G-man, First of all yes WDFW does have lots of screws loose! Can you justify why they closed the Nooksack down at the end of February for fishing Steelhead when over the last many years it just get better and better each year for catch and release? Anyway, I’ve talked to the Lummi biologist and also WDFW biologist Curt Kramer and his boss about this. In fact a couple of years ago when the regs came out that sportsman could not retain Chinook in the Nooksack the tribe had a targeted net fishery in the Nooksack for them. According to both the tribe and the state these fish are completely hatchery brood stock which I find hard to believe. How could all the wild fall Chinook run be gone? Anyway, the real reason why sportsman can’t keep Chinook according to WDFW, is the North of Falcon agreement where the state and tribes decide who gets what each year. By the time the Chinook get back to the Nooksack, the white mans portion of the Chinook allocation has been taken and any Chinook available for harvest needs to be taken by the tribe to fill their allocation that has been agreed too. So by releasing the Chinook you caught your giving the tribe the opportunity of catching it again and fulfilling their allocation that has been agreed to by the fish managers. My argument back to WDFW was that it only seemed fair that if a river is open to commercial fishing it should be open for that same species for sportman but that argument is severely incorrect when you put the state and tribal allocations rules back into the picture.