05/01/2005: "SAVING SALMON (In their own words)"

I miss the winter sport-fishing season. I was used to spending the cold rainy days out on the water catching salmon. Now fishing is closed during the good months of winter. Oppressive restrictions now strictly limit salmon fishing and the Department of Fish and Wildlife has become as autocratic in their authority as the Taliban. The numbers of fish keep declining and I feel guilty for trying to catch them. I wish there were something I could do to help. So I had an idea.

I thought that if salmon could talk they may be able to help us in our quest to save them. But have we really listened to them? So I tried a psychic mind meld with "scargill" the last old Chinook I caught. It worked. He went on a rant that sounded something like this,

" If you want to help us quit saving the damn whales and sea lions. They are picking us off like crazy. And bring back the bounty on seals for crying out loud. Seals are always chasing us around taking bites out of us".

"You people look ridiculous spewing over the rail of those whale-watch boats. What is the big deal anyway? You treat the whales like giant poodles. They're not cute little pets they're murderers! "

"If you want to save us why not put those whale watching boats to use as taxis to drop us off right in our spawning areas? Do you know how hard it is to swim up the river past the nets and dams?"

"And why did you let all the small fry's out of the hatcheries without first making sure there was enough to eat for the rest of us? What were you thinking? We need more snack food. Herring, anchovies, sand lance, surf smelt, any little darting fish would do."

"And you can tell the sport fishermen that we're getting smarter. The ones they catch don't live to spawn. They are the dumb ones. Not many of them are left in the gene pool. And those little glowing rattle lures are a joke. We would never fall for those."

" And if you think you are smart when you put those little tags in our noses, well that hurts. And we don't even run, we swim. I have never even owned a jogging suit. We would not be caught dead in shorts and sneakers either."

"If you want to help us don't love us to death. Take us out of the smokers and off the menus. Let some of us die a natural death and fertilize the riverbanks so trees can grow bigger to provide shade and then fall in when it floods. And tell the clowns at the Army Corps of Engineers to leave some deadheads in the little streams and rivers. We like to hide under them. And quit throwing your garbage in the rivers."

"And for heaven's sake stop using the sound like a toilet. Those people in Victoria should knock it off. We have to swim through their sewage and some of us don¹t make it. So that is how you can help us out!"

All right, I lied. I am not a fish psychic. But a fish-eye view of the world should be considered. There are things we can do to help. I just hope we can do it before we see the last of these flashing silver creatures.