Why We May Never See A State Wide Wild Fish Release |
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| Why am I doing this? And things were going so well. If I answer this question, I am going to step on a lot of toes. Why not do it?. Politically, I will take a hit. Dale Carnegie once said, "People are not interested in the truth, they are interested in hearing things that support the way they feel." In other words, you may be very interested in listening to me tell how kill fisheries and possibly management, are responsible for our woes, but are you still happy when I tell you the very highest echelon in the Pacific Northwest of flyfishers are as guilty as anyone? Now before you head for the phone, and tell your favorite fly club president that Dennis really does hate the flyfishing community, at least let me answer the question, "Why not C&R wild steelhead?" First of all, biologically, it works. There have been extensive studies on mortality rates of Catch and Release (C&R) fisheries on salmonids. Oregon, Montana, and California have demonstrated this on trout. Canada came to this same conclusion in Vancouver Island steelhead. If your goal is to maximize recreational fisheries, with minimal impact to the resource, no management tool will accomplish this, as well as C&R. I have never personally read a resource document that ever concluded that when utilizing bait restrictions and barbless hooks, in which the mortality rate was EVER over 10%. Most studies demonstrate 4-6% ! Even the brainless can deduce that the mortality rate of a kill fishery is 100%. So give me one good reason why we don’t use it? I will give you several. The fishing community is very fragmented. We are probably not going to be able to rid our ourselves of the old guard community that are not what you might term as "Sportsmen", but rather "Personal Subsistence" fisherman, because they sincerely believe if it comes to shore, it dies. They will be danged if they are going to have some high and mighty, holier than thou, flyfishing gnats, tell them how to fish, what they can kill, and what they can’t. Why, it’s Un-American! They are not dumb. They rub shoulders, and personally fish with Wildlife Department heads, and political officers, to pull their position. If there is one thing we have learned in 1998, it is this, you don’t have to be right, you simply have to convince the decision makers, what you propose, Is the voice of the people. Think about it. The Wildlife department has two problems. 1) They are politically driven. They are only hanging on by their teeth because they still think that selling more licenses is what keeps them in business, and there is a lot of pressure to give the angler what they want. What is best for the fish, is secondary, always has been, and it doesn’t matter how many conclusive documents you could set on the table, about the ills of kill fisheries. 2) Pride; they have managed toward kill fisheries for the past twenty years, to reverse this trend now, would be to admit that maybe, how they have been running their business is wrong. No, they would still like you to believe, if those Indians would just go away, everything would be fine. Fish for everybody. I know, lets all hide our head in the sand and maybe, just maybe, when we pull it out, Lynnwood will be a corner store on the side of highway 99. Get Real! Nothing is going to make things look like they did twenty years ago. Besides, these Game department guys that you have been schmoosing to hopefully get management to see it your way............Are the old guard. They also believe that; C&R is a waste of time, that its all the Indians fault, that that there is nothing really wrong with bait fishing on natives, because Joe biologist fishes this way, and he doesn’t hurt fish. Don’t you get it? The real reason we can’t seem to manage away from kill fisheries is because the Wildlife Department mangers believe, the fish killing gear heads are right! That’s because they are one! So how does that affect the flyfishing community? They have been telling these managers they are all wrong from the beginning, Right? Yup, and there in lies the problem. "Pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered." I am reminded of the commercial of the guy walking on the highway after an accident. Caption says " You can be right.......and you can be dead right." Let me tell you a little story. Back in the early eighties, our regional biologist had an idea. If the Sauk river steelhead are in poor numbers, why not cut off the kill fisheries, make everything C&R, take broodstock, and see if the fishery returns. This landmark management was a phenomenal success! Spawning recruitment actually tripled! It was not unusual for a competent flyfisher to handle upwards of six fish a day. The gear heads were reluctant at first, but when they realized they were handling as many as twenty fish a day, they decided, this was a lot of fun. Yes, life was good. Some were not willing to let well enough alone. There is a small but highly vocal group of fly anglers that decided that the jet sleds were scaring all the fish, and knowing that the Skagit gear heads primarily ran sleds, were able to have upstream motorized traffic banned from use during March and April. This management so incensed the gear boys that the following year, they sat down with the powers- to-be, and posed a simple question. "Are there harvestable numbers of wild steelhead?" Then we want them. As steelhead do not spawn in the bottom of boats, the numbers of spawners fell back to the pathetic state we have today. So who do we have thank for this? You figure it out. As today’s management stands, one of the greatest contributors in why we can’t seem to move closer in limited kill management, is because these flyfishing Zealots are so concerned about being right, and so asinine, in their approach, as they sit in these committee meetings, representing the entire flyfishing populous, nobody wants to listen to them. These guys spend all their efforts being right.........just to be right. So why don’t more flyboys get involved and show fisheries management, not everyone in the fly community so is Pharisee? A couple reasons; a) steelhead flyfishing is not for everyone. Most fly anglers fish trout where they are more successful, you tend to only be passionate about that which you feel you have a vested interest in. Two many guys hear how it takes two years to catch a steelhead on a fly, so they don’t get in. The local steelhead flyfishing community doesn’t help dispel this notion because the last thing they want, is more guys on their water. So what is the answer? After spending nearly thirty years, in and around fishery, I can honestly say......I don’t know. but at least you have heard my humble opinion, of why it is there. Perhaps in a follow up article, I can share some ideas on how we might actually start saving our wild fish.
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Dennis Dickson Fly Fishing
Steelhead Guide dddicksons@aol.com |