Oregon fisherman in the top 10 in global species hunting

Luke Ovgard is a writer and teaches high school in Southern Oregon. He loves his students of course, but he spends his breaks fishing, his passion since before he was in high school himself. He plans his travels in the U.S. and abroad around where he can go to catch new species of fish. It’s a global, albeit small, fishing niche. Ovgard was sixth in the world to break the 1,000 mark, and has added to those numbers but remains sixth on the list of species hunters overall. The pursuit is known by a variety of names. Ovgard calls it his “Species Quest,” and has a column and a blog that predominantly features fish. We hear more about species hunting and what drives his own quest.

The following transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer:

Dave Miller: Luke Ovgard is an angler with all the tools you would expect and one you might not. He has rods and reels, lures and bait pliers and sinkers and bobbers and a spreadsheet. He needs that last one because he is a rare angler who, like a birder, keeps track of the many species of fish he has reeled in. And I do mean many. Ovgard was only the sixth person in the world to catch 1000 different species. He passed that mark last month and he’s already gotten to 1,101. When he’s not fishing Ovgard is a writer and a high school teacher in Klamath Falls. He joins us now to talk about what he calls his species quest. Welcome to Think Out Loud and thanks for joining us on your website. You say Lao Tsu was wise but he clearly wasn’t a fisherman. If he was, he would have said ‘give a man a fish, feed him for a day, teach a man to fish, hook him for a lifetime’. When did you get hooked?

Luke Ovgard: I started fishing when I was really young. In fact one of my earliest memories was a three year old self sitting on the side of the lake and waiting for a trout to bite here in southern Oregon. When my dad tried to move the car, he got it high centered and said, ‘well I guess we’re fishing all day’. And so I remember sitting there for hours and hours because it was well before cell phones and we just had to wait until someone in the family decided they wanted to come look for us. And I did eventually hook a fish. But I had no idea what to do so instead of reeling it in, I just sort of backed up to the bank a little bit higher with each step until I pulled the fish onto the bank. And then that would become our dinner later that night.

Miller: I can imagine that story going either way, an endless, hot, dusty day that you never want to repeat or the beginning of a lifelong love. Clearly it went the latter. Why?

Ovgard: I’m not entirely sure. That being said, it was something that was so wonderful for me in so many ways. It was just such a holistic experience that I’m thankful that there’s not just one thing I love about it. The ability to travel and see the outdoors to do something you love, occasionally get a rush of adrenaline and just immerse yourself in the beauty of the natural world. Altogether it’s just such an unmatched experience for me that I think that’s what’s made it my central life passion.

Miller: At what point did you start to consider yourself and describe yourself as somebody on a species quest?

Ovgard: Well, it was fairly recently. I always liked to fish and I really didn’t care what I was fishing for. But living here in southern Oregon, we have fairly low fish diversity. And so I didn’t travel a lot and I didn’t really know what else was out there. It wasn’t until the summer of 2016 that I really started to read and to know what was all available to me out in the larger world. And I went on a specific trip in November 2016, caught a fish that nobody I knew had caught and that was fairly uncommon. And I reached out to the guy who actually was the first to hit 1000 species of fish, Steve Wozniak. Despite the fact that he is a tech executive, he’s not the tech executive you’re thinking of. And he was just so friendly and so interesting to talk to that he sort of initiated this whole thing that I’ve now called my species quest for the past seven years or so.

Miller: How would you describe the community of species questers or species hunters?

Ovgard: It’s not your typical fisherman, right? You’re not looking at these arguably elitist fly fishermen who are wearing $1000 in expensive gear and looking down their nose at anything that’s not a trout. It’s not bass fishing culture where, again, you’re fishing in a boat worth more than most people’s houses chasing a handful of fish that you’re going to weigh at the end of the day. It’s a really unique group of people and what we tend to have in common is more or less a love for the natural world, for contributing to science and for the breadth and depth of the natural world. But that’s about it. Apart from that we’re as varied and mixed as you can imagine. The community is spread all over the world and just about anyone you know, could be welcomed into the community with open arms and find something there for them.

Miller: At this point do you go looking for a specific fish on your list?

Ovgard: Sometimes, yes. Other times, as with my trip to Asia this summer, I just knew that there was incredible diversity. No matter where I go I would try to use some sort of method that would catch a wide variety of species. And that’s exactly what I did. So here in the States, you know, I might go on a weekend trip. I’m now to the point where I have to drive six or eight hours to find something new. And so in those cases, yes, I’m probably looking at a specific fish or maybe two fish. But generally, when I go on these bigger trips, no, I’m just dropping something that’s going to be appealing to a lot of different fish and hoping for the best.

Miller: Do you remember what number 1000 was?

Ovgard: Yeah, it was actually a fish called a silver mooney. I was in Singapore. They’re an oddly shaped fish. They’re almost shaped like a crescent moon, thus the name. They’re silver, they have a little bit of yellow on them and it’s a fish that most people have probably never seen and would never find in a fish market. And yet for me it was absolutely something that made my day.

Miller: Did you know immediately that you had caught a silver mooney?

Ovgard: I did because I was fortunate enough to be fishing with one of my friends who lives in Singapore. His name is Jaiuan Lin. [00:05:44.329]He’s absolutely like a walking encyclopedia. I think I’m fairly knowledgeable about fish. But this guy is on another level. He looked at it and from 20 feet away, in half a second, told me, ‘oh yeah, that’s’, then dropped the latin name, which I still struggle to get myself. It’s incredible. The more you fish and the more you realize how good you are at something, it’s always incredible to see - wow, this person is even better at something that I’m great at. And, you know, for some people that can be difficult. But for me it’s just been a great experience because I’ve gotten to sharpen my skills and to immerse myself with people who are better than me and it makes me better in the process.

Miller: But so then other times when you can’t tell what you’ve caught or you can’t tell if it’s a new species or a juvenile version of when you’ve already caught or a sub species that doesn’t qualify?

Ovgard: Absolutely. I don’t count subspecies as separate species myself. But there’s no shortage of online resources out there today that you can look at and that you can read and help you identify fish. It’s much easier here in the west where we’ve been dissecting and further dissecting species and taxonomy for so long. But if you go to these more remote places, particularly in the developing world, it can be a lot tougher and you might come across fish that have no common English name as I did this summer a few times. And then you’re stuck trying to butcher the latin name as you recount that tale later down the road.

Miller: Does any story come to mind right now in terms of a memorable lifer catch?

Ovgard: Oh Jeez, there’s so many fish that I’ve caught and each one is memorable in its own way. But there’s one particular fish that really stood out in my mind and that was actually the first fish I caught that wasn’t something I could catch in my backyard. I was 14 years old. I went over to the Oregon coast as part of a school trip and our biology class had the opportunity to tide pool to look at banana slugs and the local flora and fauna. On one day our teacher said, ‘hey, if anyone would like to go out on the boat, we’re gonna catch some rockfish and lin cod that we’re gonna eat for dinner’ (because we went to a small school and didn’t have the funding to take everyone out for pizza). And so we went out. We caught some fish and the fish that I ended up catching first was what’s called a black rockfish. It’s one of the largest and most commercially important species here in the state of Oregon. It’s not terribly pretty or exciting but it tastes pretty good. It’s the bedrock of a huge commercial and sport fishery here in the pacific Northwest. For me, it’s just a memorable fish that really stands out in my mind.

Ovgard: So it was a subsistence field trip. It sounds like you had to catch your dinner?

Ovgard: In a sense, yeah. I think one of the coolest things about species hunting and being in this thing we call a species quest is that a lot of people hear about some guy who’s caught X number of species of fish and view me maybe in the same way they view the trophy hunter who shoots a lion in Africa and puts it on his wall. So I want to dispel that idea. That is not what I do. I’m not out here bagging fish for posterity, putting them on my wall, because apart from a few paintings and pictures, there aren’t any fish on my walls. But rather than killing these fish, I’m taking photos of them letting them go, and then using those photos as a chance to tell a story about a fish most human beings have never heard of because it’s not on the menu of their favorite seafood or sushi restaurant. And so by going out and catching these obscure fish, making my readers and my followers aware of them, I get to bring awareness and support to these fish that really have no commercial value and would probably be ignored otherwise. And so the species quest, which again is what I call it, that’s just going out, catching as many species of fish as you legally can [which] will lead to improved conservation, habitat protection and those are both crucial because every single species matters, whether or not it has commercial value. Whether or not it’s small or ugly, it deserves to be protected and to have its story told. And so for me that’s one of the beautiful things about this type of fishing.

Miller: You’ve just come back from a big trip in various countries in Asia, as part of your summer vacation from being a high school teacher. What’s the next big trip that you’re excited about?

Ovgard: I’m throwing around a couple of different trips. One of my close fishing buddies has his 60th birthday next summer. And so he is toying with the idea of either going to South Africa or Australia. Of course, both of those locations, just due to the additional flight cost, would be more expensive than a trip to southeast Asia. But either one would be incredible. And not only do you get a fish, but you get to experience the local food and local culture. When you’re sitting on a rock fishing with a local who maybe speaks just a touch of overlapping whatever the native language is and english, you really get a true taste of that place as opposed to visiting the Starbucks in the town square next to whatever the most popular tourist location is. And so I really look forward to the chance to travel and see new locations.

Miller: At this point if you catch, I don’t know, a rainbow trout or some fish that you’ve caught 200 or 2000 times before, do you still get a thrill?

Ovgard: You’d think no, but typically I do. So the very day I got back from my trip, I had spent 12 hours on a layover in the Singapore airport. I was pretty stiff and my sleeping schedule was all thrown off. So I decided to take my kayak and I went out to the local lake here that I’ve been fishing since I was a kid. I went out. I caught three rainbow trout. They were all, for me, fish of a lifetime. And you mentioned 2000, which is hilarious because I caught my 2000th rainbow trout this last year. And in that entire time, I caught one of them over 30 inches. The other night I went out and caught three in the same night. So it was the evening of a lifetime, the best day I’ve ever had fishing in my backyard and it still was incredible and provided the same thrill and rush as I was able to let two of those fish go. The third one passed away unfortunately. And so I gave it to a friend who ate it. And for him, it was a great experience as it was for me.

Miller: Luke Ovgard. Thanks so much for joining us. And we even just learned there that you have counted the number of rainbow trout that you’ve caught over the course of your lifetime. It was a pleasure talking to you. Thank you. That’s Luke Ovgard, an angler, a writer and a high school teacher.

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