Most people understand difference between wild salmon, farmed fish

It's hard to understand why Kenai River guide Don Johnson is so obsessed with his desire to have Cook Inlet's commercial salmon industry fail. It appears that growing interest in "Kenai Wild" and organic classification of Alaska's wild salmon is seen as a faint pulse in a fishery that Mr. Johnson had presumed dead.

In reference to his letter to the editor on Dec. 4 "Wild label does not accurately describe inlet's hatchery stock" it is Don, not consumers, who is confused about the meaning of wild and organic salmon.

Most Kenai Peninsula residents and consumers understand the difference between fish that are raised and fed in a pen and those that feed and grow in a natural way at sea. It also is understood by most that local hatcheries take eggs from local wild stocks and provide a brief protective environment to improve the survival rate. The fish are then released, genetically intact, to feed and grow at sea.

Maybe Mr. Johnson, with his universe of knowledge of all things, could best focus his great problem-solving skills on some of the many growing in-river issues that threaten his own future as a Kenai River sportfishing guide.

As for the many hard-working people of the commercial fishing family, best of luck.

Bob Correia

Kasilof