By Jack Whitney During a recent TU meeting I was having a conversation with a recently retired local WDFW fish biologist.  He said to me “You know Jack, we have created quite a large business fighting for Salmon.” Later I reflected on what he said and thought of all the fish conservation organizations in the NW and the number of people connected with them.  So, I started looking into the different salmon and steelhead conservation players and thought that I would pass on some of what I learned. Wild Salmon Center – This organization scientifically identifies and protects the strongest rivers suitable for wild salmon. These areas of focus included Northern California, Oregon, Washington (there are two river systems), British Columbia, Alaska, Russia and Japan.  They work with communities, agencies, tribes, and local conservation groups providing them with scientific, political, legal, fund raising and communication expertise.  The Wild Salmon Center’s [...]

Gary Borger is a noted fly tier, but he isn’t a fly purist.  “There are literally hundreds of thousands of fly patterns and every one of them catches fish,” he says. Only the patterns that work have survived in the literature or the re-telling between fishers after a day on the water. The huge variety of patterns also proves a basic fact about fish behavior, he says. Fish aren’t always selective. “During non-hatch periods fish are basically sampling the drift,” says Borger. “Anything that comes along and looks tasty they will eat it. Obviously in a hatch you want to find a fly that matches what they are taking. Even then there are some nymph designs, what I would call universal nymph designs, that are exceptional in being able to catch fish.”   The pheasant tail, for example. In just about any river tie on a pheasant tail nymph in [...]

Applications are now being accepted for the June 23-29, 2019 Academy.   Academy Open Application deadline April 15 The deadline for the 2019 Northwest Youth Conservation and Fly Fishing Academy is April 15. Boys and girls must be 12-16 years of age. Those that are accepted, will be notified by the middle of May.  The Academy this year is June 23-29, 2019 on Hicks Lake in Lacey, WA.  Applicants need to write an essay explaining why “they” would like to attend. They also will need a letter of recommendation from their school counselor, science teacher or responsible adult.  Cost is $300 and there are sponsorships available.  No one will be turned away because oflack of money. The support from the fly fishing community again this year is nothing short of spectacular.  Applications are coming from all over the State.  In the past years, we have been supported by over 50 [...]

  Everybody likes dry fly fishing because its such a visual process. You see the fly. You see the fish take the fly. It’s an exciting process. It’s possible to experience the same visual excitement nymph fishing if you develop the right technique, says Gary Borger. “Whether you’re fishing at the surface, just under the surface or at the bottom you can make it a process that is totally visual to the angler,” he says. But the process works only if the fly is on the bottom of the river and stays there throughout a drift, he says. “If you’re not on the bottom, you’re not doing what needs to be done and you will not catch fish. Period. A lot of people think they put on a couple of bead heads and heave them out there thinking they will sink and that’s not the case.” The problem with getting [...]

  Adrian Mead  (top) was one of dozens of kids introduced to the art of fly tying during the Fly Fishing Show in Lynnwood in February.  Overlake Fly Fishing Club members Bill Reisbick and Howard Levens provided patient instruction.  

Fish and fisheries have been part of the life blood of Washington since before statehood and part of a long-running research and education program at one of its leading universities. The University of Washington School of Aquatic and Fisheries Sciences is celebrating 100 years of science April 16-18. The school is making its annual Bevan Symposium on aquatic sciences a celebration of that effort by telling Centennial Stories of the school’s first 100 years of discovery. From Professor Bud Burgner’s studies of sockeye in Lake Aleknagik, Alaska to Prof. Amanda Bradford’s work studying Western gray whales in the Russian far east the program has played an important role in our understanding of oceans, rivers and species that inhabit them. Go to www.fish.uw.edu/news-events/100-year-celebration-and-2019-bevan-symposium for more information and registration materials.         Pioneering scientists including Bud Burgner at work in 1946 and Amanda Bradford in 2002, have made the UW [...]