The fruits of not fighting for transparency

Why do the tribes fight so hard to keep you from knowing what they demand in the North of Falcon? So they can pull off Bullsh&t like this!

August 7, 2018

Nisqually River to close to all recreational angling on Sundays

Action: Close Nisqually River to all recreational angling on Sundays.

Effective date: Aug. 11 through Sept. 30, 2018.

Species affected: All species.

Location: Nisqually River from the mouth to military tank crossing bridge (located one mile upstream of mouth of Muck Creek). Pierce/Thurston counties.

Reason for action: This rule is necessary to comply with fisheries agreements made with co-managers during North of Falcon proceedings. It is needed to avoid gear conflicts between tribal and recreational fishers.

The reg pamphlet had salmon fishing closed Sundays for the entire salmon season. If they (WDFW) had agreed to a Sunday closure to all angling, and not just salmon it should have been in the pamphlet. If not, why did they agree to something and then not print it? Or, are they just getting pushed more?

Perhaps we should be asking “why Sunday?” They can net any day of the week, when most guys have to work. There’s a hell of a lot of hard working people who can ONLY fish on the weekends. Talk about a kick in the nut sack! And your wonderful WDFW representatives, who proclaim they are NOT LEAD BY THE NOSE BY THE TRIBES, agreed to this, behind locked doors! Pathetic. Sickening and Fuc$ing pathetic.
Thanks Ron Warren for sucking up so well, you pathetic piece of shyt!

The Nisqually surprise just isn't right.

There are lots of reasons to ask "WHY" on other areas, too. Last week I studied the pamphlet, and made some discoveries. The Deschutes is scheduled to close after March, and not open until late May. Years ago several of us worked to keep it open year around for selective gear, catch and release. Why this closure? there's nothing in there but nice cutthroat and the fishing is good for them because I do it. Then I dug a little deeper: There were 30,000 Chinook that returned to the collection station at Tumwater Falls. Thirty Thousand !!!! Only 100 (not a misprint) were put upstream and ALL of those were males! 29,000 were shipped off as surplus. And the Deschutes is open to fishing for salmon. Hello? Who is running this outfit? I also see that the senior fishing area on the Nemah on surplus fish has been eliminated. Stupid cut backs in areas that should be open. This fall the Deschutes will let no fish above the rack.

The very long ago practice on the Deschutes was to pass just males. The, lots of adults were passed. Now, because of ESA, there is a fear that those fish might successfully spawn. If so, the fear is that those wild fish could, with the proper lawsuits, be considered part of the ESU. If so, that would muck up that hatchery program and (especially) the non-selective fishery on returning adults.

WDFW studied the possibility of those fish being successful in the wild. Some unmarked adults did come back but the number could also be explained by "drops" (the unmarked hatchery fish that were dropped during marking.

I think that the seasons on trout were made to conform with the simplified (stupified?) pamphlet concept. Reduce the number of regs, lines of text, complexity. Simpler means either less fishing or less conservation.

I have been fishing that river for more than 20 years and I have never seen any conflict with tribal fishermen. Non tribal versus non tribal, you bet. I have seen non tribal fisherman buy fish on the netters.

I think they just want what the Puyallups get.

1. The rec fishermen is ever so slowly losing opportunities to harvest, and it is done because "we" are not an "equal" partner in the "Co-management" system. It is very apparent that the Tribes have, and continue to gain, the majority of the influence in management.

2. Part of the "process" of removing non-tribal citizens from the river is to reduce harvest and to reduce witness to the harvest of ESA listed wild fish, it has nothing to do with "gear conflict".

3. Can you say Skokomish? All the rivers are headed that way, very incrementally, so there will be no huge public outcry. The non-fishing citizen actually sides with the tribes, albeit due to mis-guided sympathy. The politicians side with the tribes, because it is a hot button topic and because they get money. And the feds won't get involved because the risk to reward is too great. So, it is plain to see that things will never get better for the rec. guy. We are destined to be regulated to fishing hatchery trout in the lakes at some point. It's just a matter of time.

as much as this bothers me, it's not as bad as a few years back where the river was closed sunday-tuesday(or something like that). a year before that, it was closed to fishing from boats sunday-tuesday(i can't get my head around that one). it's not like this was a surprise, the river was closed in the regs on sundays from the beginning this year, and i don't think there's a lot of trout fishermen down there. WDFW did sneakily put in a CNR reg for cutthroat this year without a reason why, which does irritate me.

as much as i wish we could go back to the '90s here, i have witnessed a lot of hostile jackass behavior by recreational guys down there toward the indians(and by the tribe as well, when fishing out of my sled, guys playing chicken with me on the lower river while i'm anchored next to the bank). there needs to be the realization that the tribes have a *right* to fish and we have a *privilege*, so throwing rocks and yelling threats are going to get those privileges reduced or revoked altogether. they hold the cards and there isn't a lot we can do about it. it's easier just easier to copy the puyallup tribes example and fight for closures on days that they net rather than call enforement.

if the "simplified" regulations were any goal, there was no improvement on the deschutes, other than making the entire river open only june-october. there's still a salmon season and the river is still under selective gear, rather than the blanket general season afforded to other small streams.

for that matter, capital lake should be re-opened as well. the mud snail reasoning for closing it is a load of BS, as other waters in this state have them(lake WA for example) and they aren't closed to the public. barring that, at least open up the area below the locks to fishing. oops, can't do that, the squaxins get to cork it off with nets, can't have "conflict" with the all powerful indians.

Exactly the reasoning why we are moving toward ALL natural resources belong to the tribes, and we (the tax paying citizens) only have a "privilege" to enjoy them...

The fact that the fish are a "public resource" is mute.

That is generally correct, according to a very informative response I got from a Region 5 biologist when I emailed WDFW to bitch about the shortened seasons on both the Deschutes and the Tilton. (I think it bears mention that I receved NO response about the Deschutes).

He explained that the general strategy was to make the river seasons more consistent. He also acknowledged that a review of the situation on the Tilton resulted in a decision to go back to year-round, C&R next season. I was glad to learn that, but I'm more upset about the Deschutes, since it's rare the Tilton is fishable outside the June-October season. Still no word on that one. My guess is that the talk about the BS hatchery chinook run points to the reason why they WON'T be changing back the rules on the Deschutes, which WAS my favorite spot for a year-round quick outing.

As little access as bank anglers get to salmon and steelhead (especially those mutant Deschutes kings that get made into dog food and fertilizer), it's really starting to upset me how much good, salmon-safe recreation we're losing in the name of protecting them. A half dozen people fly fishing for resident cutthroat simply can't have a meaningful impact on spawning salmon (much like 100 or so male salmon can't do any meaningful spawning without females). What a ridiculous waste of everything that Deschutes salmon hatchery is....

With all the excess kings coming back to the Deschutes, Nisqually and Skokomish in past years, why is there only a two fish limit for them south of Ayock on the canal and in MA 13?
SF

I just read the LOAF-2018 (List of Agreed Fisheries) that was signed by both the State and Tribes. I found, under the Nisqually River recreational, no mention of any Sunday closure for salmon (as shown in the printed regs) or all fishing (as shown on the e-reg justification).

So, does NOF not only produce the publicly available LOAF but also a list of otherwise secret (non-published) agreements that get sprung on folks at a later date? Like Double-Secret Probation???

It looks more and more like it is unwritten but indisputable WDFW policy to throw freshwater fishing in Puget Sound rivers under the bus to maintain friendly relations with treaty tribes. Thank you Jim Scott and Ron Warren. The logical next step is that tax dollars and license fee receipts not be used to for their paychecks. If WDFW isn't going to work for the people who pay their bills, then it's time to close up shop and put WDFW out of business. I get a very good return on my investment in a Montana non-resident fishing license.

Haven't gotten a Montana license but have gotten a nice return on Wyoming, Yellowstone, and Tasmania. Expecting good things from Iceland.

WINNER!!

And don't forget good ol boy Mike Grossman who is essentially a Tribal lobbyist.

Tasmania... Cool.

It was. Water too high for decent trouting but next time will be better. Have a few streams in Queensland to hit, too.