[juro]

When I saw my first steelhead, I was stricken with awe. When I saw a steelhead last, I was also stricken with awe. A large part of me never leaves the pacific northwest.

Hearing these reports makes me realize, amidst all the excitement, that somewhere, somehow, someone deserves a thank you. Of course there is mass genocide of native strains all over the northwest, hatchery-based management policies are atrocious, poachers still lose their full punchcards every winter to get a new one, and we encroach further each day into the streams where wild fish are born... but because some people care, there can still be the miracle of native steelhead within minutes of the major metropolitan mecca of Seattle.

That's not to say there is cause for complacency, and no one is beating their chest... it's just that at times like these I just gotta stop and say thanks to the collective spirit of the conscientious steelheader.

I will raise a toast of single malt when I work my way home through this nasty nor'easter to the Wild Steelhead Coalition's charter year - native steelhead forever!

 

[NrthFrk16]

Thought brought a tear to my ear. It is our duty!
...and thank you!!!!, for giving us one Hell of a logo!!

THANKS!!!

 

[Crusty]

Single malt is in hand. Here's to you Juro, great board.

Crusty

 

[KerryS]

I kneel in the river with head held high, arms out stretched and give thanks for all I see and feel.

 

[Todd Ripley]

Nice note, Juro.

Another personal thanks for the job you did on our WSC logo. I'm envisioning it all over...

Will you be at Sunday's meeting? If so, I look forward to meeting you. If not, I suppose I still look forward to meeting you, just not Sunday!

Thanks.

 

[juro]

Todd -

Ya' know I just might be there some Sunday... even though I've since moved 3,000 miles east to Boston. But that never stopped me from arriving for the spring natives or fall greaselining since I left the pacific northwest.

I also look forward to meeting you, and if I know the gang - we'll on be swingin' a fly on a steelhead river any day now.

Juro

 

[Robert]

In this place, I think we all realize the gifts these rivers bring us. We realize also that gifts are meant to be exchanged.

I was walking down to Lyman bar the other day, taking the muddy path past the plunker fires, and just as I was about to break through the young willow shoots and out onto the bar I heard this strange moaning. It sounded like an old heron with larangitis. Out on the bar there was a wild haired fellow kneeling in the river, waving his arms and shaking his fists at the cloud covered sky. I didn't think it prudent to get to close. Maybe he had lost his checkbook. Walking back up the bar in stumbling twilight I found a checkbook once. I called the phone number on the checks from a phone booth in sedro Wooley. The address on the checks said Sedro Wooley. Nobody answered the phone so I dropped the checkbook in the night deposit box at the bank. Maybe it was his checkbook. Maybe he never got it back. Maybe he was just another fool steelheader with a fly rod kneeling in the river and waving his arms around. Ectasy will do that to a person.

Hey and check this out. These people have been fighting the good fight for a good long while. The Osprey newsletter is a leader in bringing the latest in updates on current science, politics, policies, and the state of our wild steelhead through out their range. Check it out, then subscribe.

<!--http--><a href="http://www.fedflyfishers.org/Osprey99.htm" target="_blank">The Osprey Newsletter</a><!--url-->

 

[KerryS]

Hey,
I resemble that guy kneeling in the river waving his arms around but, I didn't see you or lose my check book. Your hyperlink doesn't work.

 

[Doublespey]

The link works for me, but the date's sure archaic (spring 1999).

I remember teasing Steve about his "Steelheading in Ancient Times" article, and that was quite a while ago.

The Osprey's a neat paper, but how often do they put it out?

 

[Robert]

The Osprey people decided to put a selection of older articles on the web, hence the 1999 date. I think they missed a couple of past issues due to editor problems but they are back on helm now with a new editor. They publish 3 times a year and issue 38 just arrived. Some good articles on the Skeena, Umpqua, and the latest updates on wild steelhead stock status.

Kerry, lucky you! If I ever find your check book I'll probably go out and buy you a new rod, reel, and drift boat. Might take me a few years to deliver them though.

 

[KerryS]

If you found my check book it would take more than a couple of years to get your stuff. LOL No money in my account! By the way the link did work for me a little later.

 

[Robert]

02/20/2001
Bob Mottram ; The News Tribune

Washington's saltwater fly-fishing community has won an in-writing acknowledgement from the state Fish and Wildlife Commission that the state will manage specifically for catch-and-release << salmon>> fisheries as well as for catch-and-keep sport fisheries.

The acknowledgement is contained in the commission's recently adopted North of Falcon policy for 2001. The policy is named for the federal-state-tribal process under which co-managers negotiate each spring to set << salmon-fishing>> regulations for state waters in the area from Cape Falcon on the northern Oregon coast to Olympia on Puget Sound.

The new policy says that when managing sport fisheries, "meaningful recreational fishing opportunities will reflect the diverse interests of fishers, including retention and catch-and-release fisheries."

The Department of Fish and Wildlife told the commission that this had been "an implicit intent in past years, but a number of constituents have requested more explicit recognition."
Some anglers, including fly-fishing groups, have pressed the state for catch-and-release seasons in the belief that it allows fishing to continue during some periods when it otherwise would be closed to avoid exceeding catch quotas.

Another new provision in the policy puts into writing what the department said had been "a traditional exception" to the general practice of allocating most chum, pink and sockeye << salmon>> to commercial netters. The exception is for Lake Washington sockeye, and the policy now specifies that the first 200,000 of those fish harvested by non-Indians will go to recreational fishermen. For allowable non-tribal harvests above that level, the policy says, commercial harvest "will be considered."

Most non-tribal commercial sockeye fishing in Washington is directed at Fraser River fish.
Commercial fishing representatives who spoke at the commission meeting acknowledged that recreational anglers traditionally have had first shot at the Lake Washington fish in years when their abundance was great enough to allow a harvest. They objected, however, to including a specific threshold number in the policy. One spokesman also pointed out that, because federal courts have ordered a 50-50 sharing of harvest opportunity between treaty Indians and others, the return to Lake Washington would have to reach 400,000 harvestable fish before non-Indian commercial fishing would be considered.

Another new part of the policy acknowledges an intent that "recreational opportunities will be distributed equitably across fishing areas" throughout Puget Sound.
No explicit formula for that can be established, the department said, but the agency will try to ensure "that individual fishing areas are not unfairly disadvantaged when looking at the balance of available recreational opportunities."

In the past, the department has managed marine fisheries around Tacoma more liberally than those in most other parts of the region because most of the fish returning to the Tacoma area have been hatchery << salmon>> and not endangered stocks.
In the Columbia River, the policy says, commercial and recreational fishing opportunity will be scheduled "to provide a balanced opportunity to each fleet."
In Willapa Bay, harvest will be managed so as to provide "meaningful" opportunities for both recreational and commercial fishermen.

The new policy directs the department to increase effective public involvement in the North of Falcon process, and directs it to "strive to include representatives of recreational and commercial participants . . . as observers during appropriate state/tribal discussions of fishery issues."

The department said it has not received any response to a letter sent in October to the tribes by state Fish and Wildlife Director Jeff Koenings asking them to agree to allow non-Indian fishing representatives to observe some of the negotiations between state and tribes.
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* Reach staff writer Bob Mottram at 253-597-8640, or [email protected]
© The News Tribune