The silver lining is that they hardly planted any summer runs so there are no fish anyway. That ought to make you feel better.

 

The Stilly was open less than 12 days? It's only made worse because the season length on both rivers has nothing to do with conservation. WDFW just says it does because they don't want to name the spineless jellyfish in the fish program who would rather throw freshwater sportfishing under the bus than offend the treaty tribes who have found them to be easy marks.

 

Skagit was open for all of Jan plus 12 days. Stilly was only open for June. There is a chance it reopens in October but I'm not holding my breath.

 

The regs say it opens back up Oct. 16th. I predict heavy rains to start a couple of days before that and the river won't be fishable until Christmas when the temperature drops to around 10 degrees.

 

I'm betting on emergency closure to protect the coho from legal anglers targeting steelhead, all the while the poachers illegally targeting coho have free reign.

 

Damm ,I missed the chance to catch a deer creek fish

 

I tried and failed....river was as gorgeous as ever though.

 

The situation with the Stilly is infuriating indeed. According to the game warden I talked to up there they are justifing the summer closures because of the locals snagging Kings.

 

Note to officials, poachers don't care if the river is closed , in fact they prefer it less eyes to witness thier activities & also unlikely any law enforcement patrolling the river as there is less potential for ticket writing as when the river is open....

 

Hadn't fished Stilly much since the 90's. Decided to relearn the river this year and have so far spent 7 days and hiked and fished pretty much everything from French Creek to below the slide and a couple spots below Deer Creek. No Steelhead but a few nice 15-18" resident trout ate my moose turds.
One guy getting ready to fish gear when I was walking out of C post on Fathers Day. Told him it was fly only. I'm sure he cared.

 

To be fair WDFW staff; especially at the local level worked very hard during the NOF process to restore/keep game fish seasons on the Skagit and Stillaguamish. They were successful on the Skagit and as hard as it may be to believe current seasons are better than what was the starting point during the early discussions.

The underlying problem is as a result of the State attempting to get its own ESA take permit several years ago and the resulting failure to achieve ESA coverage for non-treaty salmon fisheries the non-treaty fishers are fishing under what is essentially the tribal permit. If there isn't agreement on the season package coming out of NOF NOAA will not approve the season under ESA. However as was demonstrated in the aftermath of the ill fated at separate permits the tribes through their BIA nexus would be able to get their own take permit in a matter of weeks. The State lacking that nexus (and other factors) has been told by NOAA that they are unlikely to receive a take permit or at best it would take18 or more months to do so. As a result if the tribes or an individual tribe object to a non-treaty fishery the rest of the non-treaty fisheries are held hostage until the State caves. The harsh reality given the choice between a game fish season on the Stillaguamish and ocean salmon seasons the game fish loses every time.

A potential long term solution is once again having all the co-manager fisheries covered by a single co-manager permit. Just so that happening before 2020 (if then).

Previous to 2018 the Stillaguamish game fish closure were driven by wild coho concerns this season the issue was Chinook concerns. The Stillaguamish wild Chinook are in serious trouble due largely habitat issues. In my opinion the perceived impacts (hooking mortality, poaching, and redd damage from wading anglers) during game fish are over-blown and largely bogus.

Curt

 

The term "co-managers" seems largely bogus.

 

*Assistant to the Co-manager

 

And after the NOF debacle of 2016, if WDFW had pursued its own Section 10 PS take permit, it would have been done six months ago, and this nonsense of the tail wagging the dog would be history.

 

And the howling from the short sighted saltwater rec anglers that were going to lose their seasons during the 18 months is still echoing off the cascade mountains. It was at this precise moment in 2016 that the still new WDFW director figured out who runs things around here...and the tribes made a couple more turns of the screw.

Eventually, we will be buying our fishing license from the treaty tribes...

 

NF Stilly was closed due to concerns that water temperatures could hypothetically rise into the mid 60s.

 

I'd be curious to know who/where you heard this.

 

Some historical data.

Let's play it safe this summer.

 

Thank you @DimeBrite for providing the temp' chart.
However it's not dissimilar to the temp's shown on many of the rivers that flow off both the west as well as the eastern slopes of the Cascades that contain trout, steelhead and salmon that remain open.

Here is a link to WA. Dept of Ecology summer temp's of many of these rivers. You can open the links to many rivers to illustrate similar summertime diurnal temp's. as the N.F. Stillaguamish;

https://fortress.wa.gov/ecy/eap/riverwq/regions/state_ContTemp.asp

Again, I'm still respectfully curious where these "concerns" you mentioned were carried out, and by whom...

 

Lorraine Loomis

http://www.sequimgazette.com/opinion/guest-opinion-poor-salm

 

From that article:
The good news is that ocean temperatures are cooling. We have also seen a wet winter with a larger snowpack that will help our rivers and streams run higher and colder this summer.

 

Dimebrite-
You are correct that those fishing on the North Fork Stillaguamish and a number of other rivers in the region should always be aware of and concern with evaluated temperatures and what the impact on fish being caught when during the periods of high temperatures. For more than 30 years there have been period summer closures via emergency regulations.

However there is more to the North Fork Stillaguamish game fish closures this year than just concern over evaluated temperatures. Remember the closure is for the period July first through the 15 of October. As the graph you provided clearly during the later portion of that closure period temperatures are not an issue. Reportedly the tribes were concern about the numbers of Chinook anglers targeting summer steelhead or sea-run cutthroat might encounter as well the impacts by wading anglers on Chinook redds. It is my opinion that those concerns are largely bogus. The tribal folks apparently were not receptive to regulation changes such as eliminating weighted flies that might reduce potential impacts on the Chinook.

Curt

 

While fishing summer steelhead on the NF Stilly from 1972 to 1991 I caught three incidental summer Chinook. Steelhead and sea run cutthroat fishermen must be a less acceptable threat to Chinook than the annual mob of poachers on the NF. I've seen everything from dynamite and divers with spear guns used to take Chinook there. The occasional conventional gear fishermen fishing illegally are almost a blessing in comparison.

 

Makes me wonder how many Chinook (and Coho, etc.) will be taken during the closed season this year...
I’ve never touched a Chinook while fly fishing for Searun Cutthroat.

 

Greg, the estimated number of "saved" coho on the Stilly closure last year was 1.4.

 

I remember that number. They’re all worth saving. But 4/10’s of a coho?

 

4/10's is probably the gonads

 

4/10s of a coho pretty much describes most of the 2015 run.

 

Maybe they will accidently leave the stilly open like they did elwha tribs