Listing Won’t Soon Affect Fishing
Steelhead fishing this fall will not be affected by the recent listing of wild Idaho steelhead under the federal Endangered Species Act.
The National Marine Fisheries Service announced Aug. 11 that Idaho’s wild steelhead would be included in its listing of many Northwest steelhead runs under the Endangered Species Act. The move, although anticipated for some time, had been opposed by the Idaho Fish and Game Commission and the state Fish and Game Department.
“We do not expect any adverse effects on steelhead fishing opportunity in the short term,” said fisheries chief Steve Huffaker. “If there are negative effects, they will most likely come later as restrictions to our ability to produce and stock hatchery steelhead in the numbers and places we need to stock them to optimize returns to the sport fishery.”
Idaho outlawed harvest of wild steelhead after the 1984 fishing season. Where wild steelhead may be caught, barbless hooks are required and wild fish must be returned, unharmed, to the water immediately.
License automation possible
Buying a Washington hunting or fishing license may become simpler by 1999 if proposals being considered by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife are adopted.
The department is considering two ways to streamline license-buying, simplifying the license structure and automating the license system. The proposals are up for public review.
Three alternative fishing-license simplification packages are being considered:
A basic license package with enhancement fees for premium species.
Flat-rate licenses for freshwater and saltwater fishing with pro-rated enhancement fees incorporated into the license.
Saltwater licenses that include the full Puget Sound enhancement fee and freshwater licenses that include the full warmwater enhancement fee and individual species fees.
A similar effort is being made to repackage hunting licenses into a format that separates big-game and small-game species and allows more bear- and cougar-hunting opportunities.
The automation proposal, dubbed Washington Integrated License Database (WILD), may result in a computerized licensing system that would produce credit card-size licenses. Licenses would bear basic identification information and a recreational use number that could access a database with a card-holder’s current license information.
Members of the public who wish to comment may request a survey by writing Maria Hug, Automated Sportsmen’s Database System (ASDS) Project Leader, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, 600 Capitol Way N., Olympia, WA 98501-1091, or by phoning (360) 902-2433.
Safety class scheduled
The Washington State University Cooperative Extension, Whitman County, will sponsor a hunter’s safety class Sept. 8-11 in Colfax with a field day on Sept. 13.
Classes will be held 6-9 p.m. in the Public Service Building. Hunters must attend all class sessions to become certified.
There is a $5 charge. The class is limited to 25 people.
To register or seek further information, telephone the WSU Cooperative Extension at (509) 397-6290.
Lower limit proposed
Montana biologists have proposed that daily and possession limits for rainbow trout on the Missouri River be lowered to protect the population.
The Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks said the recommendation is for the daily rainbow limit to drop from five, one of which can be larger than 18 inches, to three per day, one larger than 16 inches.
The limits would be imposed on the river between Holter Dam and the town of Cascade.
Steve Leathe, a regional fisheries manager, said anglers are catching nearly 30 percent of the catchable fish in some areas downstream of Holter Dam. That, in addition to natural fish deaths, is reducing the population too much, he said, and a safer level would be 20 percent a year.
Leathe said there also is concern about whirling disease, which has been discovered in the river.
“The rainbow populations are still healthy,” Leathe said, “but we’re going into a whirling disease environment, and we’ll probably begin to lose at least a few young fish each year to the disease.”
The proposed limits will go before the Fish, Wildlife and Parks Commission Sept. 4. If adopted, there will be a public comment period, and final regulations will go into effect March 1, 1998.
BASS suit bound for trial
A federal judge in Montgomery, Ala., has refused to dismiss a Kansas man’s lawsuit accusing a national bass fishing organization and founder Ray Scott of illegally profiting from millions of dollars in member payments.
U.S. District Judge Ira DeMent, in a ruling released Aug. 5, rejected claims by Scott and others with the Bass Angler Sportsman Society that the suit should be thrown out.
The ruling allows a trial to be held on the suit filed in 1992 by Bradley Murray of Kansas. No trial date is set.
The suit claims the fishing society founded by Scott in the 1960s led members to believe they were joining a conservation-oriented effort. But in 1969, the suit alleges, Scott turned BASS into a profit-making corporation.
Contribution redirected
A $25,000 contribution from the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, initially scheduled for emergency elk feeding near Yakima, has been redirected to habitat-enhancement projects on the department’s winter range within the Oak Creek, Wenas and L.T. Murray wildlife areas.
After the RMEF had committed funds in answer to the department’s request for emergency winter feeding funds, the Legislature provided funding to sustain feeding efforts. As a result, the RMEF directed its money.
, DataTimes