My God Becker, that looks like Pete quoting (no offense Pete, hell you acknowledge and own it). Anyway, I was trying to get you to express your specific concerns. Which "hard core TU guys" are giving the LRSA a hard time? And on what matters?
Below is a run on diatribe. It is my opinion on the issues at hand for the LRSA as I see them. I also include actions/discussions that you post as you are the sole representative on here and you are a huge supporter. Understand anything I say here is to help you out. Don't take it personally.
Frankly, I believe that the Lehigh River Stocking Association suffers from image issues that draw certain amounts of heat, some warranted and some unwarranted. I go back to your joining and very first post of this forum. You can in responding to a discussion between Alpabuck and I regarding the LRSA and their metal stringer brigade. Now, I did not know you, Alpa or anyone else. I was just a guy that fished the Po twice and each time ran into to LRSA "conservationist" that engaged me in conversation. The first event was a gentleman with a metal stringer literally hanging from his wading belt. He is the guy that plastered our car with flyers. Very odd guy but hey he was passionate about STOCKING the Po. My second encounter was with another LRSA gentleman that was telling me about the benefits of LRSA. I think Redsun was with me on that trip. The guy scared Nate. He literally had torn the arms out of his shirt, smoked a pack a minute (flicking the butts in the stream) and talked incessantly about LRSA, all the stocking and how I would get a button. Again, very strange guy and very aggressive in promoting the LRSA. He was having a stellar day, throwing meal worms with split shot into the spillway below the Parryville dam and had creeled two 18" or so browns into his metal basket thingy.
Hey those guys were passionate about their beliefs and frankly if they were targeting the market right, they would have been effective. I would suggest that they would qualify their potential candidates a bit better. For good or bad, fly fishermen in general are pretty into the whole C&R thing and are going to be put off by metal stringers and metal baskets full of fish.
You on the other hand are a very passionate and solid representative for the association. You have taken folks out and introduced them to the Lehigh watershed. I appreciate the work you are doing, particularly the conservation work, but including the stocking. I think that you find yourself in spirited debate when you start talking about hypotheticals that are dependent upon other hypotheticals. For example the studies into the removal of dams on the Lehigh river system to restore shad runs. Fine. A lot of folks are going to say that is pie in the sky and will never happen, but hey it surely will not happen if you don't try and open the lines of communication. However, to go one step further and start talking about stocking steel and atlantics is just opening yourself for criticism (of both you personally and the LRSA since you are speaking as a representative and board member). Get the dams taken care of, check out the shad thing. If those are successful, then move on to other activities. If that includes potentially stocking steel and atlantics, then by all means get your facts together, get support from PFBC (you gonna need it) and have a reasonable proposition together prior to popping online and firing off some pretty radical stuff. In the thread regarding the steel/salmon you cite Dr. (x), where you don't have the name of the guy, much less his credentials. This is just going to open you up to criticism and skepticism. Hey, the PFBC is going to have to sanction and support this effort, so get some of their biologist backing you up. Makes you and the LRSA much more credible.
Again, the biggest thing is image. Look at the LRSA website. Seriously right now. Go to the front page. I have attached a photo. In small letters you have a decent mission statement, but who cares look at the big all caps LUNKER FEST stuff! I gotta look there. Screw the mission statement. So you have my attention. What I get is there is a LUNKER FEST where we pay $15 to enter to win prizes based upon the size of my catch. I have spot burn maps of where I can catch those lunkers. Below I read about Fall winning raffle items (congrats on the $25!). Then I read "PLEASE RENEW YOUR LRSA SPONSORSHIPS FOR 2011 - Your sponsorship funds go directly to paying for trout stocking in the Lehigh, where all your favorite pools between Jim Thorpe and Northampton are replenished with beautiful trout." See how folks think it is a big fishing club all about stocking, catching and eating fish? I mean, hell there is NOTHING wrong with that but it seems that some are trying to evolve the group beyond that. (BTW, the main page if mind numbingly long but I know you guys are working on the site).
Again, nothing in this post is to discredit the efforts of LRSA, it is just my opinion of what you and your organization can do better to promote the Lehigh fishery (if that is your intent).
As to your issues with Trout Unlimited. To my knowledge there is nothing in the national TU or state PA council of TU that addresses stocking. The purpose of TU is to protect, conserve and restore cold water watershed, with a direct and unhidden purpose of supporting cold water fish. It is up to the individual state fish commissions to address stocking laws in their state. My guess is that MT TU chapters don't worry about stocking since it is not allowed in the state. Certainly the Nations Capital Chapter does not worry about stocking as they have no cold waters around them, rather they support conservation efforts of other chapters. Other chapters go as far as to run their own hatcheries to support non-existent to small trout populations in marginal waters.
