the Tailout May 2020 tailout_may2020finalx | Page 29

The author was named on of the “25 Most Influential Anglers in the West” by Salmon & Steelhead
Journal.
Making A
Difference
CONFESSIONS OF AN INFLUENTIAL ANGLER. BY ANDY MARKS
LATE LAST YEAR, I WAS named one
of the “25 Most Influential Anglers
in the West” by Salmon & Steelhead
Journal (Dec-Jan 2020, Vol. 16, Issue
6). After basking in my 15 seconds
of glory, I got to thinking what,
exactly, have I accomplished with all
my ‘influence’? Try as I might, I am
hard pressed to come up with a list,
or even the start of a list. OK, I am
a smart guy, so my next thought is,
what have I learned?
I think I have learned that the
issues behind the decline of our salm-
on and steelhead, and the opportuni-
ty to fish for them, are many.
There are political issues. This is a
real problem because many, maybe
most all of us fish because we want to
escape the pressures of daily life. We
are bombarded with news of political
strife and a polarized country daily,
and if you’re anything like me, you’re
sick of it. Nothing sounds more ap-
pealing than getting out on the water
and getting away from the noise for
a while.
There are social issues. We,
anglers, are literally a dying breed.
Demographic data tell us that people
who buy fishing and hunting licenses
are aging out and new young fishers
and hunters are not coming on board
in big enough numbers to replace the
ones who are no longer participating
in the outdoor sports.
There are biological issues. When
baby steelhead and salmon leave the
redds and begin to fend for them-
selves, they enter an environment
where the water they live in has been
tainted with urban runoff, where
there are predators anxious to end
their lives before they get started as
they reach salt, and they likely aren’t
as fit and able to survive as their
predecessors.
There are governmental and reg-
ulatory issues. Each of the alphabet
agencies (WDFW, ODFW, PFMC,
NMFS, NOAA, ESA, etc.) each
with its own silo farm of committees
and departments has its own sphere
of influence and the results of their
actions clashes with the jurisdiction
and actions of others. In the words of
the late Dr. Peter K. Bergman, who
invented coded wire tags, “North-
west salmon recovery has no one
in charge.” There’s no one sitting at
the top to sort out the Gordian knot
of agency/regulatory gobbledygook
when it all doesn’t get the results
necessary. Salmon and steelhead
populations are still in decline, the
trajectory still hasn’t changed (at least
enough), and we are no closer to
knowing what the real answers are.
www.salmonandsteelheadjournal.com
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