We had a great breakfast meeting at the Agate Beach Golf Course on February 7th.

A quick rundown which doesn't begin to cover everything discussed during the business meeting: John Spangler spoke about some of the upcoming events such as the tour of the commercial boat docks; Brian Hudson talked about the upcoming schedule of events; Wayne Hill spoke of the various fish traps; Dave Dinsmoor spoke about the SOLV bags at Big Creek as well as the upcoming Beverly Beach cleanup; Frank Stout suggested (along with Wayde Dudley) our club buy a boat the group who attended the Eugene Sportsmen Show saw last week. Unfortunately no one took him too seriously and the item was tabled for another as yet to be determined meeting; Wayde Dudley spoke of a project for ODFW he is working on with Casey and introduced a new member, Walter Chuck; and I mentioned there will be something new on Fish-de-Bay in the near future. Keep a lookout for Big Fish and his wonderful "blasts" on e-mail. All the information on this upcoming items will be forthcoming.

Casey Deckard, our good friend at ODFW spoke about the study he has been working on the last several months regarding the albacore fishery in our area. A lot of work went into this project and he shared the results as well as his methods of getting the information. The final report is not yet completed as there is a lot of information, but we learned a lot about this important fishery which has become very important to Newport.

We were lucky to have another good friend visit us, Dean Fleck from Englund Marine. He spoke about the rather sad state of the salmon fishery in our area as well as the state of the fishery along the west coast. He also touched on the marine reserve issue to let those of our group who were not able to attend the meetings last month what was going on in that area. Both of these are very important issues to all residents whether you fish or not.

As always, it was enjoyable, informative and a great way to spend the morning.

First Lady