I've been reading this thread the last few days, and thought I'd chime in a bit with my two cents...

1. I do have my own spots that no one except me and a few of my friends fish, where we do very well, and I'd be very disappointed if lots of folks showed up. We don't do well because lots of fish are in the area...we do well because a few fish use it, and we're the only ones who fish it. Harvest reports will only show a dozen or so steelhead harvested per year, I can can honestly account for eight or ten of them myself, and a couple for my friends, and the other couple must be for someone I don't know who I haven't seen fishing there.

2. Harvest reports just show how many fish are harvested, or planted. What they don't show is how many yahoos fish like crazy and don't catch anything. As they say, 90% are caught by 10% of the fishers. In some spots, I'd say it's more like 95% are caught by 5%.

3. The folks who are truly willing and able to make a difference preserving our rivers and our fish are fishermen. The more conscientious fishermen, the better.

4. Educating people who already fish is probably more effective than keeping all the fishing secret...at least at getting more people involved in the political/conservation end of it.

5. Outside of my true zipperlips, I have a lot more, but they're more like individual rocks or chutes on popular rivers. You don't get those from harvest/plant reports, and you don't get those from posts on the internet. You get them from going out and fishing, especially by not standing in the footprints of the dude who was fishing that spot right in front of you.

6. There are no magic spots, magic baits, or secret numbers and reports. Experience will outfish anything else except blind luck 90% of the time.

Well, that was a bit disjointed and rambling, and probably more than just tw cents, but there it is...

Fish on...

Todd.