B
Friday, August 23, 2019
The Observer & Baker City Herald
FISHING
FORECAST
REGULATION
UPDATE
Effective Sept.
1 through Oct. 31,
2019; the daily bag
limit is one hatchery
steelhead in the fol-
lowing areas:
• The Grande
Ronde River up-
stream to Meadow
Creek
• The Imnaha River
downstream of Big
Sheep Creek
• The Wallowa
River from the
mouth upstream to
Trout Creek
• Big Sheep Creek
downstream of Little
Sheep Creek
• The Wenaha
River downstream of
Crooked Creek.
GRANDE RONDE
RIVER
The Grande Ronde
has reached base
fl ows and fi shing for
trout is probably slow
with warmer water.
The lower river fi shes
very well for bass
during the summer
months. Try fi shing
between the state line
with Washington and
the town of Troy.
IMNAHA RIVER
The upper Imnaha
fi shes well for trout
and whitefi sh during
the summer months.
The lower river
often fi shes well for
bass during the sum-
mer months as they
move in from the
Snake River.
JOHN DAY RIVER
Smallmouth bass
fi shing is beginning
to pick up. River
fl ows are low but still
doable for smaller
infl atables.
MCNARY PONDS
The ponds have a
good population of
warmwater species
and provide good
bank access. The
ponds are also open to
non-motorized boats.
TWIN PONDS
Twin Ponds have
been stocked twice
and fi shing should be
good.
Follower
of the fir
■ The Douglas-fir is a common — and
sometimes uncommonly massive —
sight in N.E Oregon’s mountains
A
sucker for the
views and the
vibe of knife ridges,
I often fi nd myself
trudging long miles
along mountain
and canyon divides. I also
often fi nd myself against my
better judgment bushwhack-
ing straight down canyon
sidewalls, executing a kind of
controlled fall that is probably
not doing my knees any good
— but what the hell.
In both cases out here in
the Blue/Wallowa/Hells Can-
yon country, my company on
these backbone ridgelines and
steep slopes is (besides that
one same raven that seems
to keep an eye on me out
there, in every backcountry I
go) colossal old Douglas-fi rs.
Blackish bark spangled with
wolf lichen; eccentric canopies
made by burly boughs and
dead prongs. Pistol-butted
on sharp grades, sometimes
with great boulders leaning
against the swollen bases;
warped and weatherbeaten
on the wind-scoured crests.
Douglas-fi rs — easily
among the most widely
distributed trees in the
American West, and the most
commercially signifi cant
— exhibit what technically
you’d call a broad “ecologi-
cal amplitude”: the ability to
fl ourish across a wide range
of environments. You can fi nd
Douglas-fi rs growing happily
in riverside forests, scattered
in mid-elevation montane
settings, and up in dry, stony
subalpine heights past 7,000
feet. It’s a bit of a jack-of-all-
trades sort of conifer.
Our Douglas-fi r is the
Interior or Rocky Mountain
variety, found from southern
British Columbia to central
THE LAY
OF THE LAND
ETHAN SHAW
Mexico; from the Cascades
westward lies the dominion
of the Coast Douglas-fi r,
renowned as among the
very biggest and tallest
trees in the world and for
its all-around ubiquity, from
city parks and suburban
cul-de-sacs to pastureland
and wilderness basins. There
are Coast Douglas-fi rs in the
temperate rainforests of the
west side standing nearly
330 feet tall, and evidence
suggests historical specimens
may have breached 400 feet:
putting them neck-and-neck
(crown-and-crown) with coast
redwoods—currently the
loftiest trees known—and the
skyscraping Australian euca-
lypts called mountain-ashes
as the tallest of all trees,
pushing the plant kingdom’s
limits of vertical development
and hydraulics.
Those giant rainforest
Douglas-fi rs are mind-
boggling to behold up close;
meanwhile, the importance
of this species in the timber
industry on both sides of the
Cascades (and — thanks
to plantings — all over the
world) goes without saying.
Less celebrated, I reckon, is
the sheer toughness of those
often misshapen Doug-fi r
veterans studding our Inter-
mountain canyons and ridges.
Common as Douglas-fi rs
are scattered in our mixed-
conifer woods above the low
ponderosa zone, they hold
real sway over major swaths
of canyonside, ridgebrow
and ridgetop, where they
Photo by Ethan Shaw
A Douglas-fi r in the eastern Wallowa Mountains has the tangle of branches common
to very old specimens.
beat out most competitors
with superior drought-, fi re-,
wind-, cold- and soil-creep-
resistance. In many of these
settings, ponderosa is well-
represented, too, given an
edge thanks to fi re. Douglas-
fi r seedlings and saplings are
vulnerable to fl ame; older
trees, with their immensely
thick bark, are very resilient
in the face of wildfi re, and
many big specimens bear
charcoal tattoos bequeathed
in long-ago blazes.
Speaking of bark, it’s one of
the relatively few distinguish-
ing physical characteristics
between the Coast and Inte-
rior races of Douglas-fi r.
See Fir/Page 2B
Photo by Ethan Shaw
An impressively big
and tall Douglas-fi r in
the southern Wallowas.
WALLOWA COUN-
TY PONDS
Wallowa County
ponds on the forest
and in the valley
have been stocked
this year and fi shing
should be good.
Kinney Lake is fi sh-
ing well for stocked
and holdover trout up
to 16 inches.
WALLOWA LAKE
Kokanee fi shing
is picking up for
anglers. While most
are fi nding moderate
catch rates, the quali-
ty of fi sh is very good
with kokanee to four
pounds. Trout fi shing
has been good for
holdover and recently
stocked fi sh.
WALLOWA RIVER
Trout fi shing on
the Wallowa River
is currently good
with fi sh to 20 inches
being reported. Dry
fl ies during the last
few hours of daylight
have been effective.
Photo by Ethan Shaw
Source: ODFW
Old Douglas-fi r trees along a ridgeline in the northern Blue Mountains.