This ran in my local paper the other day

Sport fishermen already getting enough

By Jerry Lowe

In 1995 and again in 1999, the voters of Washington state rejected initiatives favoring the sport fishing industry. Now, once again, these same selfish folks are trying to take our salmon away. This time under the veneer of conservation rhetoric and with the support of state Rep. Liz Pike, we now have a bill introduced in the Legislature that would effectively put our salmon into the hands of the privileged few.

There are close to seven million of us now. Why can’t we craft a bill that will spread this precious resource among as many citizens of Washington as possible?

Collectively, the recreational fishers contribute about 17 percent or approximately $25 million a year in license fees, not enough to cover the cost of steelhead and trout management by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Yet still, they want all the salmon as well.

Rep. Pike states that the public, represented by the commercial fishermen, is given preferential treatment concerning timing and seasons over these license holders. In 2014, recreational anglers could fish for Chinook salmon in Washington 365 days. In the Columbia River they fished for spring salmon for three months before the commercials got eight hours. In total, commercials fished for 51 hours and the sports fished almost five months. In the Columbia River summer fishery the sports fished the entire time and commercials fished 56 hours. To say the WDFW has limited recreational opportunity is not just a twisting of facts, it is a blatant falsehood.

In Willapa Bay, commercial fishing has been restricted more and more each year for the last 20 years while preferential treatment has been given to the recreational fishers. Now they have over 100 days, a net-free zone and a two pole endorsement. Yet Rep. Pike characterizes this as constrained. She also states that the recreational fishers contribute vastly more income to our area’s economy. Have you been to Willapa Bay, Ms. Pike? Where might you see this contribution? Bay Center? South Bend? Raymond? Tokeland? These are places where the entire communities have been devastated by WDFW recreational policies.

In October of 2014, at Top Foods in Aberdeen, coho salmon were selling for $80 apiece. Whole Chinook salmon were available in the Pike Street Market in Seattle for about $400. At these prices how many fish do these people, who hide behind the adjective of “sportsmen” really need? Bass fishermen are considered sportsmen but labeled persona non grata if they kill one. Hunters are happy and content to get one deer a year. Yet these fishers never get enough. Lots of them get 150 salmon a year and some catch over 100 Chinook. And Rep. Pike wants to give them more.

So where do we go from here? Instead of your bill, Rep. Pike, I suggest we increase the recreational license fee to more accurately reflect its true value. The original catch record card would have space for six Chinook and 10 coho. If an additional card is needed, it would have space for 20 salmon and would cost $1,200 instead of $12.

Hatchery production of steelhead should be curtailed and salmon production should be enhanced. These policies would benefit the state in many ways and help spread this beautiful resource among the people of our great state, instead of the chosen few.

Jerry Lowe is a resident of Ocosta.

Should I be feeling guilty about my claimed share?

It seems to me that the true 'chosen few' are the Tribes and the possessors of commercial licenses. Sport fishers are not the 'chosen few' instead they 'choose to' be Sport fishers and pretty much anyone is allowed to participate.

I suggest that the NT commercial fleet find a "selective fishing method" that will allow release of non-targeted fish.

This has been "kicked down the road for years"....I've heard all the arguments: to costly to get different nets, won't work in Willapa or GH Bays, who'll feed the public if we can't gill net???

It's not the "sports communities that have driven wild/natural escapement numbers", to numbers that are approaching all time lows......

You have found the enemy, NT gillnetters.....IT IS YOU!!!! Point all the fingers you want.....just look in the mirror!!!!

How many fish do the commercials get in 56 hours? A lot. Nets are the single biggest detriment to the fisheries whether they are tribal or non-tribal. But for us to point fingers we need to show a true obligation to preserving the resource and if that means catch and release in some cases that's what we should practice. It should be about the catching more than the killing.

He should be careful with those claims. If selective hook and line angling is so successful, maybe it's time to go to barbless, selective troll fisheries for commercial harvest.

Who is selfish and who do the fish belong to ?

Is this guys only income commercial gill net fishing ?
I would hate to think he Gill nets for FUN and Money like My Dad and I commercial trolled for salmon. (never expected a profit but did look forward to it)
Wonder how many fish he kills compared to the average guy that he thinks fishes a hundred days a year for spring and summer runs and catches a limit every day.

Maybe its time to find a job that gives you more than a couple of days a month to make a living or for some reason do we owe him that too.

Is there any reason for commercial fishing on PNW salmon stocks, where only 5-10% of the total mass over the past 100 years now exists?

It should be getting closer to catch and kill your own like game animals.

Yup. I got a real kick out of how the author used hunters as an example of what sport fishers should be. Wonder if he knows the reason why hunters are only allowed one tag per season....

It's very convenient for us as sports fishermen to proclaim ourselves blameless. However, all users of the resource exact a toll and we are users of the resource just as the Commies and the Tribes. I would suggest to Mr. Lowe the same thing I would suggest to us - before blaming the other guy, make certain that your own house is clean. Kind of a stones/glass house kind of thing. There are some "sport" fishing practices that approach the low level that we ascribe to the other users. I'd feel a lot better about our position if we cleaned up those practices.

Something that the author should consider.

There is a parallel of present day game animals to PNW salmon because there is not enough of either for everybody to eat. The mass of PNW salmon has shrunk over 90%, over the last one hundred years and unfortunately will continue to decline if history continues to prevail.

Total hours fishing ? Is that the new paradigm?

This letter tosses up so many easy comebacks it is unbelievable. I would love to see him present this is a debate fashion. Why should we allow limited access to the commercial field? Should we spread the licenses out? How many fish does he need to survive at $400 a fish? Shouldn't we raise the commercial fees to reflect market prices. What percentage of fees do the commercials pay? How many salmon does the average license holder catch? It goes on and on. A true idiot, but my guess is that no true response to this will be allowed. Maybe we should dissect this line by line and send back a response as a collective, with everyone signing on.

You know what they say about arguing with an idiot. Lowe's letter is a poorly penned piece of hysterical fiction; the genre of choice when a gillnetter wants to deflect the scrutiny his wasteful practices are attracting. Once, a gillnetter did a television interview while standing in front of a huge pile of gillnets. Oblivious to the nonselective "curtains of death" stacked behind him, he loudly proclaimed fish farms to be the "greatest threat" to NW salmon survival. Testimony from the commercials at the recent senate hearing on SB 5844 was as emotional and irrational as the Lowe letter. The "sports priority" legislation sponsors aren't going away, and neither is their push to get their legislation passed in another session.

I'd think the local fishwrap would welcome a reasoned rebuttal to Lowe's letter.

Well, as someone who just got home from the NOF meeting.....both on Willapa Bay and Grays Harbor........probably a good thing the meeting was close to Costco......I'm thinking the gill netters made a run on toilet paper and purchases of new underwear...........

That's a novel way of saying, "I've got some GOOD NEWS!"... I hope

and went wee, wee, wee, crying to relatives Blake’s House.

Uncle Blake, I thought you said you had the F&W commission under control through your connections in the governor’s office.

Blake retorts, the commission is using science for conservational concerns, if I told them once, I have told them twice that politics got us into this mess and politics will get us out. Everybody knows that the legislature has vast more knowledge than the scientific community does when it comes to our state fisheries.

Yes Uncle Blake, you do have more knowledge than the combined scientific community in running our state fisheries. I just can’t believe that only you and us commercial fishermen comprehend that.