Gilly -
I don't disagree that the hatcheries could select the fish they use as brood stock. However current spawning protocols do not allow such selection of brood stock. While you and I would likely agree on the benefits of some selection for larger brood fish the genetic police do not and currently they have the last word.

If this year fishery develops like last year and we burn through the quota as in only a couple of weeks it clearly is time to think about ways to extend the fishery or redistribute the catches. Hopefully if those discussion happen folks will become more involved than in the past. As I mentioned earlier with allowable impacts on the weakest stocks limiting our fisheries significantly larger summer quotas in mixed stock areas will be at the expense of some other fishery.

Parker -
You obviously do not get it at all. Our fishing today is not about how many hatchery fish we kill but rather how many wild ESA listed Chinook we encounter and in that process kill. Our fisheries and to some extent our future fishing depends on limiting our impacts on those listed fish. It is attitudes (screw limits) such as that you expressed above that allows other resource users to place the majority of the conservation burden on the fishing community.

When we anglers sort for better fish we will in that process encounter more of the listed wild fish meaning that for the same wild fish impacts there will be few fish to harvest. Of course we could all lie about those encounters. Howver in that case I believe that those that do so forfeit their right to take the managers to task for mis-management.

Tight lines
Curt