KLAMATH FALLS — Klamath Falls is a destination. Yes, on purpose. Locals not working in the hospitality industry might scoff. Oregonians who’ve never visited might wonder why. But just like the birds that darken our skies, people from all over the world flock here en masse to see some of our natural wonders.

More than 500,000 people trek to Crater Lake National Park every year. An additional 100,000 visit the Lava Beds National Monument. Klamath Falls is the closest city of any size to both, which makes our little high desert haven the perfect home base for both.

Though the national park and monument are the biggest draw, our natural resources also have a magnetic appeal.

Birders, waterfowl hunters and anglers have long visited the region to pursue their passions. Bald eagles, skies full of mallards and trophy rainbow trout hold the broadest appeal, but this summer, I hosted an international visitor who came from Amsterdam to fish for the lesser-known species here in the Klamath Basin, namely our chubs and sculpins.

Going Dutch

Theo Modder is a Dutch angler of renown. He has caught more species of fish than any other European angler in history — including the famed French lure designer, Patrick Sebile.

One of the power players on the Netherlands-based specieshunters.com website, Modder was just the seventh person in history to eclipse 1,000 species of fish and the first angler in the Old World to do so.

Theo and I exchanged a few emails and interacted online over the years, but had yet to meet. We arranged to meet up in the narrow window between my return from Alaska this summer and my departure for Squadron Officer School this fall as Theo journeyed from San Francisco to Seattle on a West Coast fishing trip.

Thai Orchid served as Klamath’s first ambassador, saying “Hallo!” as well as I’d hoped. Theo and I grabbed a fantastic lunch to fuel our efforts. We had just the afternoon and evening to pursue the five species Theo hadn’t caught that were available locally that were realistic possibilities: blue chub, tui chub, Klamath marbled sculpin, slender sculpin and Sacramento perch.

Unpleasant surprise

Historically, a small ditch in Klamath Falls holds a few Sacramento perch, while all five of the native species were easy to catch at Hagelstein Park. It seemed easy enough.

Though we caught loads of pumpkinseed in the ditch, the perch didn’t play.

On we went to Hagelstein Park.

I hadn’t been there in a few months, so when I arrived, I was shocked to see signage saying fishing was not allowed to “protect spawning suckers.” I was floored. I’d fished there my entire life, and though there are a dozen or so resident shortnose suckers in the large spring pool, these grazing suckers do not readily take bait or flies. In 30 years of fishing the pool, I’ve caught just one, and I’ve seen just a handful of other anglers there in my lifetime.

Yet, in an arbitrary decision devoid of logic, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife closed it to all fishing in an emergency action this summer.

An informative sign would’ve sufficed for the one sucker caught there every 10 years, but instead, ODFW closed the only local fishery where you can easily catch all of the Basin’s native “rough” fishes in one place.

Hopefully they reverse their mistake, but in that moment, it was a pipe dream, and I was forced to look elsewhere.

Embarrassed and flustered to have brought Theo there, I had to reevaluate. We crossed the highway to fish the mouth of the spring, visited a few other spots along the lake, and had to work much harder to find what we were after, but we did manage to find a blue chub. One down, four to go.

Pleasant surprises

The sculpins bite at night, but chubs far less so.

We had the endemic blue (our first target, since they’re not found outside the Basin) but needed the tui. Though native here, tuis have a much larger range, but they don’t live in the Netherlands, so they were still on our radar.

With just over an hour of daylight left, we opted to head to Rocky Point to chase chubs. In the fall, yellow perch and native tui chubs stack up along the shoreline. Trout chase them. Most people chase the trout, but we chased the chubs.

Theo caught one in minutes.

Two down, two to go.

Night

With 15 minutes of daylight, we returned to the lakeshore and began searching with headlamps for sculpins. Almost immediately, Theo caught one. It was the species far less common upstream in the spring, the Klamath marbled sculpin. In fact, he caught several of these before catching the slender, but he eventually managed to get both.

Four down.

At this point, it was quite late, and Theo had an early morning, so we called it night with 4-of-5 targets hit.

Klamath Falls helped Theo in his quest and left a positive impression on its European guest. Hopefully, we can better manage our resources in the future to maximize the tourist draw of our area and bring in more folks like Theo who are here not for the big tourist draws, but for the countless smaller gems in the Klamath Basin.