This is why I dont fish anymore, I just cant do it as it makes me feel too bad, its downright depressing. Everything accept the actural main cause of overharvest is blamed for the declines.

Habitat is a factor but not much of one. If it were the fish would have never even been here by the time the white man came along. The natives were using the rivers as their toilets for thousands of years and the fish kept comming.

Once the white men got here they logged,developed farmlands and built cities and the fish still came. It was not until large scale inriver comercial harvest started before there were big declines.

decades ago we hit the point of critical mass with these runs, plain and simple they are just not recoverable.

My grandpa and his brothers fished the Dose and Duck, big Quil as early as the 20's. literally with the gear they had they could catch fresh steelhead year round as the conditions permitted. At peak times they could fill up the bed of a pickup with gear caught steelhead just standing in one spot. There were thousands of fish even in those short rivers.