Cape Flyfisher Guiding and Instruction

03/30/2026

Thank you for your service

The most elite boat operators in the United States Coast Guard are known as Surfmen.These men and women are capable of driving a 47-foot motor lifeboat at th...

03/26/2026

Damn those dams
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Between 1938 and 1942, a fisheries biologist named Willis Rich conducted the first systematic population census of Columbia River Chinook salmon, counting fish at counting stations along the river and its tributaries and producing population estimates that were simultaneously the most accurate data anyone had ever collected on Columbia River salmon and a documentation of a collapse that was already well advanced.
Rich had been hired by the Oregon Fish Commission in the 1920s to understand why Chinook salmon returns to the Columbia River were declining. The question contained the assumption that this was a natural fluctuation. Rich's data demonstrated that it was not a fluctuation — it was a trend, and the trend was continuous decline corresponding to the expansion of commercial salmon canning operations on the lower river and the construction of irrigation diversions and dams on the upper river.
He had been told to find out why the fish were declining. He found out. He reported it. The answer — that commercial fishing pressure combined with habitat destruction was removing salmon faster than the population could replace itself — was not the answer that the commercial canning industry wanted, and the commercial canning industry had considerable influence over the Oregon Fish Commission that employed Willis Rich.
He reported it anyway.
The Columbia River salmon counting methodology that Rich developed — systematic counting stations at tributary junctions combined with mark-and-recapture population estimation — became the standard approach for Pacific salmon population assessment. His 1942 report on Columbia River Chinook, "The Present State of the Columbia River Salmon Resources," is considered a foundational document in Pacific salmon conservation. It documented, with precise numbers and clear methodology, the scale of the collapse that had occurred and was continuing.
His recommendations — reduced harvest limits, fish passage at existing dams, restriction of new dam construction on salmon-bearing tributaries — were partially implemented and mostly insufficient. The Columbia River dams continued to be built. Bonneville Dam had been completed in 1938, the year Rich's systematic counting began. Grand Coulee Dam was completed in 1942, blocking salmon access to the upper Columbia permanently.
Rich continued his counting. The numbers continued to decline.
He died in 1957. The Pacific salmon populations he had counted and analyzed and tried to protect declined across the second half of the twentieth century to the point where multiple Columbia River Chinook runs were listed under the Endangered Species Act in the 1990s and 2000s. The counting methodology he developed is still used to track those populations.
He built the instrument that measures the loss he predicted and tried to prevent.
That is the specific tragedy of a scientist who is right too early — you get to watch, with better data than anyone else has, the thing you were trying to stop.

10/28/2025

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06/05/2025

Recent aerial
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After last weeks North East storm it appears a new break has been established at the tip of North Beach Island. This is a 4 minute video departin...

05/29/2025

Wh**ey calling

05/03/2025

Striper time!

04/12/2025

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03/08/2025

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09/12/2024

The Good Ol’ Days: Columbia River June Hogs
Before all the dams royally messed the Columbia River up for good, it had some monster Chinook! Bound for the upper end of the watershed, “June Hogs” sometimes topped 100 pounds. The construction of Grand Coulee Dam, which has no fish passage, ultimately did these massive beasts in for good. :(

07/05/2024

Not how to show your love for your country the day after.

06/26/2024

It's been a while since I fished the cool, crisp waters of Maine. Spent some time casting a fly in the Pine Tree state over the weekend and realized that I need to put it back into the regular summer rotation! Bait was thick and the tides run hard, scenery tough to beat.