Tag Archives: Salmon for All

The Columbia River Reform Plan – Letter: Thanks for reporting facts

After reading the letter “Don’t support gillnetting” (The Daily Astorian, March 7), I felt compelled to offer a factual response.,, The statement that the Columbia River endorsement fee on recreational licenses was intended to buy out or eliminate gillnetters is simply false. The money has been used for overall projected improvements to fisheries, including researching new off-channel select fishing areas (none were found viable), testing alternative gear (none proved to be better than gillnets), research and monitoring commercial fisheries, additional hatchery production to benefit both recreational and commercial fisheries, and commercial and recreational fisheries law enforcement. I am fairly confident most of the hardworking blue-collar commercial fishing families in the lower Columbia don’t worry much about the economy in Vancouver, Washington, where the author lives, but they sure care about their own, and so does The Daily Astorian. >click to read<10:43

Commercial fishermen want state to halt Columbia River gillnet ban

Commercial gillnetters said Oregon should halt its phased-in ban of their salmon fishing method in the main channel of the Columbia River. Speaking to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlfe Commission on Friday, panelists representing gillnetters said alternative commercial fishing methods are expensive or unproven, and plans to develop salmon runs in side channels show little promise. Astoria fisherman Jim Wells, president of , said only big migratory fish returns the past couple years have kept gillnetters operating. He said limiting gillnetting to the Columbia’s side channel sloughs will cost commercial anglers two-thirds of their income. Read the rest here 08:48