In the wise words of Bart Simpson, "Au contraire, mon frere."

Ramon's diatribe does have a least one fallacy: the idea that the NOAA proposal says wild fish can be replaced by hatchery fish is a fallacy. Any person who is willing to put aside the conviction that preservation equals conservation, to put aside the partisan idea that any environmental proposal coming from the Bush administration is bad, can see that the NOAA proposal not only honors wild fish but promotes wild fish. There is not one line in the proposal I've seen (here I'm talking about the formal proposal and not the first working draft) that says hatchery fish are the equivalent of wild fish. That urban myth started back in the Alsea litigation where NOAA got its hands spanked for counting hatchery fish as part of the ESU during the listing process but ignoring them when evaluating the health of the run. No matter how many times that fallacy is repeated on the internet, it still won't wash.

What I have seen in the Washington Trout propaganda is the organization's intent to do away with hatcheries. However, without hatcheries, sport fishing in this state would largely turn to bass and walleyes. Without hatcheries, you could say goodbye to the fishing at Neah Bay, Sekiu, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the steelheading in all rivers except for a limited few-- heck, just take a look at the regs and see where you can keep wild fish-- that would be the limit of sportfishing in this state for salmon and steelhead. To me that's pretty scary. If you want to put a spin on Washington Trout's take on things, it's easy to say that this organization is against sport fishing.

Hatcheries do have their place; they are producing just about the only salmonids we can catch and keep in this state.

But trying to lay all the problems with wild fish on the doorstep of hatcheries, or dams for that matter, is 'bad science' (in the terms of Washington Trout) and shows little understanding of natural processes.

My $.02,

Keith