No one in their right mind has, or could, deny that past harvest issues have played a significant role in depressing wild runs.

Now what? Go back and find those guys from the 60's and put them out of business again? They're already gone, and so is most of their fishing.

GBL, the steelhead taken in the coho fishery on the Skagit are predominately hatchery fish...there are wild fish in there, and there are also waaayy too many coho in there, but there aren't that many wild fish.

I agree that the earlier timed portions of the runs are in serious trouble, and that they need extra protection, but their very rarity makes for very few of them ending up in tribal nets on the Skagit.

Salmo, I'm not sure what we're disagreeing on, but I can't see it if we are...past harvest problems have significantly reduced wild runs all over the PNW...all steelhead and salmon species have borne the brunt of them.

That being said, so far as steelhead go, that harvest has largely been shut down already...if folks want to continue raping the environment while blaming the lack of recovery on overharvest, then prepare to be fishing for bass soon...there isn't hardly any overharvest to stop right now, and with the habitat degradation that exists now, and the degradation that continues to increase every day, you could stop all fishing 100% and the runs would continue to decline.

If they can't eat, spawn, or grow, then they will go extinct. Current land use practices have, and will continue, to decimate the remnants of our wild fish...unless we as a society buck up and stop it.

That will never happen, I am afraid...we can't even get most fishermen to agree that habitat degradation is the predominant limiting factor in salmonid production in most areas of Puget Sound, even though the science is quite clear on that issue.

We'll carry on as usual, and like the Chinook plan, we'll "fish our way to recovery", and the wild steelhead will soon be gone...and everyone will continue to blame it on everyone else.

Fish on...

Todd