A wonderful story about what happens when an innovative landowner of a prime fishing area fixes it up and charges people to fish there.
Food for thought.
An excerpt.
“Doug Barclay vividly remembers a fall day in the early 1980s when he said upwards of 3,000 people were on his New York property along the lower Salmon River, parking on both sides of the road—all the way back to the village of Pulaski, more than a mile away. “What am I going to do from a liability standpoint? How am I going to handle this?” he said in an interview of the salmon-crazed hordes of fishermen that were trashing and trespassing on his property day after day during the annual fall spawning run of chinook and coho salmon. He recalled the excessive drinking, the garbage on the sides of the river and all over his land, and the louts who defecated along the road near his house.
“Barclay, then a New York state senator nearing the end of two decades in office, said he approached one man who was walking toward the river with his son and reminded him that he was on private property. The response?
“They went in and sort of just said, ‘The hell with you,’” he recalled, adding the two were quickly followed by more than two dozen other anglers with the same attitude.
“It’s been more than two decades since Barclay opened the Douglaston Salmon Run, a pay-to-fish business along what unquestionably is the best place to fish on the river for spawning salmon and trout from Lake Ontario because of its closeness to the lake. Anglers are charged $30 a day to fish, parking in a lot off Lake Road. The lot has a 300-vehicle capacity.
“Barclay, 76, keeps trespassers off his property with posted signs and a team of 15–20 employees. Each year, he said, he’s expanded his offerings to clients, making the property more and more amenable to anglers. He has put in a fish cleaning station and paths, and offered exclusive lodging for anglers and hunters in five separate lodges on his 5,000 acres of land that has been in his family for seven generations.
“Recently he has expanded his private fishing area slightly through lease agreements with two adjacent landowners who, like Barclay, want to control the angling crowds on their land. He’s looking into expanding his services for those willing to pay for them. He sees his business as an example, a magnet to help bolster the North Country economy.”
