Langsdorf Landing boat ramp on the Columbia River at Caterpillar Island will be closed Oct. 13 to 31 for the completion of long-awaited improvements.
Sandra Jonker, regional wildlife program manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, said state crews will remove the old launch and replace it with new planks.
There will be additional intermittent closures for installation of the boarding float, piling and asphalt paving. All work will be done by Dec. 15.
In 2011, the state Recreation and Conservation Office announced a grant of $753,000 for Langsdorf Landing, also known as the Caterpillar Island or Shillapoo ramp.
Work was completed earlier this year on the parking lots, new restroom and mitigation aspects of the project.
The Langsdorf launch ramp will remain a single lane, but will be wider. The existing ramp has hole at the end of the concrete planks that makes for challenging loading and launching during low water.
Some of the better spring chinook fishing in the metropolitan area occurs on the west side of Caterpillar Island. Good fall chinook fishing can be found a few miles downstream of the ramp.
Launching is free for holders of state hunting or fishing licenses.
But boaters using Langsdorf Landing also are aware that portions of Fishermen’s Slough — the name given the small amount of the Columbia River that flows between Caterpillar Island and the Washington shore — is very shallow in late summer and early fall, down to 2 to 3 feet, or less.
Chuck Bryan of Vancouver said the slough still is deep enough during spring chinook fishing season, but some sportsmen churn mud with their propellers getting in and out during the popular fall fishery in September.
“The boats get through, but I wonder for how much longer if it keeps silting in,” said Bryan, a longtime Columbia River salmon angler.
Lloyd Kadow, owner of Kadow’s Marina near the upper end of Fishermen’s Slough, said he has had to turn down some sailboat owners looking for moorage slips. He has about a half dozen slips deep enough for sailboats.
During this time of year, Kadow’s residence floats, then is aground, on six-hour cycles as the tide floods and ebbs.
His marina has room for 144 slips and he uses about 120. He caters to sports fishermen who can navigate the shallow water.
“I’d love to get it dredged,” Kadow said. “I can’t get my tug around at this time to get work done.”
Fifteen years ago Kadow priced getting a channel dredged in the slough: The estimate was about $80,000.
“I can’t believe the fisheries department isn’t going to dredge at least from the ramp down stream,” he said.
Mick Smith of Vancouver used to moor his 27-foot sailboat at Kadow’s But his vessel drafts 51/2 feet deep and the slough is too shallow from August to March for him.
He escaped during a 1 a.m. very high tide in June two years ago.
“I dragged my keel through the mud bottom and barely escaped with my motor going full blast,” Smith said.
He now moors at Captain’s Moorage on Marine Drive in Oregon.
“I’d love to go back to Kadow’s,” Smith said. “I can’t. It’s inoperable.”
He sees deepening the slough as a responsibility of the State of Washington.
“Why spend $700,000 for something people can use for three months?” said Smith.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredges in the Columbia River to maintain the navigation channel, but not elsewhere.
“The Corps is authorized to dredge the federal navigation channel; that authorization comes from Congress,” said Michelle Helms, a public affairs specialist for the the Corps’ Portland District. “Harbors and other areas outside that channel are outside the Corps’ authority and would require a congressional act to change it. There is a path to that authorization, but it’s complex and takes time.”
If a marina, or local or state agency, wanted to dredge in the slough there also is an extensive environmental permitting process involving several agencies including the Corps, Washington Department of Natural Resources and the Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Jane Chavey of DNR in Olympia said the normal process would be for the Department of Fish and Wildlife to propose the dredging because it would benefit the agency’s boat ramp.
Because the slough is an established public access spot, a dredging would be viewed as consistent with DNR’s stewardship and an application likely would get routine approval, she Chavey said.
Guy Norman, regional director for the Department of Fish and Wildlife, said dredging is not within the scope of the grant the agency received from the Recreation Conservation Office.
“We’d have to apply for a grant specific to dredging,” he said. “It’s questionable how competitive that would be around the state.”
There are reports that Clark County dredged Fishermen’s Slough many years ago to control milfoil.
Not so, according to Glenn Lesbeck of Clark County Environmental Services.
About 15 years ago, crews from Larch Corrections Center did hand-pull milfoil from Fishermen’s Slough onto a raft and the weeds were destroyed, he said.
