Conspiracy Theory

[ness]

Let me get a grip on this....

Placed by the hand of God and then protected by humans.

-verses-

Placed by the hand of a human and protected by humans ?

And who placed the humans? Oh yeah...nevermind, I know the acceptable answer to that one.

Soooo, what was the question again?

(this is a genuine mind bender)

I'm wrapping up post production on my documentary 'Trout Gone Wild: Salmonid Sinners'. It will answer all your questions.

[Outside Bend]

It can get confusing, especially when the terminology is frequently used interchangeably, but here's how I've always thought of it-

Native- (generally) present in an area before European settlement. There are cases where species have expanded their range over the past several hundred years- even though armadillos, cattle egrets and coyotes probably aren't native to Missouri in the strictly historic sense, I still tend to consider them as native species.

Nonnative, exotic, etc- species which are present due to human introduction- cats, dogs, rats, pigs, loosestrife, asian carp, mosquitofish, Japanese honeysuckle, and all the rest.

Wild- Capable of reproducing and maintaining viable populations. A nonnative organism can still be considered wild if it can successfully reproduce- brook trout in the Rockies are a good example.

Feral- The descendents of domesticated species, which no longer rely on human support. Dogs, cats, horses, pigs, goldfish, one could probably even argue brown and rainbow trout.

[hank franklin]

I've only fished the NFOW a handful of times but I have no doubt there's some brown reproduction. Life finds a way.

When debating man vs. nature, I'll take nature.