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Here is a interesting thing for you to think about.
Montana for one, has no regulations for the use of barbless hooks. In this State the legal limit is two hooks for any species, one single is same as one treble. Therefore you can fish the Madison or any of the other gold medal waters out there with two barbed trebles no matter what they are attached too.
Regulations more or less the same for PA/NJ/NY/CT, all be it there are zones designated at CR and others than have what they term as seasonal harvest.
Montana to the best of my knowledge generates more income from trout fishing than any other State in the US by far.

OK, the comparison here is that our Trophy zones are but a few miles of the entire system that is more or less open to all methods, the regulations otherwise are related to harvest issue, numbers and size.
Mortality is a accepted percentage, and the only reason why that is the case is simply due to the vast numbers of fish that are stocked, and that is also very much reliant on the fact that the Norfork National Fish Hatchery is able to produce some 450,000 lbs of fish weight a year and it is also very reliant on other USFW facilities to provide the eggs for us to hatch.

If anything catastrophic such as loss of funds or disease hit this facility every business on the White river system would be in big trouble., make no mistake about that. Given the current rates of harvest and mortality it would take a very short time to reduce the system to one that holds very few fish to satisfy the current activity.
Those of us who guide the river on a daily basis can see the marked difference when within a few days, 1000s of fish are no longer present, it is unreal and to be honest l have never seen anything close to this for any other trout fishery l have fished around the world.

Bear this in mind also. Jeff Williams does not make the regulation changes, it is the commissioners that do that for both game and fish.
Jeff, will listen to all sides of the story, which is a far cry from what we had to deal with years back.
Look at it also further, in the past 10 years we have seen many changes that have benefited the overall fishery.
We no longer stock 8 to 10 ins Bows, we have reduced harvest and larger minimums for other species that can be harvested.

John pointed out many issues that are at the end of the day related to enforcement of the regulations, and there is no doubt things could improve here.
The barbless hook rule is a very emotive issue, how many who read this board have had a ticket for this one, l know at least 3 persons myself. Do you consider this fair if say you are using a average size trout fly and get one, or do you consider that there is a considerable difference related to method of fishing ? A barbed treble against a size 16 sowbug.
At the end of the day the majority would related this to what percentage of damage may be caused to the fish.

Barbless trebles are at the end of the day no more detrimental than a larger streamer hook, and l have had a good many large trout swallow those in the past. And likewise l have caught 100s of trout and Salmon with barbless treble hooks, either one or more to the lure.
Like it or not for the best will in the world FF also cause mortality even if barbless hooks are used. Not all handle fish with care, bear in mind many also choose to harvest fish, and l have no problem with that if the fishery can support that.
You can harvest fish from the Madison river in designated zones, no size limit and 5 per day.!

Go further with this one. How many of our trophy Browns do you think we loose when they are deeply hooked when bait is used, craws and sculpins, way more than you might realise at the end of the day.
This year l have seen more dead and dying Browns in the 16 ins above size due to the new regs. It is a percentages game, l guess , if 40 die out of 100 we are still left with 60, that may or may not have been harvested if the regulation was not in effect.
Are we then to see a regulation that restricts use of bait or mandatory use of barbless hooks, may be in the future, who knows.

I did have a very long discussion with Jeff, and did tell him that both in my and Dave Whitlocks opinion to allow barbed trebles in our very restricted TZ would be a mistake, regardless of what ever data form other sources says otherwise. They were not conducted on a river system that comprises of a few miles of TZ water and is subject to the pressure we see in those zones, and lets be honest here, it is largely related to FF activity. Barbless is another issue, for l have to say l do not believe that the use of trebles at BSD has in any way been detrimental to this short section of TZ.
In fact last night l caught a 7lb Bow there, and over the years have seen more trophy Bows caught here than any other place on the entire system, that's why we choose to fish there, it produces on average way better Rainbow trout. Browns are a very different deal as we know they are well spread out.
If l personally were restricted to one zone on the river it would be BSD no question of doubt.

Aside from regulation issues the whole picture of the fishery needs to be considered here, and l would agree with a recent article the Fox Statler wrote, and he is absolutely right.
Our major concerns should be directed more to the issues of water quality and habitat resource, and not so much those related to personal preferences in so far as how we see regulation issues.
Regardless, fish need the resources of habitat and food base, regulations may well be just a cover up when it come to the real issues of concern at the end of the day.

Its like saying, fence deer in a barren field some of which die due to no food base, and also allow limited harvest , when the other side of the fence contains enough food base to enable all to survive, propagate, and grow with limited harvest. Which is the better option here.

Frankly l do not see, unless many issues such as habitat, water quality and there after regulations any significant change for the North Fork river, it is indeed a very sorry state of affairs here. I hope l am wrong here.

One other point here. I did suggest to Jeff that l would like to see same for the North Fork so far as no kill for Brown trout for the same period as we see here at the BSD end down to the end of the State Park.
Granted the 24 ins size limit may help some here at the end of the day, all be it methods of angling will result in high mortality as they always do.

Davy.






Davy.