I fished Stave on Thursday. First light to about 9ish had only two chum hooked and lots rolling around lockjawed. Got one nice coho and was hopeful for a nice day. The very few people I saw in the morning looked decent anglers, but then ........around 9 to 10am the whole area where we were got absolutely swarmed with people! It was a crazy gong show - shore lined all the way with 20ft distance in between at best. I can tolerate crowded conditions BUT every 8 out 10 people were bottom bouncing 3oz betties and 6-12ft leaders, everybody ripping and tearing all the time, fish dragged for their tail and booted back each and every time! I kid you not there was at one point 40 to 50 snaggers just in foreseeable distance, bonking yellow/black spawned chum and even a few trout! It was a very sickening thing to see, needless to say the bite went off and at about 11am we left the river. On the side of the road was a gongshow too, never seen so many cars on that river, there was cars parked with emergency lights ON the road waiting for someone to leave.
I only fished Stave the last couple of years and always enjoyed it, but with exception of a handfull of individuals the moral on the river was decent. I obvously underestimated the effect of the sockeye season on the smaller systems, it seems totally out of control. I phoned RAPP to report of retained overlimits with no result, tried to stop one guy from stepping over the heads of fish so he can retrieve his hook before booting them back - he said he dont care, also tried to "educate" an older couple of 75 yearold people, but of course they didn't know English.
I don't think someone can convince me you can entice fish to bite when you have 3oz lead balls flying every 15 feet in the water. I think I'm done with this river for this season - risking my car being towed to just watch snagger's show filling tots full of nasty decomposed chum... I'm not sure it's worth it - I'm pissed and fuming because I reallly liked that fishery in the past but its never been anything like this.
/rant over