Thousands of anglers will be out and about this coming Labor Day Weekend and I wanted to remind those who will be taking their fishing gear along that the annual Washington State Trout Derby is still going on. Anglers who catch a tagged trout can still turn it in for a wide range of prizes. If you are interested in participating all you need is a Washington State fishing license. There is no entry fee. There are over 100 lakes across the state that have been planted with tagged trout. You can find a list of those lakes by visiting the derby website at www.wdfw.wa.gov/fishing/contests/trout-derby. There is also a form on this page where you can claim your prize. There are over 800 prizes available this year, with a value of over $37,000. Most years at least 50 percent of the prizes have been claimed. I think this is the fourth year of derby and it has been very popular. It was the brain child of Larry Phillips, who was the Inland Fisheries Manager for the WDFW at the time. The Derby runs through October 31st, so there is still time to catch one of these tagged trout and win a prize.
You can still win one of the hundreds of prizes in this year’s Trout Derby.