counteracted by the "gaffing" of the fish with the large hook. During the "gaffing" the fish was often impaled through the eye, brain, gills, or heart which almost always resulted in a dead fish.

To examine what the potential hooking mortality maybe, lets look at an example. There are somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 steelhead fishermen in Washington. Lets assume that 35,000 of the them are hard core bait users and each of them catches 1 steelhead parr/smolt a month (more in the summer and less in the winter) for a total of 12 per year. Reasonable? Given the typcical mortality that means each fisherman killed 4 parr a year. Given that the over-winter survival of parr is around 50% that means that the equivalent of 2 dead smolts. With a 10% smolt to adult survival for wild steelhead that equates to 0.2 adult wild steelhead. 35,000 anglers times 0.2 adults/anglers equals equivalent to 7,000 wild steelhead. To put that in prespective that equals about the average number of wild steelhead killed by Washington sport anglers during the mid-1990s (punch card estimates). If you believe that past harvest of wild fish is excessively then is the parr hooking mortality?

The above is just the impacts on steelhead parr and doesn't consider the impacts on steelhead adults, sea-run cutthroat, "Dollies", and resident trout.

Adult steelhead hooking mortality studies have almost all been a by product of brood stock captures where the fish are capture by actively fishing the bait. This differs from how many anglers use bait. For example it has been found that the percentage of steelhead hooked in critical areas (likely to experience mortlatiy) was higher in a plunk fishery than a drift fishery. I'm sure that most of you would acknowledge that while using bait the number of fish hooked in critical areas is higher when the fish is given the chance to "eat" the bait (use of bait divers, drifting without weight, giving the fish slack line on the bite, etc)than while fishing on a tight line and setting the hook immediately on the bite.

Sometimes the argument is made that resident trout should not be a consideration in anadromous waters. Hasn't it occurred to anyone that the reason that resident trout are rarely seen on most waters is that bait has been used for decades and the resident fish are being actively selected against (30% mortalty per capture is pretty high). In fact in almost every anadromous stream that I'm aware of that is closed to fishing, where the use of bait is prohibited, or has little fishing pressure resident rainbow trout are found. Not only are there trout in these waters they often live to surprising ages (up 10 years) and large size (multiple pounds).

If bait bans are to be considered the biology of the young steelhead indicates that seasonal use of such bans will reduce most of the impacts. Once the water temperature drops below the mid-forties the fish seek out over-winter habitat (log jams, among the boulders, and other "hidey-holes"). The fish remain in those areas until the water temeprature rises or they become smolts. In this part of the world this means that the fish have limited availability to anglers from sometime in November into March.
Ergo - summer bans of bait.

Todd was correct in that kelts (spawn-outs) have higher hooking mortality than unspawned fish. Basically the kelts begin feeding shortly after spawning. One study found that kelts caught on bait were hooked in critcal areas about 30 to 35% of the time.

In our zeal in chasing steelhead we often forget that our rivers are the home to quite an array of sportfish: steelhead (hatchery and wild), various salmon, sea-run cutthroat, Dollies, resident rainbow, cutthroat, and whitefish. In some cases even warm-water species. Often one or more of these species are on the "Endangered Species List". There are valid fisheries other than those directed towards steelhead.

As things currently stand on most rivers it is for each of you to wrestle with this issue in accordance to you own fishing ethics.

Tight lines
Smalma