In a bid to save embattled Columbia River fish populations, the feds have devised a plan to kill 11,000 double-crested cormorants—black seabirds with a bad hankering for juvenile salmon and steelhead.
Pending final approval, state agriculture workers would shoot the birds, as well as spray their eggs with vegetable oil to prevent hatching. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers considered other alternatives, such as hazing—presumably using similar methods perfected by college frat boys—but said that would just shift the problem elsewhere.
“Officials said that the birds eat young salmon and as a result, put the population of the fish at risk.” On the other hand, the Audubon Society of Portland said: “…what really threatens the population of the salmon are fish hatcheries, habitat loss, and dams.”
Tom Bie is the founder, editor, and publisher of The Drake. He started the magazine in 1998 as an annual newsprint publication based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He then moved it to Steamboat, Colorado (1999), Boulder, Colorado (2001), and San Clemente, California (2004), as he took jobs as managing editor at Paddler, Senior Editor at Skiing, and Editor-in-Chief at Powder, respectively. Tom and The Drake are now both based in Denver, Colorado, where The Drake is finally all grows up(Swingers, 1996) to a quarterly magazine.