Good question, Kent.
I'd say that since they are on creeks/streams, the season is meant to coincide with the general stream opener. Where does the "upper end" of a beaver pond end and the creek begin? And since some beaver ponds are quite small, they are just part of the creek. Maybe also, since it is possible for them to get blown out, they are not considered pemanent ponds.
Just a bunch of wild guesses.

Jimbo

 

Gotta say jim is right on, anadromous fish could use them or bypass them.

 

Not all beaver ponds fall into the catagory(sp). If you read the regs you will find out that some of them are open. You just have to know to see. I know this doesn't make any sense but I don't want to tell out here for all to see.

Jim

 

I agree with Jim Wallace. It's hard enough for the game dept to enforce the rules on our rivers. If they had to debate with anglers on whether or not a section of a river qualified as a beaver pond, it would just get tougher.

Pete

 

I agree. When I was a kid, my first experience with a fly (mosquito pattern) was hooking tiny fish behind a beaver pond by my house. Later I found out they were salmon fry\smolt...

 

Beaver lake, open year-round, in Clallam County, NW of Sappho, is almost like a huge beaver pond. There's a beaver dam at the end of the lake where the outlet stream flows out. :ray1:

Jimbo

 

Good thoughts all. It sounds like most of you think ease of enforcement is the main reason.

To be the devil's advocate though, I'm kinda thinking that setting the season the same as seasonal lakes or streams to coordinate enforcement was an afterthought, rather than a primary reason since even WDFW can't point to a reason why the beaver pond restriction was originally put into place.

Here's an example of how arbitrary the season is: some lakes and streams are open all year while other are not. Why should ALL beaver ponds be aribitrarily closed? If enforcement was really a consideration, it'd be a hell of a lot easier to simply close ALL lakes and streams.

And what about lakes or ponds where there is no flowing inlet or outlet but yet where beavers have decided to set up house? I can think of several lakes that have beaver lodges on them but no dams since the lakes are spring-fed and their 'outlet' is simply a boggy wetland that seeps away slightly downhill. They're named lakes, not dammed up creeks, but closed nonetheless, because beavers happen to live there.

K

 

.

 

What about the other situation - wich could be closer to what Kent has in mind really .... where a beaver one day decides to put a few sticks across a small creek that is normally open year round forming just the slightest backup. Is that little 'dam' creating a beaver pond and is that section now closed??

Personally I think if the creek is year round, and the pond isn't really a pond - i'd say it's probably legal to fish...

 

Juvenile anadromous fish.

Randy Knapp

 

I agree Randy. But in the case I (and I'm pretty sure Kent) have in mind, there are no anadromous fish.

 

Here's a link to an article from the WDFW about this. It isn't about the fishing dates but, more about what they are trying to accomplish, looks to me they are still in the process of gathering information and data.

http://wdfw.wa.gov/fish/papers/floodplain_wetlands/index.htm

 

No doubt beaver pond type habitat is key rearing juvi salmonids. The question is are the fish wild or rampant brookies? I agree, rivers should be qualified under the reg.

 

The guys have pretty much correct the big concern with some of the lowland beaver ponds in Western Washington is with anadromous fish, specifically coho and sea-run cutthroat. On those low elvevation/low gradient streams beaver ponds can be very important to the coastal cutthroat.

The other issue is what the heck is a beaver pond?
Many folks have attempted to define what a beaver pond may be - much more diffiicult that one would think. Just one example someone mentioned beaver lodges as a key feature of a beaver dam. Many of our beavers do not built classic lodges but rather live in burrows in the mud banks; in fact it appears to me that is the preferred lodge and the classic stick lodge isn't built unless there are not mud banks in which burrow into. Those burrows sometimes have stick lodges at their "doors". By their very nature beaver ponds are very transitory with lives varing from a few days to many decades depending on flows and food supplies for the beavers. In the majority of the cases many of the ponds are little more than just temporary wide spots in the streams and it seemed to make sense to continue to treat the ponds fish as if they were stream fish.


Evidently may folks do not realize just how much water there is in this state. In 1960 there were nearly 8,000 lakes/ponds and 10,000s of streams. To list all those waters would take a huge increase in pamphlet size. That is the major reason that the pamphlet is organized such as it is - that is with general seasons for most lakes and streams (accounting for the concervative needs of the resource) with a list of waters where special regulations are warranted. As long as key fish needs are placed above angler ease the general regulations are going to be "too restrictive" for some and fishing opportunities will be missed.

The issue of beavers daming an outlet of a lake is often pretty easily dealt with in that in most cases the lake is a named water and therefore treated as a lake. Are their exceptions that may cause confusion or lost opportunities? You betcha. However it seems to work for the vast majority of cases.

If you can find a fix why not suggest it in the next proposed changes to fishing regulation cycle but I would request that you continue to put the fish needs first.

Tight lines
Curt