I am still finding it hard to beleive the battle over a fish I had seen this past Sunday. I have been fishing the Skokomish for the last few days with limited results. I am not as efficiant as others at the bump and jerk method as its not something that I practice often.

Where I had been fishing is a popular place, a short distance down river from the bridge. At that point the river is very narrow, maybe thirty feet, with a very nice drift. On the opposite side of the river is the Reservation, and on the side I was fishing, I assumed private property with a generous owner. Numerous fish were being caught, the nine or ten guys and gals fishing elbow to elbow as often occurs. It was a very enjoyable day. Listening to the stories, the hooked fish moivng up and down the hole with the loud yell of "coming up" and "coming down" and of course the occasional muffed neoprene fart that always seems to bring a good laugh.

This would all soon come to and end as the local Reservation Natives came to their side of the hole with their famous weighted treble hook. Fish after fishe began to be remooved from the hole via the "look, snag, and drag out method" so famous of the tribal members. I was appauled at the sight. The one fish that will haunt me is one snagged by a young tribal boy of maybe ten years of age. The fish ran up stream under the lines of fisherman on the private side and was hooked again by non tribal fisherman. The battle was on for this doomed fish. As the fight went on, the fish rarely moved from the middle of the river as both fisherman did not want to lose the fish. Both poles bent to nearly breaking. As the time went on, the tribal boy's father was beginning to make comments about letting his boys fish go. Following his dad's comment the tribal boy lashed out at the legal white fisherman calling him a jerk. Some time later the non tribal fisherman on the private side of the river broke lose from the fish, only to get hooked by another fisherman on the private side of the river. Only, this man was an aged man with no fight in him and released the line to the other side of the river. The fish was lost to the tribe with a belly snag.

I was shocked at the whole scene. I am saddend to see the fish snagged by the tribal members. They don't have a chance. The tribal members are like eagles, they sit at the top of their bank, eye the fish and snag it. Where is the sport in that. The fish have no choice to bite or not to bite. I witnessed more fish released than kept on our side of the river due to bum hook ups. I had seen a female landed with a leagal hook up that had 2 corkies sticking to her back that were broken off due to bum hook ups.

I am not sure what bothers me the most about the whole thing. Sometimes I am ashamed about what happened to the Indians, but when I see abandoned dead male salmon that were dumped from the inidans nets under the bridge, and watch as they sit there and snag, snag, snag I am not so ashamed as much as I feel hate. All humans destroy and create waste, but to waste with no regard is horrific.

I think that if this kind of over harvest continues, where will the fish be. After seeing the wasted make fish under the river, I am convinced now that the sport fisheman makes very little impact on the fishery. The netting by both commercial and tribal fisherman is the main cause. But the worst thing to do is to throw out fish that have no monetary value to them as the tribal fisherman have done.

I am going to throw out an idea that many of you will think I am crazy and may have some harsh words for me, but it is just my opinion and we are all intitled to our opinion. If we stopped fishing for 5 years, I mean completely stopped, everyone, indians, commercial, and sportsman alike. Think about what the fish could do as far as recovery. I would do that just to know that fishing would be improved not only for me, but for my kids and your kids. The fish need a chance to recover. One whole generation of fish could return with no impact, while four others gained strength.

Anyway, fish on...

WDR your idea as hard as it might be to accept. its not crazy i've seen it happen on some small rivers on the oregon coast even though 5years seems like a long time i am now fishing those rivers with good numbers of fish, don't have to shut them all down at once but start rotating them. and of course start enforceing the rules with the worst of penalities all this needs to be taken more serciously by law enforcement sportsmen and tribes

WDR,
I`ve thought of that myself before, wondered
what it would take besides paying the commercial fishers what they would have made on an average for that year or two,as I think even a couple of years would make a noticeable difference.
Unfortunately that snagging ordeal on the river is one of the reasons for the prejudice
we see on this board. I like to think of myself as not but when I see things like that happen I sometimes catch myself thinking out loud, I like to think it would not make a difference what nationality a person is.

"Never let your head hang down
Never give up!
And don't pray when it rains
If you don't pray when the sun shines"




------------------

I have often thought about the same thing,only a four year cycle.Close fishing down to everyone for a four year cycle,during that time up grade hatcheries and build more.Have the gill netter's farm raise there salmon/steelhead,up the price of licenses to $150.00 per year and set fines for poaching,snagging over harvest to $5,000.00 min and possible jail time.By doing this we may have good chances to double out on any given day,If I could have the chances to or actually exceed the double out then $150.00 for the tag's would be worth it to me and many other's.Like this would ever happen. Good luck STRIKE ZONE

WDR

I too have had days like this on the Skokomish. I am quite familiar with the hole you were fishing at, as well as a few more downstream. The snaggers come in at low tide when this tidal portion of the river is at its skinniest and the fish pack in.

However, sport has nothing to do with Tribal Fishing; upstream of the bridge (between the upper and lower bridges) the tribes use nets. Downstream of the lower bridge, nets are restricted, but they can snag anywhere on the Res. The Tribe is excercising their Treaty fishing rights, and I would hope they are utilizing what they catch, even if it is only to sell the roe. A lot of folks on this board think its such a waste to catch bucks and hens, only to keep the roe and not the meat, but commercials do this as well, only not in the publics eye.

Your notions of conservation are also not relevent in this circumstance. These fish are 100 percent hatchery fish. If no one fished them, why raise and let em go. And I guarantee, the Skokomish River has only a fraction of the native spawning water it used to have. This is the river that makes the news every November because it floods most years. The river has been filled in because of surrounding agro, logging, and the Lk Cushman dam.

I know that it goes against all the sensibilities of sporties to watch fish get snagged or netted, but by in large, the fight is one of allocation, not conservation (with some notable exceptions). If we stopped fishing for 5 years, the increased numbers of fish would be native, not hatchery, and I for one don't keep native fish.

Even if native runs were built up to the point where they can be safely sport caught, look at what they're doing in Alaska now. Even with the very small human population and virtually no development to muck up the streams, they have instituted severe catch restrictions in their sport fisheries. This is because they are having problems making their escapments since most of their runs are not supplemented by hatchery fish.

Down here, with streams only producing a portion of what they historically produced, and with our large population, native catch and kill fisheries are bound to last only a few years before there are depletion issues; they just don't make all that much sense.

People confuse allocation and conservation issues when talking about Tribal fisheries all of the time, but we should be talking conservation only in specific cicumstances, such as upper Columbia River salmon, Olympic peninsula steelhead, north Puget Sound steelhead, and a few others. Indian nets damage the hell out of sport fisheries, but not necessarily out of the resource as a whole.

At the risk of being chided for submitting my initial post (see Carlson vs Nets thread)I'm going to step up and voice my opinion.
I don't enjoy snagging and avoid places like Voight's Creek, The Bluff Hole, and the Hatchery at the Hump.
But..... given that the Fisheries Managers and WDFW enforcement personnel don't seem to care enough to enforce the snagging laws at these locations, I can only assume that the run is healthy enough to support nets, snagging, sportfishing, and escapement goals. The snaggers wouldn't be there if there weren't a lot of fish to provide their instant gratification.
So.. shutting down the fishing does not help the netters, the snaggers, or the fish managers and enforcers (other than eliminating the flak they are getting). It does help us sportsfishers by potentially giving us a larger portion of the fishery and a more pleasant environment.

Therefore... why would the general populace support a closure that benefits a few at the expense of many?

And... I hate to say it, our selective attitudes of supporting laws that benefit us (throw the snaggers in jail), and abhoring laws that hurt us (throw the netters in jail) enforces the general opinion that sportsmen are only interested in activities that result in more fish and game for ourselves. I don't know how to change that perception because I believe we are selfish and ego driven, many of the posts concentrate on numbers of fish caught and pleas for advice on where more can be caught. I watch from the sidelines hoping to get info so I can get more.

Anyway, just an observation and an opinion. For now I've got to go post some replies so I can get my post count up and gain credibility.

Obsessed,,, Im so glad so many people in this forum and on the rivers DONT share your point of view!

A guy can sit here and read some of this stuff and really get his tiff in a jingle.. If youve fished washington rivers all your life like some of us you'll know why so many are so upset at the way fishing is these days.. Weve stood on these rivers for many years, seen the way fish stocks have declined. And we know why! ALL men were created equal,, LETS all fish EQUALLY!
BAN THE NETS!!!!!

My girlfriend and I went up to local river today and we each got a chromer of 6 lbs. When we got there, there were 2 indian snagging fish (with the same thing as those skokomish snaggers were using, the lead and a trebble hook). There were about 20 fish on the bank squimming around. It made me mad. Melissa was not a happy camper. Well, thought that I would tell Ya....

Its wonderful too see so many folks p****d off about all the snagging that goes on along our rivers. As far as shutting down the fisheries it will take more than 5 years. To see any benefit at all the fisheries would need to be closed for a minimum of 12 years(3 complete life cycles). I personnaly am not willing to not fish salmon and steelhead for 12 years and I'm sure a lot of others will feel the same. Also the state won't allow that happen as they cannot afford the revenue loss. Just my thoughts.

Hey Iam glad someone finally said something on this matter. You know it realy ticks me off that these indians can do such a thing; the government needs to seriously look and rewrite their treaty rights and start making them do things the hard way (fishing,hunting and get real jobs not FREE money from our government) like us white people. You go to their houses and MOST of them look like junk yards. Ya I admit it I am somewhat prejudice when it comes to the indians fishing and hunting rights; so what? But I dont agree with them catching fish just to let them die or just to sell the roe; they're waste too much let the white men have the fish if they (the indians) arent going to USE the whole fish. Let me say if that ever happened to me I would say a thing or two to the indians!!! And it wouldnt be nice. Truckdriver Richard

Hey Iam glad someone finally said something on this matter. You know it realy ticks me off that these indians can do such a thing; the government needs to seriously look and rewrite their treaty rights and start making them do things the hard way (fishing,hunting and get real jobs not FREE money from our government) like us white people. You go to their houses and MOST of them look like junk yards. Ya I admit it I am somewhat prejudice when it comes to the indians fishing and hunting rights; so what? But I dont agree with them catching fish just to let them die or just to sell the roe; they're waste too much let the white men have the fish if they (the indians) arent going to USE the whole fish. Let me say if that ever happened to me I would say a thing or two to the indians!!! And it wouldnt be nice.

I saw the 1.5 dozen bucks on the river bottom underneath the bridge also. I took pictures with one of those little instamatic disposable cameras that I keep in my vest. If they turn out, I would like to post them on the web and see if I can't stir up a little [Bleeeeep!]. R.T., can you help me out with a little confuser knowledge here. I have a flatbed scanner. How and what else do I need to post pictures?
Ted

[This message has been edited by grumpyr (edited 09-12-2000).]

I beleive if ALL the sportsmen stuck together like the Indians do maybe we could do something about whats going on! I'll help ya with that scanner...

Hey obsessed, I was down on the Skok this morning, and the Indians were netting about a mile below the low bridge.(where it swings back along the highway). They didn't catch any in the 4 hours I was there, but they are netting down there. Another thing, I always here the Indians say that their nets aren't really across the whole river when they are streched out from shore to shore. On this net you could see the netting material going all the way onto the bank on both sides. SO, do they have a big whole in the middle??? How are fish supposed to get past that?

Jake

Don't know what to tell ya. I was just passing on info that a tribal member told a bunch of us guys a few weeks ago. Geez, if they just want the roe, you'd think it wouldn't matter where they placed the nets. Thanks, for the info though, I think I'll go late summer running this week end.

As far as the nets not stretched across the river, thats only when they want some of the fish to pass through to make sure escapement is reached. I think the hatchery thinks they can meet escapement by the on/off netting schedule. As long as thats not an issue, I think they can build a wall.

seacat69, I don't know if you're being sarcastic, but I have long agreed with your approach. I'v suggested something even more drastic, let the hatchery personnel be responsible for providing the roe; better chance at equity, the net sightsore and poor harvesting scene are gone, and we won't have to argue about usual and accustomed fishing methods.

Sarcasm aside , I don't know why we bother with all of the pomp and circumstance of setting netting seasons for the treaty fisherman. What a waste! It's a waste for all concerned!

Everyone basically knows when the fish return to a particular hatchery, set some dates and let the treaty fisherman come and get em'.