how long is it going to be before we are saying "man, remember when we used to fish rivers, them were the good old days"

i have a weird feeling that i will be telling my grandchildren stories of a elusive/mythical creature that was blinding chrome and could live in salt and fresh water

Assuming You've been fishing the last year or two in Wa. St...You've already expierenced "The Good Ole Days" on too many systems...Fvcking Sucks!!!

the good old days was no more than 5 years ago for me, i had epic back to back days on the sky's, stilly's, snoqualmie, the list goes one. but when every years that goes by i'm still standing in the water thinking "i know there's a fish there i caught them in years past here"

it sucks i hate to say but its time to move to alaska boys and girls... who's with me! LOL!

1999-2009 saw the most summer steelhead, spring chinook, summer chinook, fall chinook, and coho to cross Bonneville Dam for any ten year period since that dam came online in 1938. This summer broke the record for summer steelhead over the dam. Sockeye returns were the greatest since 1955.

In contrast, chum and pink salmon, once abundant in the Columbia system, are now almost nonexistent.

This winter's return of steelhead to Oregon coastal streams is good so far. I don't know how it stacks up historically, but it is impressive compared to the last few decades.

In Southwest Washington, defined as the Cowlitz to the north and the Klickitat to the east, I have landed more than 300 summer steelhead three times in the last decade. I have landed 5+ winter steelhead in one day in five different years over the last decade. In two different years over the last decade, I landed 5 or more wild steelhead in one day, multiple days, on streams WDFW does not plant.

I understand there are streams and watersheds, such as the Chehalis, Skagit, and Puget Sound streams, that have fallen on hard times.

I also understand that the Wenatchee, Grande Ronde, and Methow have had fantastic summer steelhead returns this year.

In some areas the good old days are, in fact, now. In some areas, not.

More historical perspective: Lewis (or Clark, I'm not sure which) wrote on April 17, 1806 while camped near Beacon Rock: "the salmon not having made their appearance proves a serious inconvenience to us." 204 years ago, already there were problems with salmon returns!

very cool, this downwerd trend we are on. now we can move on to the last few rivers that are open, and wipe them out 2 YAY! makes me want to quit fishing

Yeah, it seems that my drift boat has been primarily used for eagle watching these days, and as soon as the fish are extinct, the eagles will be hangin around the dump....anyone wanna buy a drift boat?

Many that post here "don't remember the good old days", cause you weren't born....

1. Before Bolt decision....late 60's ---- most of the 70's

2. Lot's of big native fish, many 25+

3. Rivers like the Humptulips....had a 3 fish limit...."upper train bridge", would have 75- 100 guys bank fishing.....fish everywhere.

4. Satsop River was open until April 30....I'd fish spring vacation and weekends.....in April....not see another fisherman.

5. Wynoochee had scary big winterrun steelhead AND SPRINGERS.

6. Tide waters had 100's of searun cutthroat.....many 18+ inches

7. Upper Quinault, Hoh, Queets, Bogie..........wow

8. Cowlitz.......what I remember....plunkers everywhere, both sides of the river, salmon hatchery.....bells ringing...all the time....

Now those were the "good old days" !!!!!!!!!

I missed it, but I have heard stories of the "civil disobedience" that followed.
Apparently grappling hooks, hay bales etc. were utilized.

Sadly, for most folks, the good old days are right now.

In another 20 years, these will be the days gone by etched in your memory for which your soul will hanker.

I'm thinkin' I experienced some "good old days" in my life time (nothin' like Drifter WA, though). Hate to think it's all downhill from here, but that's truly the way it's headed. With a few exceptions, virtually every place I fish is a shadow of its former greatness.

SAD!

No discipline, no restraint, no acknowledgment of the historic sins of unsustainable exploitation that continue to deplete our natural resources. Full steam ahead.

Lets not forget the old plunking shacks! Some were like mini cabins with heat / windows AND the card table. ( cribbage will never be the same ) It was a tradition when I was a kid, got my first hot buttered rum and Steelhead at 13 from a freinds Gramps fishing a shack.

Good ole days had some downers. Remember DW when they refused to allow S. Monte open for sport? Locked sports onto the ribs. Strange as it was it was the QIN behind the scenes that forced WDF to open it. Numbers did not work to let the non treaty nets get them and WDF said no to sports........... SO QIN said Fine we will take them. Wella......... S Monte opened and they never got it closed down again.

drifter, i was expexting a response like that when in posted this (damn kids dont know what good fishin is!!) but eyefish is right, these are the good old days for alot of us, its not my fault im not 60 years old i had nothing to do with that, i know that in the last 20 years i've been fishing the fish have been decreasing in numbers, so ya these are the good old days

lukesfishin: I also agree with with your comments and Doc's.

Rivrguy: Never had the luxury of a "heated shack", just lot's of fires on the river bars....I listened, learned, cause I was the "kid" back then. Learned from some of the best.....May they be "hooking and releasing", nothing but 30+ # steelhead, 70+ # Chinook, and all the other fish that people in heaven get to fish on......

I've had some stellar days in years past.....obscenely good days, both salmon and steelhead so I've had a "taste of it" which is satisfying.

On the other hand, the locations of many of those good days are but fragments of their former selves or are outright closed. That's the pisser. Even more so when I stop to consider every one of those spots fell on hard times due to mis-management in one form or another.

Sad indeed.

A few traditional spots remain consistent which is a plus but I also find myself adapting.....branching out to try new spots and, in some cases, new techniques and yes, I do find exceptional fishing sometimes still.

The most troublesome part for me nowadays is having to navigate trips around an exploding population being crammed into fewer and fewer rivers. It's not fun, it over-pressures the wild fish and in the end when it becomes un-bearable for a lot of dudes, they will say a collective "fu__it!" and quit buying even more licenses, strapping the dept even more.

I think future, consistent, quality steelhead fishing is in big trouble in western Washington. Salmon, not so much. It's turbulent times we live in and I'm really curious to see what I will be doing for recreation in 10 years.

Did you get to plunk night fishing for Chinook? Christ hooked one on the Satsop that sounded like a cow jumping in the river and damn near killed myself running up the bar with Stan chasing me with the old pump up Coleman lantern, got it to the bank but lost it trying chase it down. That thing was huge, at 15 looking back they all looked huge.

Catch suckers for bait early in the day, jumping off the bridge in the afternoon and the swing rope, to the gravel bar with half a rack & fire for searun in the summer evening. You know these young guys on this BB have no idea of what it was like when we were kids around here.

i use to plunk at twiddwells on the chehalis. we would get off work at 11 on a friday night build a fire in the stove put our rods out. lots time head home before daylight.be back around midnight on saturday i can remember a few times oversize sturgeon were hooked on eggs. a 20 fish day was a bad day. best fishing was december and January. those early fish are gone. big satsop hook-nose in February they are gone. a springer or two in march.

Fishin is definetly goin in the toilet around here I just hope when I have a kid and he or she grows up there will still be few to fish for, maybe I should get going on that soon. Its kinda odd looking at the numbers that have crossed bonneville since it was built, back in the times when most called it the good ole days in wa the numbers that crossed bonneville were not good compared to what we see now.

The good old days?

Is anyone posting here over 90 years old? Since 19-fricking 38 the Columbia is rockin' NOW in terms of historical numbers! If you were ten in '38, you're now 82 . You have not seen a better ten year average on the Columbia in your lifetime.

I have plunked in shacks with wood stoves on the Columbia in the 1960's, 70's, and 80's. The shacks I used were eliminated for various reasons in the 90's and have not returned. However, the best plunking I ever had on the Columbia for steelhead was this past summer. For spring chinook it was 2001.

Prior to dams and non-native peoples runs were better, of course. Somehow, I doubt we'll ever get back to pre-Boldt, Pre-dams, Pre-nonnative settlement conditions.

Pugetropolis is a different story, as is the Olympic Peninsula. To fix those problems, a few million people need to move out (Pugetropolis), and federal law and treaties need to be rewritten (Peninsula and Pugetropolis).

The waterway over which governmental agencies have the most control, the Columbia basin, has seen HUGE improvement in recent years.

For me it was skipping the first couple of periods of high school to fish winter-runs on the Cedar River. And, more often than not, we made it back before lunch with our limits. The big weekend days were for the "long" drive out to fish the Green.

Government control or good ocean conditions? Took a court order to get more spill.

You know what will tottally blow your mind? Someday we might say that these are the good old days...