PAT NEAL: Celebrating April Fool’s in style

Published 1:30 am Wednesday, April 1, 2026

APRIL FOOLS’ DAY must be my favorite holiday. It’s easy to remember the date. We look forward to every April Fools’ Day with trepidation and a sense of revenge for the box of borax in the hotcake batter, seal bombs in the outhouse and thumb tacks in the waders, but I digress.

Like other holidays, April Fools’ Day can require extensive preparation. To get ready for Christmas, we chop down a tree. To get ready for Easter, we color eggs.

April Fools’ Day can require more preparation and hassle than all those other holidays put together — if you fish.

That’s because a large part of the mirth, absurdity and futility of the holiday is not performed by an anonymous drunken fisherman, but by government bureaucracies that we have no possibility of getting even with.

You might have thought the state of Washington was run by a power-mad cabal of self-serving, pencil-pushing, pocket-lining functionaries whose only purpose is to make our lives miserable.

They also have a keen sense of humor. Why else would they insist that we get our new fishing license and punch cards on April Fools’ Day, then wait until July to publish the fishing rule book? Maybe it all makes sense now.

The money from fishing license and punch card sales could go to support many worthwhile fisheries programs like the advanced state-of-the-art computer system that is required to administer fishing license and punch card sales.

These revenues might someday provide vital funding for the latest scientific research that might someday allow the state to design a punch card that is not printed with invisible ink. Filling out a punch card, in the miserable weather the punch-card puncher endures, can be a challenge to our physical limitations and organizational skills.

The punch card must be filled out in ink. Just getting a frozen or wet pen to work often results in an ink blot that resembles a Rorschach test. We are assured that someone in the government actually reads the punch cards, but how could they? It’s really all part of the April Fools’ Day fun!

To really appreciate the humor of the April Fools’ joke, you should realize that instead of the money from fishing license sales being used to manage the fisheries of our fair state for the benefit of tribal, commercial and recreational fishers, the money disappears into a bottomless pit called the “General Fund.” That’s hilarious!

The real yuk fest comes when you go to pay for your new fishing license and find out you will have to pay 38 percent more for it this year than you did last year. All for an opportunity to participate in reduced fishing seasons.

Why? Because we have decided that, after 120 years of operating fish hatcheries in Washington, hatchery fish are genetically inferior. This despite the fact that the current world-record 105-pound Chinook salmon came from Chile. That monster came from salmon eggs that came from Washington hatcheries.

Personally, I’d rather have a genetically inferior, 100-pound salmon than no salmon at all. But that’s just me.

It’s enough to know we could grow 100-pound salmon in Washington, we just don’t want to.

While you’re buying your fishing license, don’t forget to get your Discover Pass, the permit you need to be on state land in Washington.

The price of a Discover Pass just went up 50 percent to $45, while the DNR is closing campgrounds across the state, including our beloved Hoh Oxbow Campground. That hurts.

So, get your fishing license and Discover Pass, and celebrate April Fools’ in style!

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Pat Neal is a Hoh River fishing and rafting guide and “wilderness gossip columnist” whose column appears here every Wednesday.

He can be reached at 360-683-9867 or by email via patnealproductions@gmail.com.