Ok that’s it. I wrote a 4 ½ page paper on why I believe that it is ok for people to harvest wild steelhead. However I chose not to present the entire thing to every one. if you want to read it just ask and I will email it to you. There are however a few points that I need to bring up.

I would like to take a minute to respond to a few comments made earlier on in this post. One was in regards of someone talking about the release of hatchery fish. In my own opinion and I speak only for my self when I say WTF?!?! I cannot count the total number of spawned out hatchery fish that I have caught in the rivers in my life. However, this year (since early January) alone I have landed 4 hatchery fish, 3 of which had already spawned in the river. I do not know if it has just been my luck or what, but to me this is an alarmingly high percentage. As for the comment about “As long as it’s legal, people are going to kill them.” Again I say WTF!! And I will explain why later when I get in to netting seasons and how they have been extended since the moratorium began 3 years ago, but for now, it is up to you as individuals not the regulations. If some one is going to keep a fish or not I doubt that the “Law Enforcement” has much to do with it. I fish on a regular basis and so far on the rivers I have seen enforcement once, about three years ago on the bogie.

Next was a comment regarding the mortality rate of fish in a C&R fishery. True that the percentage of fish that die is IF done correctly, is relatively low, however, many of the pictures that I see on-line of these fish that everyone catches and are then released so called unharmed is crap. I see people take these fish out of the water for extended periods of time after ether stressing them out so bad that they are finally able to tail them or land them in a net that is almost as harmful as the tribal nets to the fish, only to then man handle the fish and take measurement and pictures to show all of their friends while these fish are under so much stress, that there is a much much higher percentage of mortality than just 3-5%

Behind the comment about “not another BIG FISH killed”, there is a story about the BIG FISH. Personally I would rather a BIG steelhead buck harvested then an 8-12lb steelhead. Most people think that this logic does not make any scenes, but think for a moment about the life cycle of a steelhead. Steelhead, unlike salmon have the unique ability to spawn more then just one time in their life. In fact those “BIG” steelhead that some of you may catch or at least hook into have likely spawned and contributed on their genetics to the gene pool AT LEAST 3 times during its life. If you look at it in a manager’s eye, it is not much different than a 3-point minimum that is required in may areas for deer hunting. The idea is that those older more mature bucks have already passed their genetics on into the gene pool and if you are fortunate enough to find one you are legally allowed to harvest it.

Just for your information, I also release many of the fish that I do catch without pictures, or without any proof of the size or that I actually caught any fish at all because honestly I do not want to harm the fish if I am not going to keep it and I do not care about what others think of my fishing skills. I know what I catch and what I don't catch and I do not care about weather or not some random fisherman believe me or not. I am not trying to prove my self to any one else especially to any of you fishermen out there who want to judge me because I harvested a fish. In fact, the more of you that believe that I do not know how to fish, the better in my mind. I have no problem launching my boat well behind all of the guides and all of the other people that go fishing at the ass crack of dawn. And believe it or not I catch many of the fish that you all leave behind.

All I really want to get across is that I do not judge you for releasing your fish, it is your right to do so, and I actually applaud you for it. It is obvious that we all care about our remaining resources and want them to flourish. But do not pat yourselves on the back and assume that you are better that those who chose to keep a couple of fish each year.

Thank you for your time and this is my final post on this thread.