A sad thought

[Steelhead Guide]

I have noticed a trend and was trying to get some other opinions. This is going to be very generalized and not true of everyone but I notice that gear fisherman cut line, throw garbage on the bank, fish with barbed hooks. Gear fisherman seem to be less concerned about wild fish, and conservation.
Fly fishers seem to be much more consciencious of line clippings, barbs and reviving fish.
Why is this?
I hope everyone chimes in.

[shawn kempkes]

you can make that generalization because theres alot more of them. Especially on urban rivers like the american. It seems to pile up in terminal areas like hatcheries. The garbage gets really bad when summer comes and all the rafters are on the river.

[bait fisherman]

I notice it too and try to cleanup at least the balls of spent fishing line I find sometimes. I myself am a "gear guy" I guess, although I enjoy fly fishing for trout on occasion in the summer months . I think a lot of it is irresponsibility and the fact that gear fisherman use a lot more line, "line clippings" is not the litter we see, we are seeing the birds nest of 200 yards of mono that someone didn't want in there pocket or blew out the boat, fly guys use a couple feet of mono and if fly lines were as cheap and flimsy as mono you would see a lot more fly line in the bushes. There are probably 4 gear guys for every fly guy so the odds are stacked. I fish primarily salmon and steelhead on our north coast rivers and have witnessed gear fisherman and fly fisherman throw cigarette butts in the river or leave beer cans at the take out, but you ask-one more eco-conscious than the other? no I don't think so. I think we are all guilty at some point, but if we pack out ours and some of there's and say something when you see wrong being done well your more eco-conscious than most, and aren't we all trying to be better at that?

[mikel]

I think most fly guys are pretty "into" what's going on and what they are doing...and are more attuned to picking up trash, etc than the average Joe.

At the same time the bait/gear guys who are also "into" things in the same ways are meticulous about trash and etiquette. There are probably more of these guys than fly fishermen.

Then....there are the casuals. These are bait/gear guys because that's how most everybody that's casual about fishing starts. THESE are the guys dumping trash...they are the guys who don't know how to line a reel and strip 200 yds of mono and leave it on the bank.

Real, good fishermen, whether fly or gear take care of the water, the fish and other fishers. Just my opinion, but I fish with some real sportsmen who use gear and watch many others make a mess of things.

-Mike

[Fish Guru]

Being a gear guy as well as a fly guy, I find posts like this interesting. If you're of the belief that fly guys are more concerned with saving wild fish and conservation then maybe you should take a trip to lower sailor or bar or the outlet pipe at the fish hatchery. It's great, you can watch fly guys and gear guys( the majority are definitely fly guys) snagging and lining fish over and over. After pulling quite a few of these fly rigs out of trees, the bottom and fish in this stretch, believe it or not a lt of these guys are using barbed hooks as well. It's even better when they actually land one( they break them off a lot, as many are foul hooked) and you get to watch them hold dark spawners out of the water for what seems like an eternity as they fumble for thier camera. Dropping eggs are no big deal, as long as they get those glory shots!
As far as the trash is concerned, there are some real idiots out there that feel like they can leave thier trash wherever they want. It's a shame that most of these guys are gear guys, puts a bad label on people like myself and those I fish with who leave no trace. Like the other guys stated, it's simply a numbers game in that regard. It is very dissapointing to see people disregard this amazing resource that we are fortunate enough to have within our city limits, whether they use gear or flies.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

There are very serious Steelhead gear guys who are very concerned with the condition of fisheries but there are so many conventional anglers that don't care that you might not notice the quality gear guys.

It is a fact that in many fisheries the conventional angler (general public) care less about the ecosystem and leave trash. Most of these people are not serious anglers.

We use to go to some private ponds on a ranch that were only open to fly fishers because the owner noticed that the fly fishers left no trash and let his fish go.

Also in 35 years of business we have not had a bad check from a fly fisher. I think that says something about the integrity of the fly fisher.

I know much about this because I worked in sporting goods stores and a bait-n-tackle shop for 10 years before getting into the fly fishing only game.

Fish Guru is part of a small wonderful group of conventional anglers who actually care about the fishers just as much as we do.

According to the fishing industry studies fly fishers are more educated and make more money than conventional anglers as a whole. Does that make us bad people?

After all that I can tell you that when I am on the water anywhere in the world I feel a kinship with all other anglers, even legal commercial anglers.

[Jgoding]

I don't know..... when I see people not cleaning up I just put them under the "scum-bag" category...... never really pay attention to how they're doing it.

[lynnwhite44]

I started fishing as a kid with my dad and my trusty Zebco spinning reel. My parents always taught us kids to never litter and leave no trace. I think alot of it is how you were raised, socioeconomic background and education. I fish the lower sac a lot and everytime I go out I pick up 10 to 20 pieces of trash. I didn't start letting fish go till I picked up fly fishing.

To generalize....ya bait and gear fisherman litter more and keep more fish.

[WinterrunRon]

I launched with a buddy last year at Discovery one warm summer evening targeting stripers on the American. There was a line of maybe 4-5 boats waiting to launch. Interestingly, the game warden was checking the fishermen behind us moving toward the front of the line. Not exactly sure what he was checking, licenses I assumed, however, no one was fishing, we were all preparing to fish. :???:

In any event, when he came within a few feet from us, I asked if he would like to review our gear and licenses, and after seeing we were rigging fly rods stated, "hell no, you guys know more about the rules and regulations than we do".

I quickly surmised that, from his experience, he sees less incidence of wrongdoing from fly fishers.

For the record, I fish both fly and gear, depending...

[DFrink]

I don't know..... when I see people not cleaning up I just put them under the "scum-bag" category...... never really pay attention to how they're doing it.

Nicely put.