JJ

When you guys are quoted as saying this, what are we suppose to think?
Maybe that's half of WSC problem! You guys don't know what you have
already said. Since almost all wild steelhead harvest has been stopped
or prohibited in 2003, one can understand why there were only 3,554 wild
steelhead harvested in 2003!

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040317-110734-1219r.htm


"But the steelhead population has been hit hard in recent decades by
habitat destruction and overfishing. In the mid-1950s, sport fishermen
took more than 60,000 wild steelhead in Washington. In 2003, that number
was 3,554, according to the Wild Steelhead Coalition's review of
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife data.

Hatchery-bred fish are still plentiful in many rivers, but native
steelhead thrive in only a few streams mostly in Washington's
northwestern corner such as the Hoh, the Sol Duc and the Bogachiel,
where the protections of the Olympic National Park help protect habitat.


But even here, the wild runs are well below their historic heights.
Conservationists fear a day when only hatchery fish — often scorned as
"clones" by purists — will swim these rivers.

"We need to be very conservation-oriented, assuring that we protect the
fish first," said Dick Burge, the Wild Steelhead Coalition's vice
president for conservation.

The coalition argues that the state's policy of managing fish for the
maximum sustainable harvest pushes steelhead too hard, leaving them
vulnerable to poor ocean conditions, drought and silt-choked rivers.

So the coalition persuaded the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission
to impose a two-year moratorium on killing wild steelhead anywhere in
the state, a ban that has many locals up in arms."