Save the Cowichan

R

reel addiction

Guest
With the amount of traffic on the river I think we should rally together and get the Cowie about 10,000 Steelhead for a return every year!
Its a great river that is totally under utilized, it should hold alot more fish than it does!
Lets get together and hold a dinner to buy a bunch of steelhead smolts to help SAVE the Cowichan.
Everyone needs to do their part to save the river!
I USE IT, YOU USE IT, NOW DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!!!!
 
I have a house on the Cowichan River and have seen a huge influx of both bank and boat anglers. Just today me and my wife were in the backyard burning composte when a fishrite driftboat came down with two anglers. I havnt seen this boat on the river before so I can only assume its new to our flow. Both of these young guys seemed to know what the were doing as I personally watched the one fellow in the front hook two steelhead within ten minutes right infront of my house. The one fish was bonked and I can only hope that it was a hatchery fish. The other fish was hooked and took a massive run down river they had to pull anchor and give chase! I can only imagine how many fish these guys were into on there drift today! I wish I could afford a drifboat, as they say fishrite or don't fish at all.
 
While it is legal to keep 2 hatchery steelhead on V.I., anybody who keeps a steely from the Cowie is totally irresponsible and should be dealt with by the angling community and removed from the system. If you want to eat fish that bad then go to the lake and keep your limit of hatchery trout - that's what they're there for. There is simply no reason to keep a steelhead anymore, especially from the Cowichan, you people need to give your head a shake! It's 2007 and given the state of the steelhead species as a whole we need to think about conservation.
BL
 
ya its pretty disgusting when some one kills a steelhead on the cowichan when it only supports a couple thousand fish if that.
 
Can you just "buy" smolts for a river? I thought that they would only plant smolts where the parent fish originated from that river. If they just planted fish without regard to the genetics, we'd have issues similar to those that Oregon has had.

Oregon once tried to plant chum where the parent fish originated from the Kamchatka Peninsula. I believe they only got 7 back out of thousands of fish planted.
 
Fishing is a blood sport and if you want a politically correct afterglow maybe you should golf instead. Eating your catch every now and then will serve to remind you that fish are not toys put in the river for the exercise of your expensive equipment. This catch and release only mentality is seen by many as absurd; playing with, traumatizing and sressing out wild animals for the entertainment value alone. All of this is misguided morality against someone dignifying fishing by killing and eating what they catch.
 
The problem is not taking fish, the problem is taking fish from run that is extremely endangered and facing the highest level of pressure its seen in years.

If you want fish to eat, go halibut, salmon or trout fishing - steelhead are far too precious.

Its not a "catch and release only" attitude, its a C&R attitude when the fish is endangered and barely supporting itself. I'm not sure if you understand but the fish has to be alive for it to create more baby fish - pretty simple concept.

How you can state that killing an endangered fish is some how doing it more justice then sore lipping it and letting it go is beyond me.

Maybe you should golf instead and just buy your fish at the store on the way home. Hell I'll give you fish if you stop killing steelhead.
 
So the taking of a hatchery Steel is wrong? The hatchery program exists for people to take fish, not for repopulation of the system. Personally I have only kept one Steelie in the last 3 years but will not judge another who chooses to retain his legal limit. It's his right to do so.
 
Originally posted by think big

... not for repopulation of the system.


Why not?
If a system is in trouble, the hatchery fish DO help repopulate the system. Taking hatchery fish is legal...that doesn't make it right.
 
so you're saying that Hatchery fish don't spawn.

If a fish is born in the river, be it from wild or hatchery parents then that resulting fish will in deed be wild.


If you want a blood sport take up kick boxing, not steelhead fishing.
 
I'll weigh in on this one as a homeowner and avid fisherman on the Cowichan River. Talking to fisheries biologists over the last ten years in the Cowichan Valley I have come to the understanding that hatchery fish have been put in the Cowichan River for one reason. That reason for sportfishing angling opportunities and not for repopulation of the wild stocks! Infact the biologists that I have spoken to would perfer no cross spawning of wild and hatchey fish! These fish are put in the river to be taken out and to minimize the rehooking of wild stock! And for this reason I do not see a problem with retaining hatchery steelhead on any system! Infact I believe your problem with the retention of hatchery fish lies not with the actual retention but with the fact that there are less fish for u to fish for!
 
think big, you are totally contradicting yourself with your comments, in one post you put, the fish are not put into the river as toys to excercise your whatever, then in the next post you put that the fish ARE put into the river for the fisherman to take, i dont really understand where your comin from, but anyway, its true that the hatchery fish are not for the intent for reproduction, but as it has been posted here they will reproduce IF givein the chance and the way i look at it if my kids get to go steelhead fishin 10-15 years from now and all they are able to catch are spawn of the wild and hacth, well then thats good, but if the miss imformed people out there keep killin every hatch fish they catch then i might as well not even bother teachin my kids how to fish for steelhead, what we need is for a more enhancement from the govt on the systems that see all these meat hunters, but we all know thats not goin to happen, so i would like to say you dont have to kill a hactchery steely just because you can, and one more thing if you are one of those people that think that hooking a fish and playin it out is harmful to the fish,well then, you dont know how to do it properly
ensure the future CATCH&RELEASE
 
D.G. what are you saying? Of course it's for sportfishing opportunities! More hatchery fish in the river means better fishing. Are you saying that you are in it for the meat? I believe your problem is that you fish for the wrong reasons.
BL
 
Wrong reasons? If getting out in mother nature and having the opportunity to hook some of these icredible fish is the wrong reasons, then I guess I'm guilty. I dont know why your waisting your time on your computer out in Sooke, you obiously know more than most biologists here in the Cow Valley. Not sure why they would ever let anglers retain hatchery steelhead if they were intended to replenish wild stocks on the Cowichan. Think ur missing the point and you should do some homework before spoutiong off!
 
yea fisheries biologists are always right, remember something called cod on the east coast, they did a good job there too, just because there is a retention doesnt mean we should bonk em, about 10 yrs ago i got so fed up with fishing on the cow, and i fished alot at least 5 times a wk, and i knew most guys on the river, and the mentallity back then was kill all hatchery as they are inferiour fish, and i argued the point back then that hatchery fish make wild fish, but too no avail i might, maybe thats why there isnt as many fish today as even 10 yrs ago, and it was bad then (from what others that had fished 15 yrs before me said), i had many days with over 10 fish hooked and 6 or more landed,
just my 2 cents;)
 
I think everyone missed the point!
The point was to make the river better and more fun for everyone by stocking 10,000 Steelhead smolts and having a river that you could have big number days all winter!!
I have been getting my share but it is nice to take a beginner out and fish all day and have them get a fish or two!
The stamp is a very successful system because of its hatchery and management and their is no reason the Cowie couldnt be the same.
Thats what i was getting at!!
 
I catch and tube the broodstock for the cowie and we get 15 pairs a year. The Stamp does 20 pairs i believe. We've got 10 pairs at the hatchery already as of 2 weeks ago. Thats not too much more than us. Water conditions play a big role in our system. Our river would have a probably six to seven times better run if we could fix the Clay bank problem. Most of our steelhead spawn in the lower sections of the river. They did a egg survival survey last year and the hatch rate on eggs laid in the upper river had a 98 percent survival rate and the percentage down below was less than one percent. Imagine if all those eggs laid in the lower river were to survive. Wow we'd have some wicked runs.
 
I think all us that work at hatcheries and have read this thread are all laughing right now at your bickering.

I know I am.
 
Thats what i mean, everyone ******* and doesnt do anything! What and or who do we need to talk to to fix the clay bank?
I thought they just spent a bunch on that or am i wrong?
Chicken wire and concrete will fix it right up!!LOL
What the biggest Steelie you have seen at the hatchery?
How many fish are in the system this year?
 
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