malma … Your statement of Alaska regulations is applicable to only one area, SE … which basically means the Situk River.

Other areas have a one fish per day (no size limitations) limit, others yet like the streams that support native runs on the Kenai Peninsula are strictly C&R, no bait, and not even the allowance of removal from the water.

Yet, it’s interesting that you bring this up: in Alaska, the world of catch-and-kill where C&R is almost considered voodoo by many people (have any questions here, follow the story of first-run Kenai kings) .. yet, anglers here release almost all steelhead, regardless of regulations!

In 1997, only 398 fish reported harvested STATEWIDE in Alaska. An estimated 22,233 steelhead (98.2% of total estimated catch) were caught and released by anglers.

That’s a harvest rate of 1.8% of the total catch.

It’s also imprtant to note that these regs are on rivers that support runs of steelhead that anglers in this region would die to see.

The Karluk River is only 22 miles long, yet supports runs of 8,000+ fish or more. The Situk River, which is more similar to our coastal streams has a darinage area of 36 square miles according to the USGS. That’s 1/7 the size of the Hoh drainage, and 1/4 the size of the Calawah drainage … but it has seen runs of over 9,000 fish and usually exceeds 6,000. That’s a trend towards 10-20 times higher steelhead concentrations in these streams.

You fail to mention, that for a period, even rivers like the Situk were managed under C&R regulations as angler traffic increased and populations decreased. Returns boomed again following these regs and the regs were relaxed, yet as I mentioned before, anglers saw the importance of limiting harvest and release nearly every single fish regardless of what the regs say.

In addition, I think you’re seeing a shift in AK away from trophy-kill fisheries management. The handwriting is on the wall from the Kenai king fishery and you’re seeing less support for this sort of management.

If Washington streams saw these sorts of numbers, I don’t think you’d see this subject even come up for debate in this state, but they don’t.

ChukarNut … you’re right the steelhead face many dangers to their existance. But unfortunately, in most cases there is no quick fix. By releaseing