The heat has arrived just in time for the boys of summer to enjoy scorching midday doubleheaders on the baseball diamond as well as early morning and evening respites from the scorch while tucked away in their favorite fishing hole.
Like fishing, baseball is a labor of love and rooted in the pervasive reality of failure. Not every cast, nor trip, equates to a fish, just as not every at bat, or game, ends with a hit. Those failures are no be-all, end-all, however. They are simply an accepted and necessary reality of those pursuits.
Baseball and angling can each be a cruel mistress indeed. All of the passion a person can muster does not guarantee you a thing. The baseball and fishing gods owe you nothing, and a perfect approach can, in fact, end in the same abject failure as any shoddy hack-job effort.
However, a true sportsman knows that these passions must not be pursued with a results-based frame of mind. It is the approach that will ultimately separate the wheat from the chaff, but only if a person is truly unwavering in their dedication. The gods may not owe you a thing, but they can certainly take it away for any and all implied or explicit forms of blasphemy.
On the river a fish may nibble your line and bounce your bell or bobber ever so slightly, only to retreat and never return. Even once a fish has attached itself to your line, there is no guarantee that it will reach your net. Unseen snags and ornery river nymphs can spoil a catch on a submersed limb or a perverse whim.
Similarly, a textbook at bat punctuated by a picture-perfect swing and subsequent crack of the bat can wind up sending a ball soaring, only to be safely tucked away in the leather of a defender. But baseball and fishing are games of odds and chance, and anyone foolish enough to dedicate their hearts to these crafts must be wise enough to put their faith in both regression and ascendance to the statistical mean.
Just because a fish teased you with a nibble and then deserted your line, or a hooked fish broke free while you patiently played it like The Old Man and the Sea, does not mean you should abandon your patient piscatorial approach. Likewise, a batter who is retired on a sizzling line drive that winds up snared by some fortuitous defender should not give up on their long honed art of hitting. The grip-it and rip-it approach is ill-suited to the cerebral requirements of both angling and baseball. You must have the faith, keep the faith, and pray for more when slumps and slack lines torment your soul.
The only way to stack the fishing odds in your favor is to spend more hours communing on the water or in the garage. A ballplayer must toil away in a stuffy batting cage or the dust of the ballfield to earn favor.
Dutiful preparation is paramount. A hitter must know his bat just like an angler knows his rod. The pine tar and rosin of baseball are the flies and home cured eggs of angling. It is diligence and dedication to your craft that will ultimately produce more fish in the creel and hits in the book.
In life, and fishing, and baseball, there are three stages on continual repeat. There is the preparation, then the action, and the response. Positive preparation allows for a positive action, and a positive response allows for more positive preparation. Try replacing one of those steps with negativity and you will find yourself caught in an eddy of sorrow.
It’s the process and the pursuit that makes a true passion worth your while. Angling, like baseball, is not intended for those short on gumption, perseverance or resilience. There can be no true triumph and gratification without the prerequisite suffering, and that is true in life, fishing, and baseball.
FISHIN’
Rain has been scarce to non-existent in western Washington as the statewide drought continues to drag on. Many places in the southwest portion of the state received a light misting on Sunday morning, and that first-rain-smell wafted from the dusty streets. That tantalizing tease of rainfall was merely the pretext for a heavenly game of bumper bowling though as thunder clouds clapped the sky and invisible lightning spider webbed ominously over parched hay fields and tinder dry trees.
No lightning fires were reported but that wisp of rain was a flagrant reminder of how far up the dwindling creek we really are. With little snowpack left in the mountains and no rain of consequence in the rearview or on the windshield, flows in Washington’s rivers are at near record lows and water temperatures are soaring past previous highs.
The Columbia River water temperature at Bonneville Dam early this week was measured at nearly 71 degrees, which according to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is the hottest recorded temperature to-date since at least 1950. For comparison, the recent 10-year average for this time of year is about 63 degrees. Nearby at Willamette Falls the water temperature was reported as 78 degrees with flows all the way down to just 6,200 cubic feet per second.
The warm waters and low flows are combining to make for some slow fishing as fish either hide idly in shaded backwaters or dart straight for their hatchery or headwater of origin against the slack river current.
Still, with sunny weather and summer schedules in play, it is hard, I dare say impossible, to keep determined anglers at bay.
It is estimated that 4,853 adult spring Chinook were caught during the last month on the lower Columbia River, which if accurate, would represent the most spring kings caught since at least 1969. The previous “record” was established in May of 2002 when 3,982 Chinook were landed. The WDFW estimates that a whopping total of 38,991 “angler trips” were made during that time.
Using a smaller prism, the WDFW noted that salmonid fishing on the lower Columbia River last weekend was “fair to excellent.” Gorge boat anglers broke the scale, pulling in more than two summer kings per boat. Anglers on the I-5 portion of the Columbia River did not fare nearly as well, reeling in just 0.05 summer Chinook, 0.03 steelhead and 0.01 sockeye per angler.
It is estimated that just over half of the Chinook and sockeye runs have already made it to Bonneville.
The Cowlitz River experienced slow week as well, according to limited WDFW data. Five bank anglers interviewed produced no catch and overall effort on the river was noted as light. The startup of the summer steelhead recycling program will almost certainly boost those numbers in the coming weeks however.
During five days of operation at the Cowlitz Salmon Hatchery separator last week, 407 spring Chinook salmon, 82 jacks, 43 mini-jacks, and 168 summer steelhead were recovered. The first batch of recycled summer steelhead, numbering 137 fish, were trucked down river and plopped back in the water near Vader. Three hundred spring Chinook and 73 jacks were also deposited into the Cispus River.
On Monday, river flows on the Cowlitz at Mayfield Dam were recorded at about 3,980 cubic feet per second.
In other Cowlitz River news, the regulations regarding the use of barbed hooks have been adjusted to allow for their use in the middle portion of the river. During the month of July barbed hooks will be permitted when fishing for salmon, steelhead or sea run cutthroats between the Lexington Bridge and the boundary marker below the barrier dam.
The intent of the regulation change is to help anglers target surplus hatchery steelhead stock in the Cowlitz River. The original proposal would have allowed barbed hooks all the way to the mouth of the river but there was concern that stray fish from other systems may be dawdling in the cool lower river waters.
Barbless hooks are still required for all sturgeon fishing. Speaking of which, last week in the Bonneville Pool sturgeon angling slowed a bit with boat anglers landing just one legal fish for every 6.3 rods. The previous week one keeper sturgeon was hauled in for every 4.6 rods. Bank anglers also landed a few legal size river monsters. Sturgeon harvest will be permitted in the pool again this week from July 3-5.
Walleye and bass are both providing fodder for anglers in the lower Columbia as well. On June 24 an angler trying his luck near Stevenson caught a near-record smallmouth bass using a plastic grub as bait. The bass measured almost 22 inches and weighed 8.53 pounds. The state record for smallmouth bass is 8.75 pounds, established in 1966 in the Hanford Reach.
In the Bonneville Pool boat anglers caught and released about six bass per rod, while walleye effort was “light.” In the lower Columbia mainstem, though, boat anglers near Washougal were hooking some walleye.
Angling effort for shad in the big river has been diminishing quickly with only about one fish being caught per rod.
Recent trout plants in Southwest Washington include 2,000 brown trout in Lake Sacajawea and 6,250 brown trout in Mineral Lake. There was no report of angling success.
Low river flows are impacting access on the Lewis River as several boat ramps are currently out of commission due to the dwindling water. The Swift Camp and Cougar ramps are both expected to be out of commission by the 4th of July weekend, however Yale Park, Beaver Bay, Saddle Dam Park, Cresap Bay and Speelyai Bay Park are all expected to remain useful throughout the summer.
The ramp closures are yet another impact of the low snowpack and below average spring and early summer rains that our region has experienced this year. Dam reservoirs on the river are currently holding only about 35 percent of their normal capacity and the river level is at its lowest point in more than 85 years.
Following those low flows out to the ocean, anglers in Marine Area 1 (Ilwaco) last week averaged 1.5 salmon per rod. The bulk of that catch was comprised of coho.
HUNTIN’
The final countdown to hunting season has officially begun as early bear and elk seasons are set to get underway in less than a month. Backwoods action will begin to pick up as proactive hunters begin to scout large swatches of forest and meadow in order to familiarize themselves with habits and makeup of their intended quarry.
In the meantime, registration is now open for the annual women’s outdoors workshop. The event, held at Camp Waskowitz near North Bend is coordinated by Washington Outdoor Women, a nonprofit group focused on increasing the prevalence of women in all types of out of doors activities.
The camp, which will run from Sept. 18-20 will feature 16 different classes indulging topics such as archery, big game hunting basics, map and compass reading, survival skills, first aid, and duck hunting.
Participants must be at least 18 years old. More information, including cost and scholarship opportunities can be found online at, www.washingtonoutdoorwomen.org.
WILDLIFERS
A burn ban that began on the east side of the mountains and then crept into Lewis County has now expanded to include all of Washington, including state parks and Olympic National Park. Campfires, even in designated pits, have been banned as well, and only small recreational fires on private land are currently allowed. Fires are also prohibited on all DNR protected lands.
As we approach the 4th of July weekend fireworks now pose a great danger as grasses crunch under foot and tree nettle crackle overhead. Fireworks are never allowed on state managed lands and many cities are enacting tough anti-fireworks regulations in order to prevent catastrophe from sparking.
Patriotic revelers should be careful with their boom-boom toys and check with your local municipality for up to date regulations governing the use of fireworks. And always be sure to keep them away from the hayfield and the barn, ya’ hear?
