Derelict fishing gear

HauntedByWaters

Life of the Party
I don’t have time to reply to quotes but there is some legit local info in this thread I 100% agree on.

I am from Bellingham and first fished that area in the mid 1990s. I have seen shit like that “since time immortal” around there as it was said in this thread. It is a very regular occurrence, as in every Fall it happens.

About 12 years ago some locals including a fly guide some know here did a run in a jet boat and video taped and snapped pictures of the nets. They alerted the tribe to it and basically heard back from lawyers and were told that they weren’t even allowed to photo or video tape tribal fishing activities so the evidence was basically illegal. These guys that put this together were members of CCA so maybe that is why the tribes came at them full spray, I don’t really know. There was nothing productive from that endeavor.

This is just history repeating until, as another poster put it, WDFW understands that the people doing this specifically are “shitheads” regardless of blood. That holds true for a lot of societal problems. We are standing by and letting very bad things happen counter to all the aggressive laws we have to protect and deter such activities. It’s the type of thing the powers that be don’t even really want to know about. When I realized that it did make me very sad and still does.

Every fisherman in the PNW goes through a metamorphosis, seeing this and seeing what is allowed/ignored out here is part of that metamorphosis. This reminds me of the undergrads in my labs during grad school who wanted to work for WDFW to save fish…..Bless their hearts!
 

Buzzy

I prefer to call them strike indicators.
Forum Supporter
There was an unspoken rule with my hombres that if you saw Bev with a fish on, you stopped what you were doing and helped her land it. She was always very nice and appreciated the help. She reminded me of a heron the way she fished.
I don't remember his name but the woman was "Wendy". She fished gear. And was really good at it.
 
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skyriver

Life of the Party
Forum Supporter
Speaking of shitheads. How about this asshole.
SF

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This reminded me of a very old memory. I was just 7 or 8 and we were visiting my uncle's place in SW Washington. He had a creek that ran through his property and it was full of salmon.
I thought it was amazing seeing all those fish.

As I got older I realized that there was a reason there were so many fish in the spot we saw them. My uncle had put in a barrier of some sort so the silvers couldn't keep going. He didn't kill/eat mass fish or sell them. He just liked seeing them. I think he also used several every year as fertilizer.

Not sure what he knew or thought about the laws back then (1970s). He probably thought it was his creek and he could do what he wanted. Hell, he was from Oklahoma. Total Grapes of Wrath type of family.

I always wonder how much of that type of thing goes on these days. Some private stewards are better than the state, but some (like my uncle) are far worse. Think about all the salmon and steelhead habitat on private land.
 

O' Clarkii Stomias

Landlocked Atlantic Salmon
Forum Supporter
This reminded me of a very old memory. I was just 7 or 8 and we were visiting my uncle's place in SW Washington. He had a creek that ran through his property and it was full of salmon.
I thought it was amazing seeing all those fish.

As I got older I realized that there was a reason there were so many fish in the spot we saw them. My uncle had put in a barrier of some sort so the silvers couldn't keep going. He didn't kill/eat mass fish or sell them. He just liked seeing them. I think he also used several every year as fertilizer.

Not sure what he knew or thought about the laws back then (1970s). He probably thought it was his creek and he could do what he wanted. Hell, he was from Oklahoma. Total Grapes of Wrath type of family.

I always wonder how much of that type of thing goes on these days. Some private stewards are better than the state, but some (like my uncle) are far worse. Think about all the salmon and steelhead habitat on private land.
You can't look at the behaviors of the 20th century thru the lens of the 21st century.
 

HauntedByWaters

Life of the Party
You can't look at the behaviors of the 20th century thru the lens of the 21st century.

True. I remember when I was young and Senator Slade Gorton was seen as a major impediment to protecting fish in WA. He was simply a dinosaur. He literally has quotes from the 1950s saying that there were too many natural resources in WA to even worry about them. It is so much easier to just believe the world is limitless.
 

Chris Johnson

Steelhead
Years ago a friend of mine saw an eddy net all tangled on the bank with three rotten Steelhead in it. He pulled the net into the back of his truck and took it to the local sports shop, called fish and game and the local news paper. When everyone showed up the warden looked in the back of his truck and said "If you do that again I'll have to arrest you". Then he took the net and left. Don't touch the net, call the law.
 

Dustin Chromers

Life of the Party
Forum Supporter
Years ago a friend of mine saw an eddy net all tangled on the bank with three rotten Steelhead in it. He pulled the net into the back of his truck and took it to the local sports shop, called fish and game and the local news paper. When everyone showed up the warden looked in the back of his truck and said "If you do that again I'll have to arrest you". Then he took the net and left. Don't touch the net, call the law.

So the real question is why is WDFW running interference for this sort of obviously destructive bad behaviour.
 

skyrise

Steelhead
Did the right thing to start with but you can call the nearest tribal office and report this and you can call a tribal office that is the next closest or neighboring tribe. Sometimes one tribe will bitch out another tribe for wasting or acting like S-heads. The Tulalip tribe have a pretty fair enforcement going and I have met a couple of enforcement guys through my family. And then there is the local news paper. Send them pictures tell them the location and who knows maybe they would post it and if they have a Facebook page post it there also. Does the WDFW still have a Derelict gear phone number for reporting ? Who cares if it’s not saltwater. Heck post it on the WDFW Facebook page with pictures. Post it on the local town’s facebook page.
 

HauntedByWaters

Life of the Party
Did the right thing to start with but you can call the nearest tribal office and report this and you can call a tribal office that is the next closest or neighboring tribe. Sometimes one tribe will bitch out another tribe for wasting or acting like S-heads. The Tulalip tribe have a pretty fair enforcement going and I have met a couple of enforcement guys through my family. And then there is the local news paper. Send them pictures tell them the location and who knows maybe they would post it and if they have a Facebook page post it there also. Does the WDFW still have a Derelict gear phone number for reporting ? Who cares if it’s not saltwater. Heck post it on the WDFW Facebook page with pictures. Post it on the local town’s facebook page.

You are naive or speaking from an era that no longer exists. The media and WDFW won’t touch this stuff from a low altitude orbit. As was said earlier in this thread, we cannot legally take photos of tribal fishing activities. Even if we could the discussion would be about history and racism and not about nets killing protected fish for no reason whatsoever.
 

kerrys

Ignored Member
As was said earlier in this thread, we cannot legally take photos of tribal fishing activities.
This is not true. A photographer can shoot anything he or she wants when working from any area that is legally accessible by the public, i.e. roads, walkways, waterways, bridges, public lands, etc. This has been challenged repeatedly in US courts.
 

HauntedByWaters

Life of the Party
This is not true. A photographer can shoot anything he or she wants when working from any area that is legally accessible by the public, i.e. roads, walkways, waterways, bridges, public lands, etc. This has been challenged repeatedly in US courts.

I’m not the expert I just know what I have been told. Either way I don’t think the media will touch this stuff.
 

kerrys

Ignored Member
I’m not the expert I just know what I have been told. Either way I don’t think the media will touch this stuff.
I have no idea what the media will or will not touch. Seems they don’t fear much. I do know that I can take photographs or video from publicly accessible space of anything I want with the only exception being some active crime scenes.
 

Paige

Wishing I was fishing the Sauk
Did the right thing to start with but you can call the nearest tribal office and report this and you can call a tribal office that is the next closest or neighboring tribe. Sometimes one tribe will bitch out another tribe for wasting or acting like S-heads. The Tulalip tribe have a pretty fair enforcement going and I have met a couple of enforcement guys through my family. And then there is the local news paper. Send them pictures tell them the location and who knows maybe they would post it and if they have a Facebook page post it there also. Does the WDFW still have a Derelict gear phone number for reporting ? Who cares if it’s not saltwater. Heck post it on the WDFW Facebook page with pictures. Post it on the local town’s facebook page.


Wasn't a Tulaip warden busted for poaching crab?
 
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_WW_

Geriatric Skagit Swinger
Forum Supporter
Let's think this through a bit.
You take a shot of a derelict net.
They jump on you for taking pics of their net.
So now we know who it belongs to. :)

When notifying the media or authorities I would refer to it as a derelict poachers net. You'd probably get a little more reaction out of them...
 

speedbird

Life of the Party
Forum Supporter
You are naive or speaking from an era that no longer exists. The media and WDFW won’t touch this stuff from a low altitude orbit. As was said earlier in this thread, we cannot legally take photos of tribal fishing activities. Even if we could the discussion would be about history and racism and not about nets killing protected fish for no reason whatsoever.
Photography is absolutely legally protected and anyone who told you otherwise was lying for their own gain. Media in Canada was more than happy to cover the Sockeye wasting I mentioned earlier. I am sure plenty of US stations will pick up on it. I would argue it is naive to think that anyone truly believes the tribes do no wrong
 
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