BAITFISH ANGLER WANTS EQUAL OPPORTUNITY ON OWENS.Byline: Brett Pauly Daily News Staff Writer Dick Noles feels he is being penalized pe·nal·ize tr.v. pe·nal·ized, pe·nal·iz·ing, pe·nal·iz·es 1. To subject to a penalty, especially for infringement of a law or official regulation. See Synonyms at punish. 2. because he's a baitfish bait·fish n. Chiefly Chesapeake Bay & North Atlantic Coast A small fish, such as a minnow, used for fishing bait. angler - and is fighting to ensure his fair share of fishing waters. The Bishop man wants the regulations on the catch-and-release wild brown trout brown trout Prized and wary European game fish (Salmo trutta, family Salmonidae) that is favoured for food. The species includes several varieties (e.g., the Loch Leven trout of Britain). The brown trout is recognized by the light-ringed black spots on its brown body. stretch of the Lower Owens River Owens River A river, about 193 km (120 mi) long, of eastern California rising in the Sierra Nevada and flowing generally southward, formerly to Owens Lake, to include barbed hooks and bait. Since 1992, only artificial flies and lures with barbless hooks have been permitted, and now the section of river located a few miles north of Bishop attracts world-class fly-anglers. ``My concern is that public watersare being privatized for the benefit of a handful of anglers,'' said the 63-year-old retired Southern California Edison Southern California Edison (or SCE Corp), the largest subsidiary of Edison International (NYSE: EIX), is the primary electricity supply company for much of Southern California. It provides 11 million people with electricity. operations manager See datacenter manager. . ``There is an undercurrent of angry anglers who want this addressed.'' One official with the Department of Fish and Game said, ``He's barking up the wrong tree.'' But however slim the chance for change may be, the voices of concern are real and the plea is being taken seriously, the official said. Noles is backed by the Bishop chapter of People for the West, a grassroots group that supports access to and continued multiple use of public land created in 1988 on the heels of the spotted owl controversy. He and the group are using the Lower Owens River issue as a springboard to attack the state's Trout and Steelhead See RRAS. Conservation and Management Planning Act of 1979, which requires the DFG DFG Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Council) DFG Department of Fish and Game DFG District Factor Group DFG Data Flow Graph DFG Difference Frequency Generation DFG Diode Function Generator DFG Dog Faced Gremlin each year to designate 25 miles of fishing streams and one lake as wild-trout areas - generally restricted to barbless hooks, zero limits (or catch and release only) and no bait. ``I'm concerned about all of it,'' said Noles, the group's Fish and Wildlife chairman. ``If the wild-trout regulation continues on its present course, there will be a time, in the very near future, where there will be very few decent trout streams for any anglers other than fly-fishermen.'' Noles is asking that the catch-and-release regulations on the Lower O, as it is dubbed dub 1 tr.v. dubbed, dub·bing, dubs 1. To tap lightly on the shoulder by way of conferring knighthood. 2. To honor with a new title or description. 3. , be changed for two months of the year to include bait-fishing and a two-trout limit. Opposition to his proposal has been spearheaded by Bishop fly-fisherman and tackle-shop proprietor Gary Gunsolley. ``You can't have quality fishing by using bait and harvesting fish,'' said Gunsolley, a member of the Inyo-Mono Fish and Game Advisory Commission. ``If you're using bait, they are going to swallow the hook and die. Lures and flies have a lesser mortality rate. So to have quality fishing you can't use bait.'' Steve Parmenter, a Bishop DFG associate fishery biologist within the Wild Trout Program, has been caught in the middle. ``I'm being drawn and quartered between the two of them,'' Parmenter said. The biologist explained that seven miles of the river between Pleasant Valley Reservoir and Five Bridges was first managed with special fishing regulations in 1992, after large wild browns began being overharvested. Stocking was stopped in 1972. The spawning area has a 4.4-mile stretch that is catch and release; the other portion has a two-trout limit. Parmenter compares the special regulations to how hunting is regulated in the state, wherein there are size and bags restrictions for archery archery, sport of shooting with bow and arrow, an important military and hunting skill before the introduction of gunpowder. England's Charles II fostered archery as sport, establishing in 1673 the world's oldest continuous archery tournament, the Ancient Scorton , black-powder guns and rifles for the protection of the game. Noles uses the same comparison to illustrate his point. ``We all get to hunt on the same mountain, but at different times of the year,'' he said. ``But bait anglers never get a chance to fish the wild-trout managed area.'' CAPTION(S): Photo Photo: Bishop angler Dick Noles wants fishing on the LowerOwens to include bait and barbed hooks two months of the year. Brett Pauly / Daily News |
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