MM ... the situation this year around the Gray's Harbor streams is a perfect example of what I am getting at with the one extreme or another. Two kings a day (or silvers) for many a years, and now closure ... where was a one fish limit that some of us have asked for in the past in between. The Satsop was for a number of years closed to the retention of kings ... then the numbers came back up a little and the two fish limit was put back in place on them ... now, we're closed again ... where was the one fish limit???

The same on the Hoh ... in the two COMPLETE closure years we've seen recently, catch and kill was allowed on the lower river ... then a total closure ... no C&R reg in a season when the state knew going in that the returns were going to be marginal. Kill 'em all or nothing again. To drive the knife in a little further, the first year of the complete closure the tribes were allowed to continue netting for a period after the river was closed to sports fishing ... and the state didn't even have the guts to take the black eye (media people who came to observe)to come cite a few of us who informed the state that we were going to have (and did have) a "fish-in" to protest the netting.

Now this year, despite the southern river closures and the extreme increase in fishing pressure on the Forks area rivers that we all knew was coming ... the state, despite please from a number of people, opted to leave the two king limit as is ... their reasoning: plenty of fish for escapement, no need for it. This despite the fact we're going into another La Nina fall and winter in which we are likely to have many high waters scouring or covering many redds ... any foresight here by the WDFW ... NOT! Just kill 'em all again.

Needless to say, if we have a closure down the road from this year's spawn ... I will be filing suit ... and I'm sure others will join in too.

As to my "illegal and unethical" practices ... I can live with walking this grey line. The state says I can't even C&R a salmon 10 yards above the 101 bridge ... but I can go below it ten yards and kill two.

Does this make sense?? I don't think so. Many of our coastal kings spawn in the lower river ... take the flats below the Wilson's put-in the Bogachiel ... maybe 8 or 9 miles below the fishing boundary and a good portion of the river's kings spawn there.

The upper portion of the Hoh was long open for salmon fishing ... then the state said: no, you can't fish for them there ... but you can still fish down below and kill two. And of course, it is now open again. But never, was there an option discussed to allow more of the river to be fishable (making for a lighter load of traffic per mile, making for a nicer experience for everyone) with a lower limit of one fish.

I can live with the fact that odds are, we killed fewer fish going "steelhead" fishing (and certainly staying away from active spawning areas) than if we had fished catch-and-kill to our limit on the lower river. If the impact of my actions were so detrimental ... then certainly the limit should have reduced to one or even none at all ... has the state ever once promoted C&R for salmon ... never!!!

I'm not asking you to condone my actions ... only to perhaps understand my frustrations, concerns, and reactions in spending the day on the river fishing ... and not neccessarily killing. Bash me if you wish ... but I'm sick and tired of the short-sightedness and inflexability of the WDFW and will live with your criticisms of one manner in which I say: "I've had it!"