RiverLiver

Very good point!

I forgot to ask Todd how well those "Tangle nets" worked in last year's commercial net fishery on the Columbia.

The 2002 commercial fishery targeting hatchery-origin spring chinook was a catastrophe for three stocks of federally listed wild steelhead. Protections afforded to these fish by The Endangered Species Act were disregarded, putting these already beleaguered fish in further jeopardy of extinction even further.

Also, in 2002 the tangle net fishery intercepted more steelhead than the targeted hatchery-origin spring chinook. Of the 20,900 steelhead caught in this fishery 12,400 were wild fish. Estimates of mortality, both immediate and post-release, are between 2,400 and 6,100 threatened, wild winter steelhead, representing between 5 and 15% of the entire run. All of this information just adds support to my proclaiming that this new proposed rule/law should apply to the commercial gill netters as well as sport fishers.

What good did all those "rescucitation tanks" on board the gill netters boats do to revive all of those dead and lost fish?

Cowlitzfisherman