Shrinking stream access

[tigfly]

Neil Travis' article this week prompted me to "Sound Off".

We recently lost access to a good stream for steelhead here in Ohio. Landowners in Ohio also own the land under the stream and can deny access to their stream property. This has led many fishermen to wish for a change of riparian rights to the public interests such as the stream laws in Montana and Michigan. The particular access that I am talking about was for the past dozen years opened to the public by the private landowner whose house sits 50 yards from the stream. They never used to deny access and were very friendly people who would wave at you as you waded by when I started fishing there a dozen years ago. I realized that I fished there only through their goodwill, and so would fish there only twice a season (or less!) so as not to wear out my welcome.

Over the years more anglers found out about it and of course traffic increased. They eventually posted their property with numerous hard to miss signs granting everyone permission to access and only asking anglers not to fish in front of their house. It's only about 300 yards to get past their house and gain access to a couple of miles of stream.

This year so many anglers ignored their simple request, not only fishing in front of their house, but also, using their front yard as a toilet. The whole stream by their house is visible from their living room so you can imagine what they got exposed to! I had even approached a couple of anglers fishing there and asked them if they had missed the signs and they replied that the owners don't mind because they had seen other anglers fishing the same riffle in front of the house. A friend of mine approached another group of anglers and they said it really didn't matter if they fished there because they heard the owner was going to close it off anyway!!! What kind of convoluted moronic logic is that?!

These owners could not have been more accommodating over the years in not only allowing access, but also allowing parking on their property. I can only imagine what the owners must have been thinking as they saw their generosity rewarded with blatant trampling of both their property and their privacy.

I am also mad at myself for not finding a way to help other fishermen respect their wishes. I guess I believe as Neil Travis does that the stream is no place for confrontation, but I am not feeling so good about that now.

In a larger sense, I think this total disregard for common courtesy is maybe one of the biggest threats to our state's steelhead program. Once most accesses and streams are off limits what's the point of the program. I am sure the aforementioned owners wish the state never stocked steelhead. I know that area anglers may think ill of the owners but on this one I am totally on the landowners side. Also, with these kinds of attitudes towards private property and privacy, even states such as Montana and Michigan could some day rewrite their laws and turn access back over to the land owners.

I am sure this subject has been debated many times and long before I came to this site but Neil's article just got me a little depressed about lack of common courtesy and then fired up enough to get this off my chest. Sorry for being longwinded and on the soapbox, because in all honesty I don't have any answers or positive suggestions. I'm just mad.

[JohnScott]

Tigfly -

Last Friday afternoon, the property owner of the piece of land that fronts a section of the South Fork of the Snake that I have fished regularly for five years threatened me in such a manner that I wondered if he was going to act out in a most unpleasant way ?!

After yelling at me and calling me an a**hole, among other things, he approached me to give me an upclose and personal assault. Since he claimed to be the property owner, and I figured he probably was, I let him be the "alpha dog." After asking his name, explaining that I wanted to check the land records to see where the property line was, because I had only ever fished there because a fellow from Fish and Game had shown me the access, he asked mine. I gave it to him without hesitation, so he would know I wasn't concerned with identifying myself.

After a long but less and less heated discussion, in which I assured him that I was not an a**hole or any of those other things he had called me, but really a pretty nice person, just like I was sure he is, and that I certainly would respect his property rights when I was certain he had them, and let him fume and vent about all the things that have happened on his property recently, we ended up shaking hands. He ultimately admitted that he caught me at a bad time, and that I wasn't the problem. After all, I had fished there for five years and he had never seen me before. I now have his explicit permission to access the river across his property, in the most obscure manner I can, as I have done since I started fishing there.

My point is - go back and ask if you can fish off that closed / private property. Explain that you know why he had to post his property, that you empathize with him, and that you will fully respect any limits he puts on your accessing the water off his property. Say please, be nice, and see what happens.

John

[ohiotuber]

Good points. I am also concerned about declining stream access, but from what I have seen, the biggest problem is fishermen NOT respecting the landowner & their property. Sad that those of us who DO appreciate their kindness & generosity are negatively affected by those who take privileges for granted. The time is coming when we will have to pay for stream fishing unless it is on Public Park property. More & more "fish for fee" places are seen at fly fishing shows I regularly attend.
Mike

[J Castwell]

A 'sign' of the times,,,
from the Pere Marquette river, Michigan 1970

[Bad Luck Larry]

Folks, I feel the same way you do. I hate to confront. But wanna know something? It's an awful thing to say but for some craaaaaaaaaazy reason, the MINUTE, you 'draw a line' , all of a sudden people respect you AND what your fighting for or representing.
And it shouldn't HAVE to come to that.
But I believe that people KEEP on doing what they've been doing because they CONTINUALLY 'get away' with it.

My dear friend has BLASTED fishermen who litter or aren't respecting the stream. You can bet those people are taken aback, however at the same time (as has happened in a couple of cases with him) they realize what wrong they've been doing and have corrected their behaviour.

One fisherman was littering either leaving his mono or something else and my friend confronted him and lectured him as to WHY it was bad. My friend always brings a garbage bag or plastic bag to pick up stuff others have left behind on an outing. All he does is pick up a couple of items. Just think if we ALL did that.
Well, the person he lectured? Next time he saw him on the stream, the guy THANKED him for the 'lecture' . The fisherman even had a bag of his own and was picking up stuff HE found along the way.

In other words, whether on the stream or on the street; if you see something that isn't right....any which way...and your gut is just yelling at you to do something....DO SOMETHING!

It's not about coming to 'fisticuffs', it's about 'nipping something in the bud': doing what's right.

And it only takes one rotten egg! Then ,you've lost that access, as in this case.
No wonder landowners are so protective. I don't blame them one bit.

We are all stewards of the stream.

If you care....


Godspeed,
Bad Luck Larry

[joerogrz]

JohnScott- I agree with you totally and loved the way you dealt with the situation.

As far as we are concerned here, it's not so much as people wading or floating down the creek as it is people being nosey. You can't see the house from the creek, but you can tell something is there, because the grass is mowed. We have actually had people walk up to our house from the creek. Another problem is litter. The streams are bad enough without the additional trash that gets thrown out by fishermen.

I'm not old enough to have been alive when it happened, but my Dad has told me of times when people didn't mind you crossing their land to get access to streams. Back when they didn't require you to ask permission. It would be great if it were still like that, but it won't be like ever again probably. We've actually had coon hunters come onto our land looking for their dogs from a previous nights hunt. We require permission to hunt or fish our land, and I can't blame people for being protective as long as they aren't a-holes about it.

[Avalon]

Good points. I am also concerned about declining stream access, but from what I have seen, the biggest problem is fishermen NOT respecting the landowner & their property. Sad that those of us who DO appreciate their kindness & generosity are negatively affected by those who take privileges for granted. The time is coming when we will have to pay for stream fishing unless it is on Public Park property. More & more "fish for fee" places are seen at fly fishing shows I regularly attend.
Mike

Dear tuber,

You said well but why should we as fishermen expect things to be any different?

I'm not trying to play the Devil's advocate here, but when people can't drive with courtesy or shop with courtesy, or even work with courtesy where is it all going?

I'm fortunate in that a lot of the places that I like to fish are on public property in the form of State Forest of State Gamelands. If I didn't have those opportunities I'd probably just pack it in.

Regards,
Avalon