C6
OUTDOORS
East Oregonian
Saturday, January 19, 2019
Large field set to compete in
EAGLE CAP
EXTREME
By ELLEN MORRIS
BISHOP
For EO Media Group
As the all-volunteer staff
of Eagle Cap Extreme Sled
Dog Race readies the 2019
course, there’s already some
good news for this year’s
event.
As of Monday, 25 sled
dog teams are registered for
the 15th running of the Eagle
Cap Extreme. That count
includes seven competitors in
the Iditarod-qualifying 200-
mile race and another seven,
including local veterinar-
ian Jereld Rice, in the classic
100-mile race. It’s one of the
largest fields to compete in
race history.
Oregon Field Guide, one
of Oregon Public Broadcast-
ing’s premiere TV programs,
will be here to film the race
— for the second time. Ore-
gon Field Guide covered the
race in 2009 and they are
back a decade later.
“The scale of the Eagle
Cap Extreme is really unprec-
edented,” said Ian McClus-
key, Oregon Field Guide pro-
ducer. “It has really grown
over the years. It has become
an epic race in distance and
landscape, the only sled dog
race west of the Rockies that
offers an Iditarod qualifier.
It just felt like we needed to
document it.”
McCluskey is bringing an
unusually large team of two
producers, an associate pro-
ducer, two cameras and two
cameramen to film the race.
They will cover aspects of
the event including the vet
checks, race finishes and the
awards banquet. Better tech-
nology and better cameras are
part of the reason for return-
ing, McCluskey said.
“We are interested in cov-
ering several stories in addi-
tion to the race as a whole,”
he said. “They include the
two father-son teams of Brett
Bruggeman and his son Spen-
cer, and also the high percent-
age of women in the race. We
tend to associate sled dog rac-
ing with hardy frontiersmen
with beards. But there are a
lot of up and coming, very
capable young women ath-
letes as well as more expe-
rienced women racers in the
ECX. And there will be some
unanticipated stories that we
will find as well.”
Many of the racers are
returning veterans, includ-
ing crowd favorites Clay-
ton Perry, Gabe Dunham and
previous winner Brett Brug-
geman in the 200-mile event.
April Cox, Hugo Antonucci
and Rex Mumford return for
the 100-miler. Local favorites
Morgan Anderson of Enter-
prise and George Garcia of
La Grande and last year’s
winner, Jane Devlin of Bend,
will run the two-day mid-dis-
tance race.
The dogs used in sled dog
racing come in many vari-
eties. Most teams consist of
Alaskan huskies—a mix of
Siberian husky, hounds, Ger-
man shorthaired pointer, and
other breeds that bring sight,
stamina, speed and strength
to the team. Alaskan huskies
are generally very good with
other dogs and gentle with
people. Musher David Hassi-
lev’s team includes Chinook
dogs — an American breed
with mastiff lineage. Connie
Star will run her team of reg-
istered Siberian huskies in the
two-day mid-distance race.
The Eagle Cap Extreme
kicks off with an opportu-
nity for the public to meet the
mushers and their teams at the
vet checks on Jan. 23, from
9-11 a.m. on Main Street in
Joseph, and 1-3 p.m. on Main
Street in Enterprise. There
will also be a sled dog team
or two at the vet check event
in Wallowa from 9-11 a.m.
At the vet checks, dogs are
secured to the musher’s
trucks or trailers, and undergo
brief exams by a team of
sled-dog specialty veterinari-
ans led by Yukon Quest Head
Veterinarian Kathleen McGill
— to ensure that the dogs are
in tip-top condition. Visitors
can meet the canine athletes
— and the equally friendly,
enthusiastic mushers and vet-
erinarians. More than 30 high
school FFA members will
be on hand to help at the vet
checks.
At each vet check, a
musher will provide a pre-
sentation about their dogs,
sled, and dog sled racing to
students and adult visitors.
Schools, including Enter-
prise and Joseph Elementary,
Cove, and La Grande schools,
learn about the mushers and
dogs in history and geogra-
phy classes, then bring stu-
dents to the vet check events.
Elgin Elementary School
often brings its fourth–grade
students to meet and cheer
on their favorite mushers and
dogs at the race’s start.
The potluck dinner at the
Joseph Community Cen-
ter on Jan. 23 at 6:30 p.m.
offers another opportunity to
learn about the race if you
can’t make it to the vet check
(or even if you can). This is
where mushers draw their
numbers and the race start-
ing order is determined. It’s a
great place to meet mushers,
Wallowa County Chieftain/Ellen Morris Bishop, File
Dr. Kathleen McGill, head veterinarian for the Eagle Cap
Extreme, gets to know an Alaskan husky at the Enterprise
Wednesday afternoon vet check in 2018.
Wallowa County Chieftain/Ellen Morris Bishop, File
Students from Elgin enjoy getting to know sled dogs at Ferguson Ridge in 2018, just before the race starts.
their families, and assistants.
Kids’ artwork from around
the county is on display. The
event is free and open to the
public. Please bring a potluck
dish to share.
The race begins at noon on
Jan. 24 at Ferguson Ridge Ski
Area, Tucker Down Road,
Joseph. If you plan to go, the
ECX provides parking and
a shuttle service to the race
start. It’s best to come an hour
or so early. Each team gets an
individual start, and you can
wish your favorite racers well
as they mush down the start
chute. Racers will be starting
until about 2 p.m.
Racers finish at varying
times. The 22-mile junior
race concludes late Thursday
afternoon. The 100-mile win-
ner generally crosses the fin-
ish line on Friday afternoon.
The 200-mile winners arrive
at the finish around midnight
Friday or very early Saturday
morning.
The ECX concludes at the
Eagle Cap Extreme Awards
Banquet, Saturday evening at
6:30 p.m. at the Joseph Com-
munity Center. Mushers tell
their stories of the race and
accept their awards, and there
is an auction of art, memora-
bilia and other donated items.
Tickets are available through
the Eagle Cap Extreme web-
site, https://www.eaglecapex-
treme.com and are $20 for
the general public and $12
for volunteers. All funds from
the banquet and auction sup-
port the all-volunteer Eagle
Cap Extreme.
Wallowa County Chieftain/Ellen Morris Bishop, File
Morgan Anderson gets an enthusiastic send-off from spectators as she starts the first leg of the
31-mile two-stage race in 2018.
EAGLE CAP EXTREME HIGHLIGHTS SCHEDULE:
Race Central at the Joseph
Community Center. Wednes-
day, Jan 23- 8 AM — 3 PM,
Thursday, Friday 8 AM-10 PM,
Saturday 8 AM-3 PM: Listen to
radio updates on musher po-
sitions, learn about the teams
and dogs. Kids Corner with
activities, books and events.
Vet Checks: Wed. Jan. 23:
9-11, Joseph Main Street; 1-3
PM, Enterprise Main Street.
9-10, Wallowa School.
Musher Potluck: Wed, January
23 6:30, Joseph Community
Center. Bring a dish. Free.
Race Start: Thursday, Jan 24,
noon to about 2 PM, Fergu-
son Ridge Ski Area, tucker
Down Road, Joseph. Shuttle
starts at 9:45. Arrive at park-
ing area at least 1 hour early.
Awards Banquet: Saturday
January 26, Doors open: 5:30.
Dinner (Stangels buffalo!)
served, 6:30 Tickets: $20,
available through the Eagle
Cap Extreme website: www.
eaglecapextreme.com
Website: https://www.eagle-
capextreme.com
Listen to the race radio and
track mushers on a map:
https://www.eaglecapex-
treme.com/index.php/volun-
teers/amateur-radio
Banned fish trap returns to Columbia as sustainable way to catch salmon
By CASSANDRA PROFITA
Oregon Public Broadcasting
About half the salmon
swimming up the Colum-
bia River come from hatch-
eries — raised to be caught
by fishermen. The rest are
wild. And many of those
salmon are protected under
the Endangered Species Act.
For years, Oregon and
Washington have been
searching for the best way
to catch more hatchery fish
while letting the wild fish
return unharmed to their
spawning grounds. Now, one
group says they’ve found it.
Fish traps were banned
on the Columbia more than
80 years ago. But advocates
with the Wild Fish Conser-
vancy are revisiting the idea
as a new, sustainable way
to separate hatchery salmon
from wild fish.
At a site near Cathlamet,
Washington, about 40 miles
upriver from the mouth of the
Columbia, Wild Fish Con-
servancy biologist Adrian
Tuohy stood hip deep in
water in a cage just below
the surface of the Columbia
River.
He turned a crank that
funneled a mix of hatchery
and wild fish from a holding
pen into the cage. The fish
were corralled in the river by
a wall of netting, stretched
across a network of pilings
that reach out about 30 yards
from the bank. Now, they
were swimming around him
— so close he could pick out
the hatchery fish one by one.
He pulled out all the fish
that were missing the sec-
ondary fins on their backs,
called the adipose fin. That
fin is clipped from hatchery
fish. Then, he opened a door
in the underwater well so the
wild fish — with the telltale
fins on their backs — could
swim back out to the river.
“And the fish swim out
for the most part untouched,”
Tuohy said. “That’s the
beauty of this gear, in con-
trast to other gear types,
is you’re able to success-
ermen more access to hatch-
ery fish.
Friend Or Foe?
OPB/Cassandra Profita
Fish trap operators can pick out the hatchery salmon for
harvest and release the wild salmon so they can return to
their spawning grounds.
fully release threatened and
endangered fish unharmed.”
So far, research has found
about 95 percent of the steel-
head and 99 percent of the
chinook salmon released
from the fish trap survive.
That’s far better than the per-
centage of fish that survive
being released from a com-
mercial gillnet — or the tan-
gle net that doesn’t catch fish
by the gills.
And that’s a key factor
on the Columbia, where all
fisheries are limited by pro-
tected wild stocks. As soon
as a fishery reaches the cap
for impacting wild salmon
and steelhead, it has to shut
down. So, having less impact
on wild fish would allow fish-
When Oregon and Wash-
ington started looking for
alternatives to gillnets, Blair
Peterson saw an opportunity
for gillnetters like himself to
catch more fish.
He used century-old blue-
prints to build an experimen-
tal version of the fish traps
his grandfather used in the
early 1900s. It was a fish-
ing method that pulled huge
hauls of salmon out of the
river, but it also pitted com-
mercial fishermen using gill-
nets against canneries and
other fish trappers.
“The fish traps were not
looked on with high regard,”
Peterson said. “The gillnet-
ter on the Columbia River, he
put a lot more heart, soul and
manual labor into what he did
to catch his fish than what a
fish trapper did.”
But since the fish traps
were banned to prevent over-
fishing, Peterson said, times
have changed for gillnetters.
Now, they’re the ones at risk
of getting banned as new pol-
icies have severely reduced
their share of salmon.
“It’s been a long, long
dry spell,” he said. “And you
can’t live on looking at a gill-
net boat. It has to be utilized.”
Peterson thinks bringing
back fish traps could be a way
for gillnetters to catch more
fish again. But other gillnet-
ters don’t see it that way.
“The gillnetters are still
convinced this is an enemy
of theirs,” Peterson said.
“There’s no ifs, ands or buts
around town that I have bro-
ken ranks.”
Jim Wells with the com-
mercial gillnetting group
Salmon For All said gillnetters
are fishing strategically in cer-
tain areas at certain times when
they’re less likely to catch pro-
tected fish, and the anchored
fish trap can’t do that.
“Once a trap is installed,
it’s there,” Wells said. “If
things change in season you
can’t be flexible.”