check out this mornings tacoma paper nice atricle and quotes in it about the continued fishing by the native wild people on the OP rivers.....tribnet.com

Bob Mottram; The News Tribune

The Quileute Indian Tribe on the Olympic coast has declined to close its Quillayute River net fishery for chinook salmon even though the state has closed the sport fishery there in order to protect the run, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife has confirmed.

The department ordered the sport-fishing cutback effective Saturday, prohibiting all fishing in the Quillayute River from its mouth to its confluence with the Soleduck and Bogachiel rivers, and prohibiting retention of chinook on the Bogachiel, Calawah, Dickey, Soleduck and Hoh.

"Fish are not migrating upstream to the spawning ground in a normal pattern because of the extremely low water levels," the department said.

However, the Quileute Tribe continued to fish the Quillayute system this week in a fishery open from 6 a.m. Monday to 6 p.m. Thursday. The tribal fishing schedule continues, the department said, through the salmon season and then the steelhead season, into April 2003.

Witnesses said tribal fishermen used jet sleds to herd congregating fish into their gill nets on the Quillayute this week.

"The fish can see the nets, but they just panic," said Bob Gooding, owner of Olympic Sporting Goods in Forks.

Bob Ball, a sport-fishing guide from Forks, said he had begun to organize a "fish-in" by sportsmen in the Quillayute on Thursday to draw attention to the tribal fishery.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife regulates sport fishing. The tribe regulates its own fishery under authority granted by U.S. District Court Judge George Boldt in 1974.

"Our complaint is not that we're closed," Ball said. "But we feel that with conditions the way they are, the nets need to come out. There's a crisis."

However, not enough of a crisis, apparently, for the state to invoke its court-granted authority to close all fisheries - including tribal net fisheries - in the case of a conservation emergency.

"We don't have the data to classify the situation there as an emergency conservation issue, even though there is a conservation issue," said Tim Waters, a department spokesman. "We're still talking to the tribe and trying to gather more data to determine if an emergency exists.

"We're confident that, should we get to that point, the tribes and the state would agree to shut down to protect the fishery."

Bill Freymond, regional fisheries manager for the department in the region that includes Forks, said his agency had "spent quite a bit of time talking with the tribe.

"Our concern is that the chinook aren't moving upstream," he said. "That's why we put the restriction on the sport fisheries ... so that some fish can get through to spawn. Hopefully, once we get a little bit of rain ... the fish will move upstream."

All his agency has to go by, Freymond said, is a preseason prediction of run size and what a computer model predicted would be caught.

"At this point, the tribe has caught well above what is modeled," he said.

However, the fishing agreement reached early this year between the tribe and the state does not impose a fish quota. Instead, it calls for a fixed-schedule tribal fishery, Freymond said, and the tribe continues to fish according to that schedule.

Tribal officials did not return phone calls from The News Tribune.

Bob Mottram: 253-597-8640
bob.mottram@mail.tribnet.com

(Published 12:30AM, October 23rd, 2002)

The way that the WDFW plays political patty cakes with the tribes makes me me

They get the right to fish by treaty and the agreements they negotiate with the WDFW and NMFS, but why do we allow them to SELL fish and not be considered a COMMERCIAL fisherman and be regulated accordingly? I don't understand that at all.

What angers me is the tribal members along Hwy 101 selling Silvers from their trucks @ $1.00 a pound as I drove out to OlyPen last week. If there going to scab all the fish, they should at least get top dollar for it. Is that $1.00 a pound worth having no return run in four years?

I will preface this with an acknowledgement on my part that there is an emergency, and I would not fish it even if the rivers were open.

QUOTE-
"We don't have the data to classify the situation there as an emergency conservation issue, even though there is a conservation issue,"

END QUOTE

however, if there is no emergency, then why did the sportsmen take it in the shorts? political BS

Kudo's to Bob(and others) for getting some exposure on the issue

Here's an idea for a new fee for the WDFW I'd seriously be willing to pay. $100.00 a year for a buyout program split at 75% Tribes to 25% WDFW funding. The tribes would be required to furnish accurate and verifyable financial reports to base the buyout on.

At 10,000 licenses times $100.00, that is a million bucks. That should pay for about 375 tons of fish at $1.00 a pound.

And the department gets to put away $250,000.00 for themselves in the deal.

Any better ideas being tossed around?

I hate to say it but the tribes will never sell off thier right to fish. The State could not offer it anyway. The only way we can stop the netting by them would be an act of Congress. I would really like to see THAT happen.

how many salmon equals one whale? trade them a whale for salmon. afterall we cant fish for whales. keep the tree huggin granola bar eatin, dirtbags away and dont make issues about the damn whales and i'm willing to bet that the tribes will give it up too. i think the indians like to do more damage to fish when the white man complains.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As an outsider, but someone who drops a lot of money in Forks when we are there several times a year, a long standing question has just been answered in the quote. More people need to KNOW that the authority is there to enforce the ruling against everyone. If it is enough of a crisis for the sportmen then it surely should apply to the Indians as well.
If there is sufficient data to close sport fishing,
then why hasn't the state gotten the data from the tribes as they saw this coming.

I'm asking for an act of congress, please.

i say: let them operate brothels on their rez's in exchange for getting their nets out of the water, surely they'll make more than a $ 1 a pound...

So thats like, what, 350 bucks a pop??
Doesn't sound so hot to me.

Now that's funny Grumpyr!

Maybe we could get them to throw in a few packs of smokes and fireworks to go along will that deal.

Downriggin'

That says it all, doesn't it?

I wouldn't stop at a tribal casino to take a dump even if they washed my ass with toilette water afterwards and gave me $100 credit at the blackjack tables. ............ even if it was groundhogging.

Herding fish with jetsleds, huh? I bet their ancestors are rolling over in their graves.

My thanks go out to Bob (TRBO) for bringing this to the medias attention and everything else you've done. Also we should thank Bob Mottram for his article that made the FRONT page of the Tribune. I heard that he had to scream bloody murder to the Editors down here to get them to run it there. My thanks go out to the both of you! I just wish I could make the Fish-in What about something in Olympia?

mabe if we give them enough whiskey, they will all drown.

I don't think I've ever been so fired up in all my life. Somebody hold me down. Wish I could be there to help you all out. I'll do what I can in my neck of the woods. I've contacted the Olympian (olympia newspaper) and left three messages. What the public needs is pictures. All you guys with digitals, email those pics to newspaper editors all over the sound. Send them to King 5, Kiro, and Komo. Bombard the media. Something will definetely happen if a sudden influx of concern is expressed.

You guys are misinformed if you think all these salmon are selling for a buck a pound! The rez bound indians are selling all there salmon for .15-.25 cents a pound to the seafood factory in Lapush. My brother had to work down there yesterday and he said all day long the trucks were lined up unloading salmon for those prices. He said they were throwing salmon all over the place on the ground and everywhere chromers and dark scabby ones too. Really sad if that is there heritage, 40 poiund king sold for $6.00. I'll be at the fish in with my 3 year old boy trying to stand up for his future!