Micro,

Of course politics plays a role, as well it should. As I stated, science is a process to acquire reliable information. Science seldom, if ever, dictates how to use that information.

Natural resource management, including fisheries, is a system of making recommendations and decisions based on biological, social, and economic factors. In most cases, it would be impossible to make a management decision based on biological factors alone. That's because it depends on what the management goals and objectives are. In this state and most others, the management objectives include satisfying citizen constituents (who elect the legislature, making the laws and regulations, creating WDFW and hiring directors and biologists, etc. so they can go fishing), which includes social factors, and the economic considerations of commericial, and increasingly, recreational fishing. The economic and social interests are your politics.

You cannot take politics out of fishery management. In order to take any management action, the manager has to have management goals. Science, through biological information, will indicate something like spawning escapement goals and habitat conservation. In order to take actions that include commercial or recreational fishing, you have to consider politics - the social and economic factors that will shape what kind of management regulations get adopted, that if well synthesized, satisfy, or try to satisfy, the various biological, social, and economic needs and interests.

In your example, warmwater fish species are neither good nor bad, scientifically speaking. They simply are just "there" now, having been introduced around 100 years ago. The management issues relate to the interactions of exotic species with native species and the management objectives of WDFW, which are intended to reflect the wishes of the state's citizens, and comply with any applicable laws.

My point was to ask you not to blame science for a decision making structure that also includes social and economic factors.

SS,

WDFW has access to and uses up to date science. However, WDFW also must comply with laws, regulations, and policies that may or may not jive with that science. It's a schitzoid world, to be sure.

Sincerely,

Salmo g.