Bob -
Your personal position on chinook is more or less what I expected. Please note that position is exactly the position that many anglers are advocating for with steelhead..

It is interesting that you need to lobby your clients to release chinook.

Actually steelhead management is wild steelhead release state wild with no directed harvest unless the stock in question is considered to be healthy. That is a much more conservative position than with any salmon. In addition the bar for the determination of the status of a steelhead stock is set higher than for salmon. Our anadromous game fish are among the most conservatively managed fish in the state.

The result of the above is that those folks willing to practice CnR with steelhead generally get more and longer access to wild steelhead.

My position is that allowable fishing impacts on particular stock should be determined by the status of that stock and the biological productive of that stock. That should be applied across species -whether resident cutthroat, wild steelhead, chinook or pink salmon. Fishing impacts should all sources of mortality related to fishing.

That position should reflect the needs of the fish not my own desires. My wants would put in play in the decsisions on how those fishing impacts would be distributed among various angler interest. How I would personally distribute those impacts would likely cause heart burn for the majority of those on this site however that doesn't negate the validity of the approach. I still encourage each of you to become informed and to lobby for your wishes on how those fishing impacts are distributed.

Tight lines
Smalma