By Mark Van Duser, Past President

It was a pleasant Saturday morning. It was a good time to do some work. ODFW had asked for some help and the OBPC was happy to respond. (Note: When a group of Club members gather in the Great Outdoors with a common goal…this can hardly be called “work”…)

We all had driven to the Hatchery through a light fog…light enough to enjoy the drive past acres and acres of hop fields. (No, those arrays of tall poles are not playgrounds for the County Lineman.)

Our project was to clean up some blackberries, fill in a few pot holes and move a few hundred feet of irrigation pipe. All tasks specifically designed for high school football players—but no such athletes were to be seen.

Our day started by clearing off dozens of doughnuts from a table. Then our Historian Bud Hartman gave a timeline of the facility, starting with its construction in 1963 and dedication in 1964 with approximately 200 people in attendance. Bud described how our Club fished for the initial brood stock of bass and crappie in the near-by Willamette River. Fast forward: Today the ponds are used to rear thousands of channel catfish fry. Kevin Stertz, ODFW Warmwater Biologist led us on a tour of the 30-acre facility.

We then put on our work gloves and set to the tasks. We topped off our morning in the warm sunshine with a tasty wienie roast (good job, Herb) and a few assorted fish stories. It was an honor to work alongside ODFW Warmwater Legends: Ray Temple and Al Smith.

We give a hearty “Thank You” to: Kevin Stertz (ODFW), Gary Galovich (ODFW), Ray Temple, Al Smith, Bud and Marcia Hartman, Herb and Carol Doumitt, Mark Albers, PK and Ella Or, Daniel Or, Bill Ramsour, Don Clark, and Mark Van Duser. Let’s do it again next year!