Roland Maw at the Alaska Board of Fisheries/Craig Medred photo
The outlaw Roland Maw, the man who quit the Alaska Board of Fisheries in 2105 and then led a willing Anchorage Daily News to suggest that his resignation had something to do with Kenai fish wars, appeared unafraid of that combat zone when he appeared before the body on Sunday to explain how to handle the latest battle.
Maw is still awaiting trial on multiple felony charges that accuse him of stealing from the state’s Permanent Fund. The reason he resigned in 2015 was to try to hide the fact he was a resident of Montana or at least claiming to be one.
After Montana found out he was also claiming to be an Alaskan, it prosecuted Maw for illegally obtaining resident hunting licenses. In that case, Maw conceded to being a liar, which led to a fine and his temporary loss of hunting and fishing privileges in both Alaska and Montana.
Maw’s problems in Montana eventually led the state of Alaska to investigate his various Alaska residency claims. That eventually led to 12 felony charges against him related to fraudulently obtaining Permanent Fund Dividends and otherwise lying about his Alaska residency on official documents.
An attorney for Maw has tried every legal trick in the book over the course of the last four years to keep an Alaska jury from hearing the case. Maw’s trial, according to several attorneys, may now be the most delayed in state criminal history. It is at this time set for March 9 in Juneau, but if the past is any precedent, Maw will find some way to again delay it.
The crux of his defense is that all his actions were done electronically and someone else must have gotten onto his computer to commit the bad acts. There has, however, been no offer of evidence that he refunded to the state any PFD money that mysteriously showed up in his bank account.
Despite his legal troubles, the commercial driftnet fisherman and one-time executive director of United Cook Inlet Drifters Association (UCIDA) – the region’s most powerful commercial fishing lobby – has stayed active in Alaska fishery politics.
At that time, the fights were primarily between various gear types: purse seiners, trollers, drift gillnetters and set gillnetters. Since then, subsistence fishermen, personal-use dipnetters and anglers have all entered the fight, and the latter two groups have become prime adversaries of drift and set gillnetters in the Inlet that surges southwest from downtown Anchorage.
The commercial interests catch most of the fish. The Anchorage metro area is home to more than half the state’s population, many of them dipnetters or anglers who don’t think they’re getting a fair share of those fish.
Maw’s world
In his testimony to the Board, Maw suggested the state strayed off the “railroad tracks” of sound management when it started stuffing the Kenai River with salmon. The presention was a little hard to follow. His written testimony might be more clear.
Maw there takes issue with the Bayesian statistical method being used to forecast returns, arguing that “we are now experiencing some of the smallest returns in recent history including, in 2019, the smallest sockeye return in over 40 years. The forecast for 2020. If new information about the status of the fry population in the Kenai system is correct, no one will be allowed to harvest Kenai River salmon in a couple of years; no dipnetting, no sportfishing and no commercial fishing.”
The 2020 forecast calls for a return of 2.2 million salmon to the Kenai – 1.4 million less than the 20-year average. The forecast is largely based upon the number and size of fry rearing in Skilak Lake.
Larger fry are generally expected to have better survival odds than smaller fry, but nature doesn’t always hue to general expectations.
The 2.2 million return is low by modern standards, though not so by the standards of the 1970s. And it is more than adequate to support sport and personal-use fisheries.
Even that low return of 1.7 million sockeye in 2018 – a return 800,000 fish short of the forecast – would have had plenty of fish to support sport and personal-use fisheries if not for an early commercial harvest which cropped off a sizable chunk of the run.
With the 2018 run forecast at 2.5 million fish, Fish and Game expected a non-commercial harvest (dipnetters and anglers) of about 700,000 sockeye. Those dipnet and sport fisheries are capable of catching more fish than that, but only when large numbers get through to the Kenai.
In years of expected weak returns, like this one, the number of fish allowed to escape nets to make it into the river is reduced (the escapement goal was lowered to 900,000 in 2018) and non-commercial harvests decline.
Give the data including 2018, a claim that the Kenai is headed toward a production level that would force a prohibition on all fishing can only be described as fear-mongering. And Maw’s basic argument against the new models, which are arguably as bad or as good as the old models in trying to predict a future full of variables that cannot be anticipated, is that state fisheries managers with their fancy math just can’t be trusted.
“The models are mathematically driven,” Maw said. “Mathematical models cannot incorporate field observations of run size, age composition, weights (fry, smolt and adult), run timing, health, vigor, climate change effects, and spawning success that all come into the stock assessment process.”
Mathematical models actually can incorporate much of that data of it is available. Some is and some isn’t.
At a population level, the health and vigor of a salmon population is hard to determine exactly and climate change effects are largely an unknown. A warming ocean in the 2010s was expected to reduce salmon production but instead production is at record levels although that of some species – Kenai sockeye among them – has decreased.
No one knows why, but the decline appears to be linked to ocean survival given the weakness of most sockeye systems in the northeast Gulf of Alaska. The Susitna River to the north of the Kenai is forecast to see a return significantly below the 20-year average, too, although it has seen low escapements for decades now.
They have not produced the bigger runs of fish Maw and other UCIDA members envision. If the Susitna is indicative, it’s probable that lowering the number of Kenai spawners would only lower the number of returning fish.
Still, Maw and his UCIDA comrades could be right with their pitch that the Kenai has seen some sizable salmon returns at escapements of 600,000 to 800,000; so lower the spawning goal and let us catch more fish in our nets.
As Maw notes, only mathematicians can trust fancy math.
“It’s very difficult for non-statisticians to argue the details of the Bayesian methodology in particular applications,” he said. “But we can all clearly observe the reduction of the Kenai late river-run sockeye returns as escapement and in-river goals have been increased.”
Or at least those who want to see that can observe it. There are plenty of ways of looking at the data and seeing something else. This isn’t as simple as 2 +2 = 4 because of all the variables involved.
So basically, at the end of the day, Maw’s presentation came down to whether Alaskans should trust UCIDA, and defacto leader Maw, pumping up the many times debunked over-escapement theory, or state biologists.
Who would you trust?
Categories: Commentary, Outdoors
Craig your response shows your bias and lack of objectivity. First I am not a friend of Maw. Nice try at guilty by association. I am a professional who works with all types of fishery issues. As past President of UCIDA I am an associate of Maw. We have never had dinner together or done anything outside a business relationship. You jumped to a unfounded conclusion just like a lot of your conclusions. Nice diversion on trying to paint everything Maw says as suspect. Why not discuss those points instead of character attacks. Last I heard one is innocent until proven guilty. Just for the record Maw was not found guilt in Montana. His plea had no guilt associated with it. Montana accepted that as it was not a strong case. Was he guilt probably but no jury or judge determined that. So lets stick to the issues and stop calling people names or being uninformed.
Let me get this right: You have just started off a post with the words “Craig your response shows your bias and lack of objectivity” and ended it with a plea for how everyone should “stick to the issues and stop calling people names or being uninformed.”
And in between these two inherently contradictory statements, you’ve presented a tidy bit of what is either intentional misinformation or, giving you the benefit of the doubt, a reflection of your “being uninformed.”
To wit: “Just for the record Maw was not found guilt(y) in Montana.”
I can only hope that this stems from an unfamiliarity with the law and is not an intentional attempt to mislead.
Maw pleaded nolo contendere. It is a Latin phrase for “I do not contend.” It’s a cute way of avoiding a public admission of guilt but is treated by the court system as an admission of guilt.
If you’d ever attended a criminal trial at which someone pleaded nolo, you would have heard the judge warn the defendant that by making such a plea he (or she) will be treated as guilty under the law.
So, as far as the law is concerned, Maw is guilty. He waved his claim to innocence. If he believed he was innocent, it was his legal right to go before a jury and let it decide whether he didn’t or didn’t lie. He opted to instead be treated as guilty in the eyes of the law.
Now, with that out of the way, let me apologize if you took offense at my calling Maw your friend. Your defense of his lying ways led me to believe that you were at least friends at a Facebook level. The term these days is much looser than in the days before the internet. People clearly do not have to have dinner together anymore to be friends, or even share a cup of coffee as associates often do.
Given your preference for the term associate, however, I will from now on refer to Maw as your associate.
Either way, you are the one defending him and suggesting his general credibility isn’t an issue when he’s involved in offering management advice on an issue that benefits him directly and personally.
So everyone is supposed to believe that a guy who lies about his residency to save a few bucks on a nonresident hunting license would never, ever manipulate the arguments on salmon management to put more valuable salmon in his gillnet?
Who do you expect to buy that argument?
Meanwhile, I’d love to know your source for the claim that “Montana accepted that (nolo plea) as it was not a strong case.” The people I talked to in Montana when Maw was charged thought they had an open and shut case.
Gov. Bill Walker apparently thought the same when he asked Maw to resign. And what was it Maw told a reporter in Juneau not long before that?
“I retired in 2001 and we moved here in June of that year or 2000, I can’t remember the exact year, but whenever that qualifying period was over I’ve had one (PFD) since then,” he said.
https://www.adn.com/politics/article/controversial-fish-board-nominee-withdraws/2015/02/20/
Before you go any farther in defending your associate who says he moved to Alaska in 2000 or 2001, you might want to go back through Commercial Fishery Entry Commission records and state fishing license records to see when the professor from Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, first started claiming he was an Alaska resident.
The former are easily searchable at https://www.cfec.state.ak.us/plook/#permits
They show Maw claiming to be an Alaska resident in 1990, 1991, 1992, 1998 and 1999 when his Alaska residence appears to have been in a post-office box in Kasilof. Fish and Game licensing records, which are not so easily searchable, show Maw obtaining his first resident hunting and fishing license in 1996.
Has your associate ever told you when exactly he spent that full-year living in residence in Alaska that is required to obtain a resident hunting and fishing license?
And who told you Montana officials decided they had a weak case? Was this someone in Montana, or was it your associate who publicly claimed to have discovered the endangered “bull trout?”
This is the same associate I’ll note, who now claims someone else got on his computer and filed his PFD applications. Did that someone else also spend the money? Have you asked your associate about that?
I admit I don’t know why Montana prosecutors accepted the nolo plea. But as a reporter who once covered courts, nolos almost always came as the result of plea deals to avoid drawn-out and expensive trials. Given what we’ve seen of Maw’s behavior in Alaska – and his unwillingness to go before a jury of his Alaska peers (maybe he would prefer Montanans?) to let them weigh his guilt or innocence – a decision by a Montana prosecutor to let him plead nolo – if that is what happened – would appear to have been a good one.
It is frankly beyond me why you would want to defend Maw’s credibility given his documented behaviors, and more than that I find it a little sad.
I always had a lot of respect for you as a man of integrity, Ken, but it’s fading.
People either value credibility or they don’t. Whether you understand this or not, defending Maw here by misstating (accidentally or intentionally) how the courts treat a nolo plea and ignoring the facts in evidence while calling me names and accusing me of unethical behavior that never took place, doesn’t enhance Maw’s credibility, it only diminishes yours.
This will be my last comment on this. “In a criminal proceeding, a defendant may enter a plea of nolo contendere, in which the defendant does not accept or deny responsibility for the charges but agrees to accept punishment. The plea differs from a guilty plea because a “no contest” plea cannot be used against the defendant in another cause of action.”
So my point was he never admitted guilt but accepted the punishment. It goes on his record and people assume he plead guilty which you implied. Also for various reason one can plead nolo just to reduce their court costs and have it part of a plead deal. Have you not wondered why Montana did not pursue this and throw the book at him. I think they gave him a minimal fine relative to the number of charges. Craig I know he is guilty inMontana based on other evidence but the State accepted thenolo plead. Something was wrong with their case.
Now back to the main point. Whether someone is bias or has a criminal record allows one to look closely at their position and see if it has merit. Inmy 4 decades in UCI I have been accused of every act imaginable by various user groups. All of those like your attack on Maw are diversions. Why if you are pointing out flaw groups point out KRSA unethical history or your associate Mr Penney business history or that Mr. Penney tried to get me fired for telling the truth. My point it serves no purpose to do that. It is best to take on user group bias with good data. You can serve a valuable role in that regard but your fishery writing has been incomplete on facts in UCI.
Or he had the money to hire a very good attorney who convinced the state he could tie the case up in court filings for years, and Montana decided that rather than spending tens of thousands of dollars arguing a relatively petty case, it would agree to the nolo plea for what it is – the legal acceptance of guilt in a criminal case.
How much taxpayer money do you think this state has spent due to Maw’s legal maneuvers aimed at keeping an Alaska jury from deciding whether he lied in his PFD filings? Just the time various judges have spent on case to this point has to work out to tens of thousands of dollars.
I will admit his defense – that someone hacked his computer and filed for PFDs in his name – is creative. It’s also somewhat in line with his nolo plea: Never publicly accept responsibility for anything.
Did he obtain his Montana hunting licenses online in that state? Maybe he threatened the same defense there that he has put on here and Montana decided it just wasn’t worth arguing over that on a misdemeanor.
Who knows what stunts Maw might try. He took an attempt to snatch Exxon Valdez payments from the estate of Patroky Polushkin all way to the Alaska Supreme Court if you remember.
http://www.touchngo.com/sp/pdfs/sp-6176.pdf
So please don’t compare yourself to Maw. I’ve heard a few bad things said about you, Ken; but never that you’re a liar. Wait, I have to roll that back. I’ve only ever heard one bad thing said about you: That you were more interested in managing Cook Inlet salmon in the interests of commercial fishermen than in the interests of the people of Alaska.
Given how subjective that, I don’t even know how “bad” the accusation. One can make an argument that believing the commercial fishery should harvest every last surplus UCI sockeye isn’t necessarily against the interests of the people of Alaska. Maybe that is where the 80 percent of Alaskans who don’t fish get the biggest economic boost from UCI salmon.
It doesn’t look that way, but admittedly the economic data everyone is working with is thin. I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt because I don’t believe you’re Maw-like. He is a liar, an adjudicated liar.
Had he pleaded nolo to a charge of domestic assault or declared bankruptcy or confessed to an earlier life in Alberta as the infamous pot-bellied cat burglar, it wouldn’t warrant mention in a fish story. That would be a distraction much like your Bob Penney this and KRSA that.
But what we have here in Maw is a man with a pattern of lying to further his self-interest testifying before the Board to further his self-interest. In that circumstance, pointing out his history isn’t about distractions. It’s about providing readers context so they can decide whether they want to believe anything he says.
Which leaves me the one logical question that has gone unasked: Do you really believe Maw was the best person UCIDA could find to present its case? It couldn’t find an actual fisheries scientist to do this? UCIDA needed a guy whose science was once on display in a Kenai River catch and release “paper,” if you can call it that, you wouldn’t have been caught dead putting your name on?
Maw was probably the worst choice. I do not question he guilt in Montana. I said I had other evidence which confirmed that.
Relative to Alaska 2 judges said the State acted improperly. That is not Maw’s fault. Everyone should have fair hearing. A number of the delay were at the State’s request. I guess they changed attorneys and/or had emergency issues. After the last judge rule the case could go forward the State is to blame.
So I have a question for you. What if Maw presents peer reviewed data that indicates a new conclusion about UCI fishery management. Should it be rejected because of Maws history? Will his history keep some from even looking at the findings. Unfortunately that is happening
Relative to my history people forget I raised the goals in the Kenai and Kasilof so people could argue over abundant sockeye. Yes I spoke up when KRSA tried to use goals to achieve an allocation objective. Bob and the boys did not like that. I have never lied to anyone on fish issues.
I personally would welcome more peer-reviewed data. I, personally, would love a good, peer-reviewed study on just what the hell has happened with early run Kenai kings. The habitat, as you know, is largely undisturbed, significantly less so than for the late-run fish, and the harvest is minimal to none.
And yet….
If Maw were to present new peer-reviewed data, I’d read the study and, if there was something there of interest, do a story. I’m pretty confident, however, that Maw himself isn’t going to get a fishery study” through peer-review. The past work he’s done that I read wouldn’t cut it.
That said, I admit I haven’t ready his doctoral thesis on “the knowledge and visitor attitudes concerning grizzly and black bears by users of the Waterton Lakes National Park” in Canada. i’ve never been able to find a copy. https://pubs.cif-ifc.org/doi/pdf/10.5558/tfc58106-2
He might be a very good social scientist. He does social well.
I have read a lot of ucida publications. They are not well done relative to the writing and conclusions. The data usually comes from ADFG. Back in2003 they asked me to review a document on Susitna sockeye. I found numerous error and misstatements and pointed them out. They made no changes and that was the last time I reviewed anything they prepared. So we agree that the documents should be closely read.
Relative to early run chinook there is no doubt the mainstem fish were overharvest and eliminated. When that happens recovery is problematic, especially if there is competition with late run fish for rearing area. I believe Sport Fish Division has failed to put resources toward understanding chinook rearing issues. They also fail to monitor the distribution of the spawners. Hell they won’t even walk Slikok Creek which is quarter mile from the office when low water appeared to prohibit spawning. They believe just counting with sonar is good enough. Of course they failed after spending millions of dollar over 30 year period
“if.”
i agree it would be good to know more about Chinook rearing and particularly predation on rearing Chinook given new views on the influence of predation on ecological productivity. the Kenai River has for a long time now been managed for maximum abundance of rainbow trout and Dolly Varden char.
that’s not a bad thing or good thing, but it is a thing. and we both know that in complicated systems with multiple predators and prey it is not possible to have maximum numbers of all species all the time. that’s basic ecology.
Maw shows how ridiculous the Dunleavey recall effort is. A key premise for getting rid of Big Bad Mike is that he was two weeks late in appointing a judge. Two weeks they say. OMG … two weeks! Well, two weeks is nothing compared to judges delaying a trail for Maw for 5 years. Or maybe 6 years. If anyone should be recalled, it’s out state judges that take large state paychecks and won’t do their job and actually judge.
Maw is probably not the best spokesman for gillnetters in Cook Inlet given his legal troubles, but once again Medred wants to punish one consumptive user group by putting more fish in the river to benefit another consumptive user group – commercial sport fishing guides & lodges and the science be damned!
Craig I just have to laugh at your attention to Maw. You would attack him to discredit his position. Ad hominem attacks serve no purpose. But let’s get the record straight. Most delays in his trail are at the request of the State or the incompetence of State attorneys before a judge.
I doubt you have read the escapement goal report on sockeye but what Maw is referring is the lack of scientific rigor by the staff. The present commissioner instructed the staff he wants more fish in the river. That bias tainted the process and report. For example the authors said the brood year interaction model, which was the best fit to the data, was flawed and not used. However that model has been reviewed every few years by scientists in and out of the Department since 1999. So it did not give results the Commissioner wanted it was out. A second justification was the concept of varying escapement goals was not in the best interests of the State. That is a-policy call and has no place in a scientific report. Plus the authors provide no data to support that position.
Finally for those commenting on overescapement as a myth you just demonstrate your ignorance. Every model used by the state for chinook and sockeye assumes decreasing yield with escapements beyond msy.
Craig you really failed your readers on this one. Call me if you want to learn the errors of your way
Thanks for the note, Ken.
First off, I didn’t “attack” Mr. Maw. I fairly laid out the history of his court case. We could debate the competence of state attorneys at length, but the simple reality of the case is that Mr. Maw has been the one again and again preventing it from going to trial.
He could have agreed to go to trial long ago and probably saved himself tens of thousands of dollars in the process. Repeatedly asking his attorney to file motions to quash indictments for nebulous reasons is costly.
Frankly, I wish he’d gone to trial by now. I’d love to know his full story. Maybe he is innocent. Maybe one of his kids or grandkids has been getting on the ‘puter and filing for PFDs, and he didn’t know. Stranger things have happened.
On the other hand, he is a documented liar, and that goes directly to the issue of credibility when he is appearing before the Board of Fisheries as a commercial gillnetter trying to protect his personal interest. I’m sure he’s madder than hell that he only made about $15,000 off UCI salmon last summer, and I understand that.
But his financial interest here makes his general credibility a major issue when he starts claiming to be talking science. I find it sort of incredulous that you would ignore this and defend him by suggesting I tried to “attack him to discredit his position.”
What I did was outline why his testimony might be suspect and point out the irony of someone who once pretended to be abandoning the Board of Fish because of the heat of the Kenai “fish wars” jumping into the Kenai fish wars. That’s just too rich to ignore.
As to the science, the brood-year model is flawed. The Markov model is flawed. Ricker is flawed. Beverton-Holt is flawed. Deriso-Schnute is flawed. Clearly Mr. Maw thinks the Bayesian Markov Chain Monte Carlo is flawed.
And he’s right. Every damn model the Department has to work with is flawed. They’re all statistically educated guesses. If their probability of being right hits 75 percent they’re doing good. But they are invariably wrong as to actual numbers. Thus one can debate at length which model to use.
I think that’s a waste of time here or for the public in general.
As to overescapement, it is – as viewed by layman – a myth, and you know that as well as I. Theoretic yield does indeed start to fall after MSY is reached, but it doesn’t fall very fast. You’ve got to go quite a way beyond MSY to get a real drop off, which is probably why we haven’t had state biologists throwing dynamite in Bristol Bay rivers to kill sockeye to prevent the dreaded overescapements that have happened there on regular basis.
Not to mention that there may be cases wherein overescaping a river significantly boosts MEY. But in Cook Inlet, we don’t talk about MEY. Why is that?
Could it have anything to do with vested special-interest not wanting to talk about what is in the best interest of the state rather than of themselves?
First documented liar works in general discussion but not in science. Whether someone beats their wif or not has no place in evaluating a scientific finding. The data and strength of the findings is what matters. So Craig you missed that lesson in school.
Next you discussing escapement goal and selective in picking parts of reports shows you have no clue about sockeye salmon biology. You have no scientific publications or credible standing on this subject. No sweat lots of biologist have little understanding on sockeye production models and to deal with uncertainty. zThat is why the Bd of Fish is outdated. The Bd should allocate fish and not set goals. Frank Rue made a huge mistake in allowing Coffey to do that in 1999.
I am leaving the State after 44 years here and numerous sockeye publications. No on even asked a question. So Craig you may not-any one to listen to Maw. I claim the same about you
Do you realize how many scientists have been caught faking research in recent years? Anything touched by a man who has been documented as lying to serve his personal interests is suspect by definition.
One would have thought UCIDA could do better than Mr. Maw.
I claim no great expertise in sockeye production models, but I do understand sockeye salmon biology. It ain’t coding for AI, which I admit I don’t really understand. Or quantum physics. I really wrestle with quantum.
And I’m baffled as to how the Board of fish would “allocate” salmon without setting escapement “goals” in the absence of ironclad salmon forecasts. What happens if, for instance, they allocate 4 million sockeye to the UCI commercial fishery and 500,000 sockeye to the Kenai River sport fishery and only 2 million salmon show up?
Escapement goals and allocation levels are sort of like buttocks. If you only had one, you’d tip over every time you sat down.
This reply makes my point. Those scientists who fake data are caught because the data could not be repeated. Usually the media make a big splash about a finding only to have to take it back as the process uncovers the truth.
Escapement goals set the goal posts for management not yield. So the Board has to come up with allocation plans that reflect that management constraint. There are all types of ways to do that.
In reality the Board is using goals to destroy the commercial fishery.
Finally relative to Maw. UCIDA should use him in a different way. However I remember allegations against you for unethical behavior. I would hope people would discuss the merits of your position not past allegations used to taint the process
And what would those unethical allegations be? Maw’s claim that I called him about his professing discovery of the bull trout, an endangered species, and failed to identify myself as a reporter?
That claim on Mr. Maw’s part doesn’t pass the most basic of sniff tests. How many questions do you answer on the phone before you ask, “Who exactly is asking here?” I’m good for about one.
Maw knew exactly who he was talking to because, in fact, I did identify myself.
Meanwhile, if you think faking and fudging scientific data is something that gets reliably caught, you just haven’t been paying attention. The metanalysis of this subject concluded there’s a significant amount of faking and fudging going on: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0005738
And some habitual fudgers – like your friend Roland Maw – appear to get away with this for a long, long time. Dr. Yoshihiro Sato got away with it for years and years. He managed to publish more than 200 papers. He’s a poster boy for why we should all be skeptical of things said by people known to bend the truth the way Maw has.
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/08/researcher-center-epic-fraud-remains-enigma-those-who-exposed-him
I know he’s a friend of yours, and I understand that. But his credibility is, and should be, an issue every time he opens his mouth because of his track record. Most people who fudge the truth don’t get caught. The fact that someone gets caught has to make one wonder how often they’re fudging the truth.
Yes, it is possible to get pregnant by only having sex once, but the probability is low: https://www.webmd.com/baby/qa/what-are-the-odds-of-getting-pregnant
I trust Maw.
Alternative photo caption: “Slick photographer earns himself a hog-tying somethin’ powerful, Cartwright brothers settle down to plate of biscuits and gravy.”
When I first clicked on the photo, I thought that those two stomachs reminded me of a Lamaze class that I attended with my wife years ago.
Body shapes really aren’t pertinent to the discussion. Let’s try to behave ourselves please.
Seems like taking the word of a guy who doesn’t know what state he lives in, who has allegedly defrauded ALL Alaskans for years, who lied about discovering a species of trout, and who lied about his residency in another state to illegally kill game isn’t a very sound idea to me. Why would UCIDA not distance themselves from this guy? Certainly he’s not the best of the bunch.
The myth of “Over escapement” needs to be buried forever. It needs to be challenged every time it is used by the commercial interests or by State employees.
Why is it that those who think overescapement in UCI watersheds is a myth,( such as krsa), also believe that we are putting too many hatchery fish in the ocean. I don’t get it. Do they really think the ocean has a limited capacity but freshwater streams don’t.
Never trust a lying poacher.
Never trust Common Core math.
The rest? Well, the rest is what my good buddy P.T. Barnum used to say, “I don’t care what the newspapers say about me as long as they spell my name right.”