Catching trout at Klineline Pond will soon be as easy as shooting fish in a barrel.
April 9, waves of local youths between 5 and 14 years old will surround the Salmon Creek pond as part of the 12th Annual Klineline Kids Fishing Event, trying to land the biggest hatchery trout for prizes from the Klineline Kids Fishing group, which organizes the event along with the Go Play Outside Alliance of Washington (GoPAW) and the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Registration is still open for the event, although it’s filling up fast.
The event will occur in eight waves between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., each with approximately 200 youths fishing at a time for 45- minute intervals. There is a limit of 1,600 kids this year. Most available spaces for the event are in the 1 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. time slots. From 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. April 8, there is a separate fishing time for children with disabilities.
Registration is $5 and includes an event t-shirt and Zebco rod – no personal fishing gear will be allowed. If someone can’t afford the $5 registration, they can simply place “scholarship” at the top of the application and local donors will sponsor them. Fishers will be able to catch a maximum of two trout, with no catch and release allowed.
So far, there’s one bicycle prize per round.
“We’re trying to make it more of getting a kid to go fishing,” said Will Morrison, executive for the Klineline Kids Fishing group and a fish and wildlife employee. He said that the purpose of a bikes as prizes is to give kids farther from water an incentive to fish.
Volunteers from the Salmon Creek Lions Club will also hand out tackle and fishing rod prizes each round, measure catches, operate a food stand and provide information about its other projects. It has been involved with the event since 1984.
“Some kids have never had an opportunity to do something like this,” said Don Holly, secretary for the Salmon Creek Lions Club. “It provides them with an opportunity to network with other kids and adults.”
The fish and wildlife department will dump more than 7,000 fish from hatcheries throughout Washington into Klineline pond the morning of April 7. The fish are part of the yearly amount that the department stocks Klineline Pond and other bodies of water throughout the state with every year. It helps provide fish for 21 different events from late March through mid-July.
Erica Erland, a spokeswoman for Clark Public Utilities, said it will donate approximately 2,000 fish from the Vancouver Trout Hatchery in Columbia Springs to the event. The utility company has helped procure fish for the event since 1995. The cost of raising a full-size trout varies from $2 to $3.
The fish and wildlife department had a seven-year contract with GoPAW, a 501(c)(3) non-profit that promotes and supports recreational activities throughout the state. The contract expired in 2010, and Klineline Kids Fishing was created to raise money for the event.
There is an option on fishing license applications to donate money to youth fishing, which goes towards the events. Klineline Kids Fishing also seeks donations, which are tax-deductible through its partnership with the GoPAW non-profit.
“We don’t even need to advertise it,” said Doug Ballou, a fellow organizer and president of the Salmon Creek Lions Club, about the event’s popularity. “Kids hear about it through word of mouth.”
The event is still seeking sponsors with donations of at least $250 to help fund the event. Sponsors will have their business logo printed on the back of the t-shirts and space at the event to hang an advertising banner. To register for the event or find more information about being a sponsor, visit GoPAW’s or the fish and wildlife department’s event websites.
