My fishing on the Nic goes back to the early 60s. I think my Dad first took me there when I was 5 - so that would be about '61 but I started to do a lot of it there about '64. There were a lot more coho and cutts then and it was productive into the 70s though there certainly were lean years. When it was good the river was crowded! I stopped fishing it in the early 80's - it was pretty grim by that time and the water conditions were mostly bad. However I started going back 8 or 9 years ago and go back a day or two every fall. No where close to what it was but it can be worthwhile. At least the water is better (clearer most of the time, people keep cattle out of the tribs now) All the coho and jacks I have caught have adipose fins except one - so I am not sure how many fish return due to the hatchery. Cutts are all wild (though there was some stocking in the 70s and 80s). It proves we can have some decent wild stocks in suburban areas with just a little bit of work and care. Chum and springs are introduced (chum stocks were extrapated early in the 20th century). Given the wild stocks I hate to see still fishing with bait going on - but I don't make the regs and don't blame folks who fish that way. Spinning with light tackle is great and it can be fished with a fly if you can cope with the high grass, banks and black berries. I also fished the Serp back in the 60s and 70s but never since the hatchery has come in. The water is always a mess whenever I drive by. Used to live on a trib of Bear Creek and remember seeing steelhead in the spring. King Creek which skirts Bear Creek Park used to plug full of coho in November and almost every little rill in that neighborhood had salmon spawning in late fall. Crapppy residential and road construction has all but whipped that out. There are resident cutts in the Bear Creek system that can approach a lb or so. BTW it has been closed below 152nd street since at least the early 70s so other than a short sectio from there to the Serp there is no fishing.