Sorry Spike ... the mentality of "If they're gonna kill 'em, so am I!" is a poor excuse for whacking a wild fish. If anything, the fact that these fish face a tremendous net harvest is all the more reson for sports anglers who give a hoot about the future of the fisheries to stand up and say that "I'm gonna do my part to help!".

Perhaps you have faith in these models in use by the tribes and the state saying there is a huge surplus of fish, but as Salmo G. mentioned above, in nearly all instances, any fishery modeled under MSY has collapsed over time.

As a responsible angler, it is our responsibility to the fish, other anglers, and future anglers to stnad up and fight to put a stop to this race to kill the last one. How? First, let the wild ones go, and two, fight the politics and mismanagement the best we can. It will be a long battle, but in the long run, the fish, and the responsible fishermen will win.

As I have said before. C&R is not perfect, there is some mortality involved .. there are some watersheds that should be totally hands-off at this point. But as a management tool, it will work wonders on the runs that are in decent shape. If you've ever seen some of the world's best C&R steelhead fisheries, you'd see just how far we have to go in this state to have "good fishing". But then again, if you want a half-assed meat fishery on steelhead (or no runs at all over a long period of time), that's your perogative. But the first time you think to yourself that "Geez, fishing stinks ...", think of your actions!