On Saturday, 03-04-2017, the U-DA-MAN Fishing Tournament group,  conducted our 4th Annual Coho HO! Oregon Department of Fish & Wildlife (ODFW) Salmon Trout Enhancement Program (STEP) project on the Yaquina River from Cannon Quarry Park on Elk City road. 15 project volunteers, made up of U-DA-Man Fishing Tournament members, as well as volunteers from Longview Hills Fishing Club and others from the community spent approximately 4 hours placing a large number of clean recycled Christmas trees into the water way by securing them to existing log pilings.

All the trees are placed along the bank from boats.  The trees are secured with 120 day rot cotton cord, ensuring they will stay in place for about 3 months and provide juvenile salmon with temporary habitat and protection from predators, particularly cormorants.   Cormorants feed heavily on small juvenile salmon as they make their way down stream in their migration to the ocean.  This project hopes to enhance salmon populations, including Chinook and Coho, in the Yaquina River system.

The U-DA-MAN Fishing Tournament group would like to thank ODFW, Longview Hills Fishing Club, Dahl’s Disposal of Toledo, Newport Marine & RV,  Newport’s JC Market, Englund Marine and Industrial Supply and Lincoln County Parks for their support and services which helped make this project possible.

Information and photos provided by U-D-MAN