Runngun,

Regarding your posts:

1. WDFW negotiated a number of things with treaty tribes, but the federal court was more than clear in establishing that WDFW has no authority or jurisdiction to force the tribes to net less. I thought that was common knowledge on this forum. Further, to the disbelief of many, treaty gillnetting is not a factor affecting the abundance of PS steelhead in roughly the last 20 years. (There may be some debate about that in regards to some HC tribs.) You will have a hard if not impossible time finding one qualified biologist who will state differently regarding PS steelhead.

2. Just as treaty fishing has not been identified as limiting wild PS steelhead abundance, the same applies to sport fishing. It has been constrained such that harvest hasn't been a factor affecting population abundance for years now.

3. ibid.

4. I posted in another thread that broodstock programs can be used in some cases to restore severely depressed populations or to augment harvest where wild populations are healthy, but it is misleading to think that mining wild fish from their populations to create new hatchery fish will automatically restore the wild population, especially if it is being used to augment harvest.

Your next post about Deerlick's post: It's not up to WDFW alone to prepare the draft plan. They need to get 14 PS treaty tribes on board, and contrary to your apparent wishes, WDFW cannot force them to adopt it. And the plan is for NMFS' approval, not WDFW's. Sorry for not being clearer about that.

Sg