I went out to Seiku for the first time this weekend and caught my first salmon. It was a king (hatchery) but the hook had badly mauled the gill and gill plate. Now, the regs say you could keep only hatchery coho only but I grew up that if you could not catch and release without a good chance of survival, you kept the fish, which I did and is now in my freezer.

I think I did the right thing. What do you guys think?

So let me get this straight, you bonked a foul hooked, out of season King?
Dude, in the eyes of the law, you are a snagger and a poacher.
No Judge in the land would see this any different. "If it is otherwise legal to do so" is, I believe, the way the rules read on gill and throat hooked fish.
If your up bringing precludes "catch and release without a good chance of survival" then you need to stop catching out of season fish.
It's just that simple.
G

Pretty hard not to catch out of season fish at Sekiu. I was out there a few weeks ago and we hooked a number of Kings, all of which I managed to release unharmed.

However, that wasn't as true with the coho. Even though I released every native fish and it swam away I will bet at least a quarter of them probably didn't survive because a hook had nicked the gill or was up in through the fish's eye.

I followed the regs though because it isn't worth the ticket to keep the fish. I guess I didn't think the fish would go to waste anyway as something else in the food chain would eat it.

I am sure you made a decision to keep the fish with the best of intentions. My recommendation to you is not to fish areas where you have mixed stocks requiring release. That will relieve the ethical dilemna for you and if you do go out there again knowing what you know now and keep a fish for the same reason then I would say you have crossed the line.

I guess next time I release the fish...........

Can I ask another question of you guys then? Why were wild coho slated for release when they were outnumbering hatchery by at least 7-1 according to the people we talked to in Olsen's?

I caught a hatchery king in area 10 this summer that didn't look like it would make it. As hard as it was to do, back it went. Not worth the ticket. And besides, just because a fish wasn't consumed by a human doesn't mean was wasted. Nothing in nature is truely wasted. Still sucks though.

It sucks but you have to figure its going back into the system and is doing the ecosystem more good than it would do by going home with you.

If the cops let people off on this everyone would be hooking fish again in the gills when they got to the boat. "but it wouldnt' make it"

Many of the "wild" fish are actually of hatchery origin. They don't mark 100%. The rest is all politics (i.e. sport-v-native harvest). Welcome to Washington.
G

the question was?
the rite thing? versus the legal thing?
yes
you did the rite thing unfortunatly our laws disagree with rite when confronted with popular or easiest/ethical

most here cringe releasing a fish that they cannot keep due to legal sidebars because said laws state you must release certain fish while you first hand get to see the mortality involved

so you kept a mortaly wounded illeaglly normally kept salmonoid?

tough call

personally i think you did the rite thing
if it was already dead?
eat it and take pride in the fact that you're living more towards how nature intended us to live regardless how the politicians inact they're diatribe
i sense flak on the horizon:)

Most likely he was trolling and not snagging.

I think poaching means if you knowingly take an illegal fish. It sounds nasty and he fits the definition but I wouldn't call him that.

... but he committed an illegal act by keeping the fish. Sounds like it was his first time and he went by what feels right to him.

Now he knows and he won't repeat and also won't be able to run for any office since we have a documented case ...

Unfortunately, the person writing the ticket isn't going to be very interested in noble intent. The fact is you admittedly retained a fish when you knew it was illegal to do so. Whatever your views on the righteousness of the F&G code may be. That single act put you over the line. But you probably already knew that and have something of a conscience; THIRD VIOLATION here?


What are you, some kind of desperado?
G

What's done is done,I believe he wanted to do the right thing and now he know's more then before this post.I think most of us in one way or another through our fishin years has done close to the same thing.Good luck,
STRIKE ZONE

Is the "wild" release thing meant to help the Canadians with their coho problems?? I got that idea while reading WDFW's comments as they were manipulating the quotas this year. They essentially took a bunch of quota from the Westport bucket and gave it to Neah Bay. But first they made some kind of downward adjustment to acount for "Thompson River wild coho stocks".

Alaskans ,helping Canadians ,Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ,yup they help us keep our rivers clear of those stinkin spawnin fish :rolleyes:

just as the canucks help keep the wa state rivers clean of those stinkin spawning fish...

Since you are new to salmon catching it is understandable that you would think the fish might not make it, but over the years I have have caught fish with various states of damage that were quite healthy and had the strength to put up a heck of a fight. This year alone I have seen fish with their cheek missing from the hook tearing it out to bent and cracked gill plates(not to mention seal bites & net damage) I once caught a hatchery steelhead that had a whole gill plate missing just miles downstreem from the hachtery! MY point being that these are hardy fish and just because they go away limping, it does'nt mean they are going to die out there.

Just out of curiosity D Kid. Do you know if the canadians cut back on their silver harvest this year? They did this 3 yrs ago I believe and we ended up with record runs that year.

Dude,

Since you bonked the ******* illegally you should have at least done it justice and threw it on the Barby. Why keep it if only to go to the freezer? May as well throw it back if your not going to eat right away, which is the right thing to do, and not risk the ticket.

DOGOFF

the crabs gotta eat too......

You did the right thing man, if laws were never questioned then we'd all be speaking with a British accent. When in doubt, drop the hammer!

i'm going to ignore the original question but make a few comments.

i understand the frustration of having to release nice fish and it's even more frustrating releasing bleeders and fish we feel have little chance to survive.

what i don't understand is continuing to use gear types that cause more injuries to the fish while complaining about killing the fish. using two hooks for coho is going to increase the mortality on those fish, period. if the mark rate is good and you only have to release a couple fish to reach your limit, i understand using the traditional hook and leader setup. but if you are having to release fish consistently hooked in the gills and/or eyes... it might be time to cut the rear hook off.

yes, one can rig a cut-plug with one hook (i think it might even spin better). yes, you might lose a couple fish and go through a few more herring.... but it seems that the concern for the fish mentioned here would make up for a lost fish or a couple more dollars in herring.

same goes for any rig with double hooks.... if you're releasing lots of bleeders, you might think about changing the way you fish.... because whether we like it or not, the selective (wild release) fisheries in the saltwater are going to be around for awhile.

chris

Chris, Great point and I couldn't agree more. If the fishing is that hot why not challenge yourself a bit more and at the same time reduce your impact.