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Ballot Initiative for Nov 6 Election

66K views 434 replies 64 participants last post by  freespool 
#1 Ā·
Please pass along the following to your friends and contacts by PM or e-mail so that they have an idea about the upcoming ballot initiative. Feel free to copy/paste the text or send them a link to this thread.

Knowledge is POWER.
Change starts with awareness.
Everyone from OR on this board should make the pledge to educate your circle of friends and loved ones on this important issue.

Let's gitter dun, folks!

Immediate Release:
April 3, 2012


Contact: Lydia Plukchi
Elections Division
(503) 986-1518


The Office of the Secretary of State received a judgment from the Supreme Court on April 3, 2012, for initiative petition #21, proposing a statutory amendment, for the General Election of November 6, 2012. The judgment from the Supreme Court included a copy of the modified ballot title submitted to the court by the Attorney Generalā€™s office. The modified ballot title is as follows:

Prohibits commercial non-tribal fishing with gillnets in Oregon "inland waters,"
allows use of seine nets



Result of ā€œYesā€ Vote: ā€œYesā€ vote changes commercial non-tribal fishing in Oregon ā€œinland watersā€ (defined) by banning gillnets, adopting other regulatory changes; recreational salmon fishers ensured their recent share.


Result of ā€œNoā€ Vote: ā€œNoā€ vote continues current commercial fishing practices, retains laws allowing gillnets, leaves other current regulations in place; continues annual adjustment of recreational salmon harvest share.


Summary:
Current law allows commercial salmon fishing in Columbia River only with gillnets; requires recreational salmon fishersā€™ percentage share of overall salmon catch to be readjusted annually; allows issuing of gillnet permits within limit of 200; recognizes gillnet licenses as valid in Columbia River in both Oregon and Washington waters. Measure bans commercial gillnet fishing by non-tribal fishers in Oregon ā€œinland watersā€ (defined); requires Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission to permit use of ā€œseine netsā€ (defined) instead; ensures that recreational salmon fishersā€™ percentage of overall salmon catch remains at 2007-2011 levels; prohibits purchase of salmon caught by gillnet by non-tribal fishers in Oregon inland waters; prohibits issuing of additional gillnet permits; repeals statute recognizing validity of gillnet licenses in Oregon and Washington waters. Other provisions.


Chief Petitioner(s): Fred Girod, 1006 W 11th St, Vancouver, WA 98660, Rod Monroe, 1006 W 11th St,
Vancouver, WA 98660 and David Schamp, 1006 W 11th St, Vancouver, WA 98660
 
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#60 Ā· (Edited)
This year the commercials used tangle nets for spring chinook in the Lower Columbia river for TWO DAYS. What is a season using seines going to be?

The stated purpose of switching to seines is to remove MORE hatchery fish, yet we`re told this will improve sportfishing?

Gillnetting the Columbia river has been failing for a century now. By using the ESA we`re able to keep them off the river most of the year. Adding a few more regulations and ESA protections will put the final nail in the coffin for most of the commercials. Why prop up a failing industry? I say let it fail, if you want to threaten sports with the shutdown of hatcheries, go ahead, shut them all down{beyond the wildest dreams of even the most hard core NFS member}, I`ll still fish for other species{that require no license} and the states will get no money from sports. Bill
 
#61 Ā·
The stated purpose of switching to seines is to remove MORE hatchery fish, yet we`re told this will improve sportfishing?
That may be the claim that opponents make. And opponents who have a history of being pro-gillnet posting their opposition on this thread only help the cause.

You menetion Spring Chinook. Season, but convieniently don't mention the about 90% of the salmon harvested by gillnets in the Columbia River that are harvested completely non-selective. Meaning they kill wild and hatchery fish alike because their gear isn't capable of live sorting as sport anglers are required to do.

This initiative is about doing the right thing for fish. Allowing live sorting, fish friendly gear. Releasing wild fish in good condition so that they can spawn.

It is time for the status quo to change.
 
#67 Ā·
Well let's see. We have about half in the camp of

"The seines will catch all the fish"

And the other half in

"The seines wont catch any fish"

So that seems to be about right.

No one ever expected sport fishers to agree on any one thing. Right?

Just about everyone with a keyboard has espoused their "better idea" over the past (nearly) 10 years I have been on this board. What has changed?

This will happen. Will it be the end of policy adjustments? No. But conservation minded sport anglers are tired of gillnetters screaming that they don't need to change their methods 1 inch.

I just explained that the vast majority of non-tribal commercial harvest is done non-selectively. Have you forgotten about all the other ESA listed stocks that travle the Columbia River? Steelhead, Coho, as well as Spring Chinook?

All of these arguments don't take into account bycatch, and the condition of the fish that are pulled from a gillnet and tossed back into the river. Not to mention the catch and kill commercial fisheries that make up a vast majority of the dead salmon in commercial totes.

Sport fishers are required by law to release wild fish without removing them from the water. Why is it such a sacrifice to ask non tribal commercial fishers to do the same?

We, as people who care about fish, have to find a way to selectively harvest hatchery fish, while protecting and rebuilding wild stocks.

That is our goal.
 
#68 Ā·
We fish with tangle nets while fishing for spring Chinook. We have a quota and when we meet that quota we are done fishing. Sport fisherman kill more wild Chinook than gillnets do. If the cca cared so much about wild salmon they wouldn't let sports keep killing the wild spring salmon. The rest of the season we fish with gillnets. That because the fish we are fishing for are not an endangered species we can keep them all. Just like sports. I'd rather use tangle nets all year long other than switching to seines cause from my personal experience seines are terrible on fish.
 
#72 Ā·
Selective Gear Testing For Commercial Salmon Fishery Encouraging; Might Go Full-Fleet In 2013
Posted on Friday, April 15, 2011 (PST)

If continued testing this year and next proves favorable, the states of Oregon and Washington could launch a full-fleet commercial salmon fishery on the lower Columbia River in late summer-fall of 2013 employing ā€œselectiveā€ fishing gear.

ā€œIf information supports moving forward, then 2013 would be a good starting date,ā€ said Guy Norman of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Last yearā€™s first year of larger scale testing of purse seines, beach seines and trap nets produced ā€œencouraging news,ā€ Norman said during a Wednesday presentation to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council. The tests showed that two seine gear types worked well, sweeping in a lot of coho and fall chinook in a benign manner.

And the gear is seemingly growing in favor with commercial fishers, who had initially been skeptical of shifting from gill-nets and tangle nets to other costly gear types, he said.

ā€œWeā€™ve made a lot of gains in that arena in the past few years,ā€ Norman said.

The idea of the testing is to find gear that allows the live capture of fish so that marked, hatchery fish can be harvested and unmarked wild salmon and steelhead can be released unharmed. The goal would be to use the selective gear to implement commercial harvests that harms fewer wild salmon and steelhead that are protected under the Endangered Species Act while harvesting more hatchery fish, which can, if they stray onto the spawning grounds, have a negative impact on their listed cousins.

The testing began with a pilot study in 2009, and then more exhaustive research last year to evaluate the ā€œcatchabilityā€ of three gear types as well as measure any direct mortality of resulting from the netting. The 2010 tests showed the gear to be efficient and benign. Researchers witnessed the immediate mortality of a scant 29 out of the 22,856 fish caught.

The 2010 tests were carried out with $1.9 million in funding from Mitchell Act and Pacific Coast Salmon Recovery Fund accounts administered by NOAA Fisheries Service. This year $1.4 million from the same sources is earmarked for continued gear and direct mortality testing, and another $850,000 is ticketed for long-term mortality research.

Norman said the long-term mortality test plan would by next month be submitted to the Councilā€™s Independent Scientific Review Panel, which evaluates project proposals for scientific merit. The strategy involves employing two purse seines and two beach seines to catch coho and fall chinook below Bonneville and implanting the fish with PIT tags so that their progress up through the hydro system can be tracked. The tagged fish will also turn up at hatcheries, in tribal nets and elsewhere.

ā€œWe really need to get a handle on the long-term mortalityā€ of steelhead and salmon released from the seines, Norman said.

The WDFW could potentially pursue funding through the NPCCā€™s Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program. Funding from the Council program could be used to offset some or all of the mortality study funding so that more of the available Mitchell Act-PCSRF funds could be used to expand the gear testing and involve more commercial fishermen, Norman said.

Last year a total of 13 commercial fishermen were employed in the testing, each getting 30 days on the water during the mid-August to late October time frame.

This year the intent is to use 16 fishers, including the four for the mortality study. They will be spread out, again in the late summer-early fall, among the five Columbia mainstem fishing zones from Bonneville Dam at river mile 146 down to the river mouth.

The testing is drawing interest within the industry. WDFW got 35 applications to fill the 16 spots that are now available. Many looked at the 2010 results and said ā€œthis can work,ā€ according to Norman. In addition to the cost of buying different gear and boats, or retrofitting boats, using the seines involves more than one person. A single operator can feed out and retrieve the gill nets used in the river.

To get the necessary data for 2013 implementation, the testing would have to continue in 2012.

ā€œWeā€™re looking at the fall season as the main focus of this alternative gear,ā€ Norman said in response to a question from Oregon Councilor Bill Bradbury about whether a wholesale switch in gears could eventually be required. Norman said the type of gear being used would depend on the species being caught, and the time of the year and the area being fished.

The 13 fishers last year -- six using beach seine nets, five fishing purse seines and two employing trap nets ā€“ caught nearly 23,000 salmon and steelhead.

The catch included 11,773 chinook, 8,774 coho and 2,312 steelhead. Both purse and beach seines proved to be effective capture methods, with purse seines being the most effective of the two gear types.

All three gear types allow the fish to be encircled while leaving them free-swimming. Fish can be identified and released by type or species with a minimum amount of handling.

Such gear could be used to help reduce the number of hatchery fish that stray onto the spawning ground and compete with wild fish and, many scientists believe, reduce the fitness of native fish and pose disease risk. A recent review, called for by Congress, by the Hatchery Scientific Review Group identified the need to increase the harvest of hatchery produced salmon in order to reduce their interaction with wild fish. The WFWC endorsed that strategy in its Hatchery and Fishery Reform policy.

Laws require that impacts be limited on wild portions of 13 listed Columbia-Snake river basin salmon and steelhead stocks.

To limit those impacts, there are three primary management tools: increasing the harvest of hatchery fish; installing tributary weirs to remove hatchery fish, and/or decreasing hatchery production.

http://www.cbbulletin.com/407677.aspx

 
#76 Ā·
This will pass and I will be out there supporting it till November. Im so tired of seeing native steelhead every year with net damage on them and it will help me sleep easier at night trying hard not to imagine how many dead native/hatchery steelhead are lying at the bottom of the river.
 
#77 Ā· (Edited)
If I'm a dead ESA salmon do you think I care if I was killed in a catch and kill fishery or killed as a released mortality from an ad-clip retention only fishery?

$5 says it'll fail.
 
#82 Ā·
So, this initiative does not allow the sport share to "be reduced below that of recent years". How is that going to keep hatchery fish from mixing with wild fish on the spawning beds? I thought the "save or Salmon" initiative was created to save salmon. So, what is more harmful to wild fish; being a release mortality or breeding with hatchery stock in the wild?

So, the commecial fishery will be limited to how many of hatchery fish it can remove from the system (remember - all hatchery fish must die) as a percentage of how many the sport fleet can harvest. From where I sit this looks like a fisheries managers nightmare. If a commercial fishery is developed with a low handling mortality and a huge take of hatchery fish the removal of hatchery fish is still tied to the success of the sport fleet. If the sport fishery cannot take a substantial share of their allotted harvest the commercial fishery - no matter how clean or how effective it is at removing hatchery fish from the system - will never be allowed to remove the surplus hatchery fish the sport fleet is unable to.

As written this initiative has the possiblility of reducing wild fish mortality in the commercial fleet but will reduce the number of hatchery fish harvested. That "rider" ensuring the sport harvest levels do no get reduced really eliminates any possibility of increasing the harvest of hatchery fish and "ensures" more hatchery fish will reach the spawning beds mixing with wild fish. This initiative also eliminates the ability of fisheries managers to adjust the take of hatchery fish from the sport quota to the commercial quota - no matter how clean the commercial method is. If the sport fleet cannot remove all the hatchery fish it is allocatted than no body can sending more hatchery fish than ever up to spawn with wild fish.
 
#85 Ā·
There sure are a lot of gill netters on this board. Actually when the colville tribe tried seine nets they killed only 4 fish total. Of course you have to sort the fish responsibly. They pulled the net up next to the boat or beach and sorted the fish one by one and lifted the the wild ones over the net. it worked beautiful. The same exact thing that is done at a hatcherie. I do it all the time at the hatcherie I volunteer at. The real reason and only reason a gill netter does not want to use a seine net is that it takes one person to run a gill net but 4 to run a seine net. This was told to me by a gill netter. It sounded like the truth and made sense. The rest of these reasons sound like a pile of baloney
 
#94 Ā·
I asked a question earlier
-

Originally Posted by billjr64
This year the commercials used tangle nets for spring chinook in the Lower Columbia river for TWO DAYS. What is a season using seines going to be?
-
No one even attempted to answer it so I answered it how I see it. Again, feel free to comment on any of these predictions.
-
"Using this spring chinook season as an example, seines would have begun fishing in the lower river about April 1st when the fish showed in decent numbers, they would still be fishing today, April 20th, trying their best to remove the hatchery fish before they get to the spawning grounds. They will be fishing Cathlamet to Longview. Sports will probably not be allowed to fish near seining operations. This will not affect our{sports} recent success fishing for spring chinook? IMO it would be the same as having the last 20 days with gillnetters in the river, maybe worse as a much higher % of natives will be handled by sports. We all know what 3 straight days of gillnetting will do to the bite, do you want to vote in 30 straight days of commercial fishing?
In a normal water flow year they would have been targeting the Willamette run spring chinook about mid March, these fish are easy to target as they run in a predictable path as I`ve shown in the past. Bonus is they are not counted as catch balance for the tribes so EVERY SINGLE ONE of them are fair game with a very low impact fishing method, like sport fishing or seining{so they claim}."
-
No one denied any of the things I posted. The only comeback was half hearted flaming so I guess we can assume this scenario to be likely.
-
Next up is my prediction on what a summer/fall seine season will look like, If you want to go first LB have at it.
-
Bill
 
#103 Ā· (Edited)
Chance,

I think you are reading more into my statement than I intended. My understanding is, according to a manager in the WDFW, that the states have to get approval from NOAA each and every run of fish that has ESA listed fish. The run is on its way back in, but the approval is needed.

They completely eliminated some of the hatchery runs up here. Money was a factor, but NOAA is still in charge. I dont like it, but the feds have moved in. The state wont raise the fish, if the answer will be "no season."
I was not privy to the details of every reduction or elimination of the hatchery runs.

How the Mitchell act funds are manipulated is unknown to me. I dont know which hatcheries depend on that funding. Rumor is some of that money went into gear testing.

According to a gillnetter who testified before Blakes committee in 2009 or 2010, NOAA told them they will have to change gear or the runs will be cut. He did not provide dates.
 
#125 Ā· (Edited)
Its common for people to focus on just one aspect of their argument. Business owners tend to focus on multiple ways a business is impacted by political or legal decisions vs. kicking the can down the road. Sort of like running a flat tire until it wraps itself around your brake line and tears it off. Any business owner who feels as you do, is not likely to donate to the initiative. That is why they would educate themselves.

The fact is, you want to catch the gillnet share of the fish. If all the nets go away, NOAA will cut the plants. You wont get any more fish. If the gillnets continue, NOAA will cut the plants. You wont get any more fish. I bet you have never considered that with live capture, it might be possible to have more fish planted thereby raising the harvest for everyone. There is only one reason more fish were planted in the safe areas. The lack of wild fish impacts.

If less fish are planted there is less opportunity for everyone. That hurts business. If all plants are discontinued, that hurts business. If taxpayers revolt at the billion dollar price tag for this fishery, it hurts business. If the total amount of hatchery fish is reduced, then predators will increase their rate of wild fish impacts. At some point, you actually need to solve a problem, or someone else will. This is exactly about wild fish and the ramifications are numerous.

and


Chance,

I think you are reading more into my statement than I intended. My understanding is, according to a manager in the WDFW, that the states have to get approval from NOAA each and every run of fish that has ESA listed fish. The run is on its way back in, but the approval is needed.

They completely eliminated some of the hatchery runs up here. Money was a factor, but NOAA is still in charge. I dont like it, but the feds have moved in. The state wont raise the fish, if the answer will be "no season."
I was not privy to the details of every reduction or elimination of the hatchery runs.

How the Mitchell act funds are manipulated is unknown to me. I dont know which hatcheries depend on that funding. Rumor is some of that money went into gear testing.

According to a gillnetter who testified before Blakes committee in 2009 or 2010, NOAA told them they will have to change gear or the runs will be cut. He did not provide dates.
Here is a link to some information on the Mitchell Act if you are interested.
http://www.nwr.noaa.gov/Salmon-Harvest-Hatcheries/Hatcheries/MA-prgrm.cfm
NMFS manages and disperses the money for the Mitchell Act. But they donā€™t control it all themselves. Congress appropriates money for it and dictates in the appropriations various categories for how it is to be spent. Congressman Norm Dicks from Washington is a big fan of selective fisheries and has wanted commercial fisheries to be mark selective for clipped fish. So it is not just a rumor that a bunch of Mitchell Act money was spent on testing gear for commercial selective fisheries. Washington got $1,975,519 in 2010 and Oregon got $450,000. This was because Norm Dicks put the money in the Mitchell Act for this. Personally, I would have used the money to produce fish.
But the Mitchell Act is only a piece of the Columbia basin hatchery program. And NMFS doesnā€™t dictate how many fish get produced for this program. They do have to address ESA listed fish and have to do ESA consultations on hatcheries. They have completed this task for some, but not for all. One of the many things NMFS looks at in their ESA consultations is numbers of hatchery fish that might be spawning in areas where NMFS doesnā€™t think thatā€™s a good idea. They have expressed this concern with lower river tules. For these fish, NMFS has said that they think too many are spawning naturally. And if the weirs donā€™t work or the fisheries in the ocean and in-river that catch these fish donā€™t catch more, then maybe NMFS can force production cuts under their ESA consultation, but then again, maybe they wont. And anyway, for lower river tules, who really cares? Are you going to be sad if there are fewer hatchery tules around? For some Mitchell Act programs.... say like Carson Hatchery spring Chinook, those fish pretty much either get caught or just go back to the hatchery. There isnā€™t some big concern with these fish that they are straying all over. So, this program isnā€™t going to get cut over some concern about too many hatchery fish (with or without a commercial fishery).

There isnā€™t anything in the Mitchell Act per se that links the production to commercial fisheries. If there were, why would the Mitchell Act produce steelhead at Klickitat and Ringold Hatcheries. In fact other than some of the production in the SAFE areas, no hatchery production is linked specifically to a certain fishery. So if we simply got rid of the gillnet fishery, there just isnā€™t any evidence that production would decrease.

The Mitchell Act is not the only game in town either. There are other mitigation programs such as the Lower Snake River Compensation program http://www.fws.gov/lsnakecomplan/ and John Day mitigation http://www.cbfish.org/Project.mvc/Display/2008-527-00 http://wdfw.wa.gov/publications/01123/wdfw01123.pdf . There are HCPā€™s in the upper Columbia such as http://www.chelanpud.org/habitat-conservation-plans.html that have already been signed off on by NMFS. These plans have set hatchery production as part of them. There are a bunch of hatchery programs that are part of the U.S. v. Oregon Agreement http://www.fws.gov/Pacific/fisherie...08-2017.USvOR.Management.Agreement_042908.pdf. NMFS can grouch around about hatchery fish, but there are a lot of other power players involved with producing these fish. If they wanted to argue for less production, there will still be the mitigation requirements. The Columbia is a different ball game than Puget Sound and none of these programs are dependent on whether or not there is a commercial fishery of any kind.
 
#107 Ā·
Bill,

You dont have the math, only a feeling and I dont need to trade guesses with you. People have no reason to trust your intuition when deciding whether to change the type of gear. The TOTAL number of fish harvested is going to be the same for each side. You are trying to manipulate the daily harvest of fish based on gear type, to scare anglers. All the wild fish that die between now and the end is not going to bring more hatchery fish to your table. A slow death to the nets is a slow death to the sport fishery too. Believe or not, even the tribes are affected by low returns of wild fish and a number of seasons have been cancelled for treaty tribes.
 
#108 Ā·
I will make the "ensured" sport harvest scenario easy for you LB.

There are only a certain percentage of fish that will take a hook - Ive read different studies that say it is about 20%. Lets go with 20% for this example. Lets also say the harvest of non-tribal salmon is split 50/50. NO MATTER HOW MANY OR FEW HATCHERY FISH ARE IN THE SYSTEM ONLY 40% OF THE HATCHERY FISH CAN BE HARVESTED UNDER THIS INITIATIVE. That is the maximum. That is what tying the commercial take to the sport take does. It eliminates the benifite of a low wild fish mortality harvest method. I say get rid of the gillnets but replace them with a low mortality live release method that CAN remove the hatchery fish and not allow ballot box biology to do so.

In order for any fishery to remove 100% of the hatchery fish in a mixed stock fishery 100% of the wild fish will be caught and released. Hook and line is limited by both the impacts to wild fish and the inability to ever harvest every hatchery fish. If a commercial method is used that has ZERO impact on wild fish that commercial method is limited to the number of hatchery fish it can remove due to the "ensure" for a yes vote - no matter how hany hatchey fish are in the system.

If there are 10 hatchery fish returning sport gets 2 and commercial gets 2 leaving 6 to mix with the wild fish. If 100,000 hatchery fish are returning sport gets 20,000 commercial gets 20,000 and 60,000 mix on the spawning beds with the wild fish. The ratio will always be the same because the initiative requires that it is - no matter what the numbers. Even if the commercial fleet could catch the remaining 6 or 60,000 hatchery fish with zero impact to wild fish this initiative does not allow that to occur.

I believe you that this initiative was not dreamed up in a bar. However, the fisheries challenges we are faced with on the Columbia River go far far beyond being fixed with a single initiative.
 
#109 Ā·
However, the fisheries challenges we are faced with on the Columbia River go far far beyond being fixed with a single initiative.
I do agree that a single initiative will not solve our complex set of issues.

There are certainly some things in this bill that I personally don't agree with, but I understand how politics work and I realize that to pass this (which is a push in the right direction for future work)it needed to pass muster, not with us, but the general public (who doesn't hunt/fish).

In a utopia we would have pristine rivers, free-flowing waters, self-sustaining wild runs that were strong enough to support yearly harvest by recreational/commercial anglers.

As long as hatcheries exist there is nothing that will guarantee co-mingling on the spawning beds will not happen. In the mean time I support any change that will help even a few natives back to their home water and applaud a change in methods that will save countless non-targeted species (not fish) that end up as causalities of war. Then eventually we can also put the ghost net issue in the CR to bed once and for all which is another messy issue.

Magic bullet....not even close, but a good step forward.
 
#111 Ā·
All of the hand-wringing and gnashing of teeth aside, the vote will come down to what Joe Couchpotato and Evira Wacko 'feel' about seeing scalped fish vs a young lad tearfully bidding his papa a good day of dragging nets through the river.

It's politics - reality need not apply. :flag2:

I now return you to the pontification series in progress......
 
#119 Ā·
Non tribal seining operations will take place in the lower Columbia, well before most sports get a chance at them. To plant more hatchery fish and then remove them there would be another subsidy for commercial fishing, again paid for by sports and the general fund. Bill
 
#121 Ā· (Edited)
Point of clarity to you folks arguing your opinion about what the initiative is or is not.

IP-21 Bans non tribal gillnets in Oregon Inland waters.

IP-21 assures that sport allocations will not be reduced.

IP-21 allows the use of selective fishing gear that is currently not allowed and mandates that it must be used selectively (live release of wild fish)

Tribal agreements are not effected. Catch balancing is currently the largest limiting factor on sport harvest. This initiative wont change that.

This initiative bans gillnets and assures live release of wild fish and the bycatch that gillnets currently catch.

Seines and other selective gear are coming to the Columbia River whether you support this initiative or not. Look back at Splash's post.


"Selective Gear Testing For Commercial Salmon Fishery Encouraging; Might Go Full-Fleet In 2013
Posted on Friday, April 15, 2011 (PST)

If continued testing this year and next proves favorable, the states of Oregon and Washington could launch a full-fleet commercial salmon fishery on the lower Columbia River in late summer-fall of 2013 employing ā€œselectiveā€ fishing gear."



So, would you like a law in place that assures sport allocations? Or would you prefer selective gear be implemented on top of gillnet fisheries with no protection of sport allocations?
 
#126 Ā·
Great post FF.

Why then did Mitchell Act funds get sunk into gear evaluation? It's because they want the fish that are produced via artificial propagation to get harvested before they hit the hatchery traps. The sport fleet is about topped out on what it can do.

But the LCR commercial fishery is an open book. Those that control those purse strings want all hatchery surplus that isn't needed for production goals sucked up in fishing fisheries.
 
#128 Ā·
Great post FF.

Why then did Mitchell Act funds get sunk into gear evaluation? It's because they want the fish that are produced via artificial propagation to get harvested before they hit the hatchery traps. The sport fleet is about topped out on what it can do.

But the LCR commercial fishery is an open book. Those that control those purse strings want all hatchery surplus that isn't needed for production goals sucked up in fishing fisheries.
Are you kidding me LOL
 
#130 Ā·
Great post FF.

Why then did Mitchell Act funds get sunk into gear evaluation? It's because they want the fish that are produced via artificial propagation to get harvested before they hit the hatchery traps. The sport fleet is about topped out on what it can do.

But the LCR commercial fishery is an open book. Those that control those purse strings want all hatchery surplus that isn't needed for production goals sucked up in fishing fisheries.
Hatchery surplus is ALREADY sold to commercial buyers. The rest is given away to food banks. Considering the lack of nutrients in the tributaries, much of the surplus should be kept for nutrient enhancement, FOR WILD FISH. The sport harvest is not topped out. A little gear change and credit for leaving the fish in the water and the percentage will go down.
 
#132 Ā·
Bill has taken a beating here. He has asked some very good questions that no one has answered.

When he projected a very possible answer, it was easily dismissed!

WHY?

Does anyone know the answers to his questions?

And if not, how do you know his is not right?

A whole lot of unknown territory here to get all excited about this initiative and assume this all that and a bag of chips. I would like to advocate for the fish, but I would also like to advocate for sport fishing as well.

I have heard a lot of "this is good for the fish" on this thread. How many of you that are only concerned about the well being of fish, go out and fish for salmon and steelhead?

If you're only concerned about the well being of the fish, here is the solution.

Close down ALL hatcheries and ALL fishing of any kind. If you don't support that initiative, you are talking out of both sides of your mouth.:twocents:
 
#136 Ā·
Bill has taken a beating here. He has asked some very good questions that no one has answered.

When he projected a very possible answer, it was easily dismissed!

WHY?

Does anyone know the answers to his questions?

And if not, how do you know his is not right?
Proponents of this initiative would like to have the vote of sport fishermen so when I point out that a spring chinook commercial seine season will last many times longer than the current gill net seasons they really don`t want that to be known or thought about. Columbia river sport fishermen know that fishing is lousy after a commercial season, which was 2 days this year{so far}. Having a spring commercial season lasting 30 days or more would be devastating to sport spring chinook fishermen.
-
Coming soon, my prediction on what a summer/fall seining season will look like. Bill
 
#135 Ā·
What's your opinion on using excluders at the dam to sort out hatchery fish?
Perhaps the Tribes could take a portion of their quota in hatchery fish sorted at the dam.
 
#150 Ā·
If the tribes decide they want to do it and USACE is cool with it then you have no problem.

Where and how they die has no affect on ESA recovery.
 
#140 Ā·
Do our part meaning watch fish stock die off? There has been too many changes to spawning areas to have any recovery of native fish. Some studies quote 85% of traditional spawning areas are destroyed. Do you really think if we just remove hatchery fish big changes will occur?

We could outlaw all fishing, commercial and sport angling and they would not recover. It's a pipe dream.
 
#145 Ā·
Sounds like it will destroy springer fishing in the Willamette which is where I do 90% of my springer fishing. I'd personally rather see the Columbia shut down all together than have the commercial fleet take substantially more of the Willamette bound springers before I even have a chance to fish for them. I know it's a little selfish but that's just how I feel. Removing more hatchery fish in the lower Columbia is not good for me no matter how people spin it.
 
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