Well I've heard rumors of a new netting schedule for the Columbia River, something like 5 days a week in the lower river. Has anyone heard what it is exactly???
Also, this is B.S. to net from here on out, hampering runs of wild fish that our Department of F+W have tampered with to keep us from fishing on these fish. For example, we used to go and catch and release WILD chums in the Grays River for fun, now it's closed Oct. 16 through Dec. 1st above the Hwy bridge to keep everyone away from these fish. Although there are tons of HATCHERY silvers there to be caught during that time period.
It makes me sick to know that they will be netting and most likely killing the WILD chums and throwing them out of the nets and back into the river, they're a trash fish for the netters.
We need to do something to get the netters out of the river!!!!!!!!! I'm just foaming at the mouth to get something done about it. Guess I'll have a reason to go and fish my wild chums if the nets are in below the grays even if it is closed.
Keith

[ 10-13-2001: Message edited by: stlhdr1 ]

Yeah, F-CK it, just go fish for them chums. If the commercials can do it, you should be able to too.

Inside rumor: Rummblings of another anti-gillnet initiative for the Columbia River in the not-so-distant future. Unlike I-696 that didn't pass a few years ago, this one will be fought much harder with better funding and strategy. Be ready all, to jump in and help get it passed this time.

RT

Difference KB, one kills the fish one doesn't.

Fishhead5

Back at it again,
While I'm still hot about this topic as I will be until the netters quit I just wanted to also include that it makes me sick to think that the WILD chums in the grays certainly aren't the only fish they are screwing with.
WILD silvers in the lower columbia basin are struggling, all the stories of the silvers in the SW WA rivers back in the 60's and 70's that my father and others older than him have told me about make me sick. My dad said back in the 70's you used to be able to walk across the rivers in native silvers in Sept.-Nov. and now there's very few left. Ever since they've been clipping silvers the last couple of years you'd think there would be a lot of incidental natives caught but there are hardly any.
You see a few in the NF of the lewis which could be misclipped hatchery fish and in the EF where they were plentiful in the 70's, you might incidentally catch 1 or 2 a year. It's sick.
It's not all the nets, but they play a large role in wiping out what's left of our lower columbia native fish.
We were supposed to get 17,000 native fall chinook in the NF of the lewis this year, they'll be lucky if they meet they're excapement of 6000 fish. You can tell by the numbers that are being caught in the river. Where did all those fish go??? NETS, NETS, NETS...
We can sit and watch. Or do something before they wipe out the rest of the native fish that we have left.
Sorry so long, but I'm p*****!
Keith

I posted the same message on the topic ,Silver runs over. According to the Longview Daily news A week ago Fri. the nets are in 5 days a week till the end of the month.
There was a letter in the editorial from a commercial netter in Saturdays paper saying they don't get very many native fish.The ones that arent clipped are from upriver.Tribal released fish.They don't clip theres.
Also the mortality rate is Between 2-5% on Fish they release. A few other interesting remarks were made in rhe editorial.I'll try to find it and post it later.
We're getting screwed,a look at the Cowlitz is all it takes to show you that.

Long battle. Until the nets are voted out, it is time once again for a few well placed midnight hay bales (Off Hwy 4 bridge over Abernathy, Germany or other creeks right next to the Col Rvr above the netters along Hwy 4) or cordless drill torpedoes.
x

Hay bales, woooo, you folks know how to have fun....I'm in, and I will even fring a few bales of my own to toss....

Dad's got 52,000 in the barns. I'm sure he wouldn't miss a few

Fishhead5

Ya know it still makes me sick! What does a guy do??? You've got runs of wild fish that the Endangered Species Act is trying to save and then the nets go in 5 days a week, where do you make sense of this?????? Listen to me *****, what good does this do.. They can have all the hatchery fish they need, but a 2-5% death ratio on all fish they turn loose, YEAH RIGHT... I've caught hatchery silvers, chinook, etc. this year and prior years that escaped the nets with half torn out gills and net marks all down there sides, but haven't caught any native fish with the same marks.. Why, because they made it through without hitting any nets, LUCKY FISH...
I'm tired of it, so I guess I'll do what I can but to start I'll go and get a ticket on a closed stream that has hatchery fish also, and discuss it with the judge!!!!!!!!
Keith

Whatever you do, make sure you don't wrap those hay bales in barbed wire. That would make them really entangle anything they got 'caught' in....

Maybe I was misunderstood in my above post, but just to clarify, I don't see anything wrong with Keith goin' and fishin' there if the commercials can do it. Screw the rules. Sometimes they're a bunch of bullsh!t. "Were not gonna take it, no were not gonna take it, were not gonna take it anymore." Whatever band that's from. Like you said fishead5, he wouldn't be killin', he'd be releasing.

There should be a new definition of a selective fishery, and its what all should go by.
A selective fishery being the ability to catch and release or catch and keep what you want, which is the advantage of hook and line. I wouldn't have a problem if the commercials were out there with hook and line, doing it like the rest of us. Working hard for fish rather than just setting a net out and having all fish, chinook, silvers, chums, steelhead, sturgeon, large squawfish, hay bails, small, large, hatchery and wild run into them. It amazes me that they say that there is only a 2-5% mortality ratio on all fish that are released from the nets, that's the biggest line of [Bleeeeep!] that I've ever heard. I'd sure love to board one of these boats for a day so I could watch how careful they really are, then puke, p!ss and sh!t all over them everytime they pull a net full of chromers...
BAN THE DARN NETS!!!!!!
Keith

[ 10-16-2001: Message edited by: stlhdr1 ]