Now this is getting fun!

Bossman (?):
I like the way you used the pronoun "you" in referring to someone who might need to snag a fish...that's never been MY problem...

I'm not sure most people see this as such a black/white, right/wrong issue. I don't relly condone snagging. But I also think that this problem, if indeed it really is a problem, is a symptom of how perversely backward our salmon management has become. We have scads of hatchery fish returning to some areas, wild runs going extinct, tribes taking eggs and dumping carcasses, we can't fish them for long in the salt water, and there they are stacking up like cord-wood at the hatchery. Then some poor guy comes along and gets a fat ticket for keeping a fish that was hooked in the pectoral fin instead of on the gill plate?
From a purely logical point of view this makes little sense.

Maybe the good old WDFW needs to pull back on dumping so many plants in some of these areas (RE: Hood Canal chum). All they are really accomplishing is supporting the tribal and commercial take anyway.

BM:
I've heard every ethical consideration in the book, but I would like to see you post your reasons on exactly WHY you feel all snagging is right up there with capital murder. Fish are greatly abused by any means of harvest. Why is hooking them in the head a finer way? I'm sure you know as well as most that MANY if not MOST salmon in some stream situations are "lined" or the hook drifts into the fish's gaping maw. Just curious.

Good Fishin'!

GS