Salmonhawk -
I could not agree more - the fishers and the recreational fishers have absorbed more than our share of the burden of conservation for the wild salmon resource. That of course is the result of a couple factors. It is entirely poltical/economic that society has opted to use the vast majority of the inherent historic productive of the populations for uses other than fishing. Also as we all are aware the law of the land says that the treaty tribes are entitled to pound of flesh.
We all need to remember that even in selective fisheries the are wild fish mortalities - selecitve fisheries provide incresaed access to hatchery fish while potentially holding wild fish impacts to acceptable levels but wild fish are dying. As long we recreational anglers continue to insist that much of our fishing is in various mix stock fisheries we will always be limited to the weakest stock and will not be able to harvest our "full" share of the other stocks leaving those fish for more terminal areas. From the tribal prespective that is the State"s choice. The full non-treaty share could easily be harvested in each terminal area without those wasteful mixed stock fisheries if nets were used to harvest those fish. However thankfully the State has opted to fore go some of that harvest some of those fish to provide those mixed stock recreational fisheries because to provides lots of opportunity which of course equates to more economic value but remember that is a choice.
Nelly -
Why from the fish's point of view is it less damaging to kill them in a mixed stock recreation fishery than a terminal gill net? I can see why for an economic or society point of view that it makes sense to have those mixed stock fisheries however that decision is clearly a "political" based decision.
While I was out of state when all the discussion about the Elliot Bay fishery happened I suspec the time was driven in at least part by the timing of the tribal test fishery. However once again I must stress the undrelying issue with those green river wild fish continues to be that hatchery and wild fish are treated the same as when it comes to natural spawning. It is that allows decisions such as the one we just saw. Unfortuantely the tribe seems to hold nearly all the cards in this case and I suspect that we will continue to be frustrated.
Tight lines
Curt