Cowlitzfisherman,

No offense taken, although I'm not quite sure if we're on the same page. I wasn't advocating the closure of taking jacks in the Cowlitz. The point that I was trying to make, was that if there was a targeted season on just jacks, people could use it as an excuse to fish for the depressed adult run.

Case in point, The snagfest known as the Carbon river. The regs state that it opens for the taking of salmon on Sept. 1. They also state that the river opens June 1 for summer steelhead. There is no significant run of summers in the Carbon, but it opens the door for the snaggers to go in and use the excuse "Hey, I was fishing for summerruns."

I realize that right now there aren't any mobs fishing for jacks. My point there was if the regs. stated an open season on any salmon during the springer run, the same mentality could appear with people using the "Hey, it's open for jacks" excuse.

I'm not defending the WDFW's position on lower river closures for taking jacks in any way, just trying to maybe add some insight as to why it is closed. We all know that WDFW management policies follow no discernable logic. If a regulation, allowing the take of incidentally caught jacks could be worded, so that the grey area was removed or significantly reduced, I would fully support the taking of jacks on the lower Cowlitz river.

Cowlitz,

Though your arguments are generally sound, here is another possible reason we can't harvest them that hasn't been addressed yet.....run prediction.

I'm guessing on this and acknowledge it is not the strongest argument but WDFW needs accurate jack counts as part of the their formula for predicting future runs.

If jacks are taken before they are counted at the barrier dam it's harder to get an accurate idea of their numbers and that too has to then be guessed.....which is bad. Once the jacks have been counted, WDFW has them on paper and they can then be harvested.

Again, this is all theory on my part but the friends of mine who are fish biologists have all said in the past that accurate jack counts are crucial for prediction of future run sizes.

Food for thought.

I think 4salt has hit it on the head here, strictly an enforcement issue to keep people from targeting the kings. Another dumb thing that I've seen anglers do is "stretch" the length of a jack. So a 28-29 inch king is a jack (sorry officer, my tape measure was off, it sure looked like a jack to me).

It's really too bad, because the little bait stealers do go well under the broiler.

Most anglers are honest, but there's something about 'nook fisheries that bring out real eye rolling behavior. So much so, that there may be impacts since they bring out the crowds and the seasons are short. With a lot of nook fisheries, there can be significant numbers of "those few bad seeds"

Eric,

Good thought, but I am still having a major problem with the scenarios that you have given. For example, if it was so important for the WDFW fish management to keep an accurate count of all the "jack" returns on the Cowlitz, then answer this one!
When you go to the WDFW weekly escapement at http://www.wa.gov/wdfw/hat/escape/escape.htm, you will see that WDFW only have counted 55 jacks at the rack. Tacoma weekly newsletter says that over 203 "jacks" have already been passed into the upper Cowlitz! In addition to that, Tacoma states that WDFW trucked an additional 459 "Mini-Jacks" into Riffe Lake, all which came from the lower Cowlitz. Remember a jack is a jack!

So to me, it sounds like WDFW is not counting all the jacks because they are NOT LISTED in their own weekly escapement report! This report is used in there projection program.
As usual WDFW fish managers on the Cowlitz couldn't do their job right even if someone else had already did it for them!


Cowlitzfisherman,

Is the taste of the bait worth the sting of the hook?????

Cowlitz,

I have no idea. Like everyone else, I am clueless as to WDFW's real agenda. Doesn't it seem like it's been a REALLY LONG TIME since we had faith in the department? I know a big sticking point with me is lack of forthright communication.

I genuinly believe they are afraid of backlash if they make much of their agenda available to the public. What strikes me funny is their lack of communication does even more damage and they seem oblivious to this. Amazing!

It would just be refreshing to get some direct answers to some direct questions for a change.

Hears another thought! I hear a lot about the need not to open the chinook fishery on the Cowlitz…right? So WDFW closed the Cowlitz early this year to "protect" the Cowlitz chinook runs because of the low numbers that were projected to return. So, OK, we can live with that one, but stop and think about it for a minute. Cowlitz spring chinooks are among the very first to return each year into the Columbia. WDFW thinks nothing about allowing an early net fishery in the Columbia for chinook and sturgeon. Guest whose fish get hit the hardness? WDFW's concerns about "saving" our spring chinook runs are nothing more then a smoke screen. When it comes to fish management on the Cowlitz, think of commercial fishery! Watch what will happen this year when our coho return. You will be able to walk on the nets all the way across the Columbia!

And when it's all said and done, you will hear the fish managers say; "the run was not as strong as we thought it would be!" That way, they won't have to worry about the 80,000 projected coho returning to the rack at the Cowlitz, and trucking all those wasted fish up into the upper Cowlitz for natural production. God, if they did that, what would they do for there jobs at the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery??? The game goes on and on!

Cowlitzfisherman,

Is the taste of the bait worth the sting of the hook?????

cowlitz fisherman,you hit the nail right on the head.the wdfw gives the sporties a big oulook,gets everybody excited,buying liscenses and what not,then they net the crap out of the rivers, and tell the sporties a big bull**** story.all the wdfw cares about is revenue that is it.scott

I think Eric is right on with the WDFW needing accurate jack counts. They take the number of jacks and put into account ocean conditions etc. and form their estimate to the size of return they get the next year. A mini-jack and a jack are different. A mini-jack is a year younger than a normal jack. I'm not sure why WDFW's numbers are not correct. Who knows with them.

~ Dr Pepper