Of course there's no excuse, but, as usual, there are reasons. This being the day before Thanksgiving, perhaps I'm fated to play the apologist.

As long as treaty tribes are responsible for enforcing their fishing regulations, this is what we can expect for the foreseeable future. If I was a young treaty Indian, roe fishing would look like a pretty good opportunity for fairly easy cash. If I were a treaty Indian, the odds are overwhelming that my family would be highly disfunctional. If I were a young treaty Indian most likely, either I, or members of my family, would use drugs and or be alchoholic. If I were a treaty Indian, more likely than not I would have dropped out of high school. My future education and employment prospects would look pretty bleak. Hell, the odds of living a "normal" life would look pretty bleak. And the odds of living to a ripe old age would, statistically, be lower than average.

Fishing for roe isn't all that hard, as fishing as work goes. Keep the roe, and discard the carcasses, get quick cash, for booze, for drugs, maybe for groceries. As for discarding carcasses at public boat launches and on beaches in front of citizens homes - well, I'd have to care about myself first, before I could comprehend caring about what others think of my behavior.

Indians are treated as a racial minority in US society. In a lot of cases, perhaps on balance, they are treated as second class citizens - altho that hardly seems the case here, where their superior fishing rights are more or less continuously paraded. As long as Indians are treated as a racial minority, and as long as Indians perceive themselves as being treated as second class citizens, I expect that the social disfunction, lack of education, lack of quality employment prospects, drug and alchohol abuse, and irresponsible fishing will continue.

BTW, it is legal for treaty Indians to harvest roe and discard salmon carcasses. Obviously, how and where they're discarded has a large effect on opinions regarding the practice.

As sickening as the sight of wasted fish is, it doesn't bother me nearly as much as when I've seen a bunch of little Indian kids, uncared for, growing up on a reservation to be the next generation of disfunctional members of our society.

A small disclaimer: I know that not all Indians and their families are disfunctional, but we both know that much of what I've discribed above is highly pervasive in Indian culture and society. If life is better than this for you, be thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Sincerely,

Salmo g.