bob, the hoh river proposals are imo indefensible. the river has been closed early 3 of the last 4 years... and i've been told has only exceeded escapement 1 time since 1990. that seems pretty clear cut for not increasing harvest. as for the proposal to do away with the selective fishery waters upstream of the 101 bridge, i know this may be a tough one because i know you and many of the guides wouldn't mind fishing bait in that stretch, but if you choose to fight that in your letter, remind the department that the river's dolly varden/bull trout have just been listed as threatened on the esa. imo, that's a pretty strong reason to keep the current regs in place.

as for the quillayute, i just don't trust the state's numbers... both their escapement goals and their escapement numbers. but the department probably doesn't want to hear one questioning their numbers <G>. one thing i think is that the state really isn't plugging in c&r mortality into their harvest numbers, and if they are, where are they getting their info. i don't see many creel checkers asking how many fish were caught and released, especially in the areas closed to harvest. i might also add that the poaching numbers aren't being plugged into their harvest numbers. i got a chance to see last years preliminary harvest numbers on the quillayute. they said only 403 wild steelhead were taken out of the bogachiel, 103 out of the quillayute, 144 out of the calawah, and roughly 700 out of the sol duc. i'm not sure these figures reflect reality, and certainly don't account for the poaching that is going on out there.

of course, the argument that quality fisheries have value and that more fish is a good thing, not a management failure is a good one. good luck on the letter, today i'm getting a bunch of postcards made up so people can just sign and send a simple statement in opposition to these proposals. i hope to get all 200 of the postcards i'm getting printed to be signed. if you think you can get some signed in your area, please e-mail me.

good luck, and maybe i'll see you in vancouver.

chris