Pat Keliher traveled to Brewer on Monday night hoping to hear what Bangor-area anglers thought about the possibility of opening the Penobscot River to Atlantic salmon fishing.

“We want to hear anything that you think,” said the executive director of the Maine Atlantic Salmon Commission. He told the crowd that a yet-to-be-proposed fall fishing season for salmon is not set in stone, and all suggestions would be considered.

During its regular September meeting, the ASC board heard a technical report indicating that opening a fall fishing season on the Penobscot was the most favored option available.

On Monday a cordial crowd of about 30 anglers and conservationists listened to a detailed scientific presentation by ASC biologist Joan Trial, then made several suggestions for the ASC staff to ponder before moving forward with a proposed regulation.

Among the suggestions made by some anglers: Open a traditional spring season rather than the fall season that has been discussed, stock holdover brood stock into the Penobscot to increase the fish population, and recognize that restoration efforts thus far have been less than successful.

“I don’t really think that the fall angling season is the best choice, only because I think that fish that have stayed in the river, that have been up and down the river until September and October, are pretty well spent by that time,” said Lou Horvath of Holden, who has served as president of all three Bangor-area salmon clubs over the years.

“I just strongly feel that this spring fishery is the way to go,” Horvath said.

Horvath made some of the most pointed comments during the meeting, which was held at the Penobscot County Conservation Association clubhouse.

Among his assertions: That the theory of “restoration” of wild Atlantic salmon in the Penobscot is a fallacy.

“Self-sustaining runs of fish are a fairy tale,” Horvath said. “We can take every … dam out of this river and it will never be the same as it used to be. We’ll always have to supplement it with hatchery stock.”

Roger D’Errico of Hampden, representing the Veazie Salmon Club, said that his club has also defined its position on opening the salmon fishery.

“[Our] feelings are [we’d] like to see April 1 to October 15, the way it was before the closure, the original dates,” D’Errico said. “Hook and release, single-pointed hooks, no size limits, no doubles, no kill.”

Gary Arsenault of Winterport, the president of the Maine Council of the Atlantic Salmon Federation, cautioned against “cutting off our nose to spite our face” and said anglers couldn’t afford to hold out for an all-or-nothing scenario.

“It would be great to have a spring fishery, but the first step is to start in the fall and expand,” Arsenault said. “I don’t think there’s any fisherman here who’d say, ‘If we don’t get spring fishing, then no fishing at all.’ I don’t want to give that impression.”

Jeff Reardon of Windsor said he had a couple of concerns. One involved Trial’s estimates on fish mortality on released fish. Any fishing again would be catch-and-release.

“We’re talking about a fishery that will have as low as zero but as much as 6 percent mortality,” Reardon said. “If somebody told me that the aquaculture industry or the Veazie Dam or some other user of our resource was going to handle salmon and cause up to 6 percent mortality, I know how angry I’d be.”

Another of Reardon’s concerns: If a fall fishery were implemented because of the reduced stress on fish caught during cool-water conditions, abnormally warm fall weather could complicate matters.

“I hope you could couple [a fall season] with a water-temperature [component] and a closure that would remain closed on days that the water temperatures exceeded whatever the appropriate threshold was,” Reardon said.

Reardon also said that opening the Penobscot would likely lead to criticisms from those who used to fish other Maine rivers before their closure in 1999.

The Penobscot was one of 16 Maine rivers closed to Atlantic salmon fishing in 1999, as the ASC imposed a statewide ban on the practice.

Eight of those rivers had been identified by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service as home to endangered salmon.

The agencies believed that those eight rivers – the Penobscot was not included among them – support the last self-sustaining runs of wild Atlantic salmon in the nation.

Adult fish returns in the Penobscot increased in subsequent years, prompting many to wonder when the fishery would be reopened.

In 2004, 1,323 adult salmon were counted at the Veazie Dam salmon trap as the fish made their way upstream to spawn. That marked an increase of 209 over 2003’s total and the best since 1997.

Keliher told the anglers that their comments would be considered when drafting any proposed regulation, which he said should happen soon.

Keliher said he expects the ASC board to act on a motion to open the Penobscot in some way as soon as its December meeting, and after a 90-day comment period, public hearings would be held in the spring.

John Holyoke can be reached at jholyoke@bangordailynews.net or by calling 990-8214 or 1-800-310-8600.