Reply #8

[BigJim]

My idea is all those guys fishing for hatcheries can have those fish, am I going to go to elbow to elbow for those fish? No. I did it at reiter and walking up and seeing thirty guys and trying to slip in and ask somebody if its alright if I fish next to him knowing that he would rather I jump back in my rig although I am fishing no closer to him as he is to the next guy is not fun to me.

 Wild Steelhead mortality is known, and yes there is going to be some mistakes and mishaps but when Daredevle I think said 10% I think that may be a bit high for a seasoned steelheader. I don't consider myself a seasoned steelheader but I wouldn't say my handling is all that bad, I still learn as I learned I hate wool gloves for nates.(Which should be put somewhere on some website when it comes to proper CNR practices because those things suck up so much slime.) I am confident my fish that I wore gloves with will spawn and do just fine this year but I may be wrong to think he will be returning as a kelt. Who knows.

 I don't only fish nates, and wouldn't think anyone does. But I am sure not going to Terminal Zone elbow to elbow for some hatchery fish. Do I have a problem with hatcheries? Yes, I have always thought these things hurt wild fish when I first heard that they hurt wild fish, but I didn't understand why until recently.

 I am pretty sure the reason why, seeing as no one ever fully told me why these hatchery fish hurt the nates is well they spawn with nates and everyone knows that. This weekend we even found a buck doing so( he was quickly dispatched). But I think the real damage is a river can only support so many fish during a certain period of time, steelhead can't just say hey I need to get out of this river.... theres not enough food and hit the salt like pinks do right off the bat. They stick in the rivers, I have seen so many smolt chasing spoons and even hooked some and some of them were 12 inches. So if River X can support 3000 steelhead smolt throughout the year and there are 35000 native smolt possible and 15000 hatchery smolt released you have 50000 smolt fighting for 3000 spots, those 35000 natives could wreck shop and take over all the spots if they didnt have to compete with the brats but the brats are going to win some of those spots. And you(no one in particular) may think survival of the fittest but thats like dumping a bunch of brookies into the carbon the same time the nate smolts are rolling around and asking why there is less nates in two years. I am not for hatchery or nate I am for biodiversity and every time we lose another subspecies we all lose something.

 There is no more wild steelhead on multiple streams.
 No Summer chums left, maybe a run or two.
 I never heard of a summer Coho until this weekend. There is so many runs we have lost or are going to lose and one of the reasons for some of them are hatcheries. If they want to keep hatcheries open, at least broodstock with the native fish, let the brats come in early let people bonk them all. But the true nates need to be released. BC has a way better hatchery program then we do, we got Skamania all over the place. And if you want to talk about a failed hatchery program talk about the hatcheries that close to meet broodstock requirements, any program that needs to close for that needs to be shut down. And the Carbon River Hatchery Steelhead program is a complete joke. When 195000 are released and 3 return there is a huge problem with that stock( can't remember exact numbers but something like that.) Those Skamania fish are not Carbon worthy, the nates are full bodied monsters, big shoulders and brutish as can be. The Skamania is a trout compared to those fish. And no wonder why the nates do so much better, other than nets.... which probably have something to do with the crappy return for those hatchery fish but that river is a mean silty mess in the summer, I couldn't imagine a trout chilling in there it just doesn't seem possible but they do.

 Rant done.