cOWLITZ,

I'll tell you what I know. Most of my info. comes from a friend of mine (some years older than me) who fished it back in the day when you could use boats decades ago. I asked the same question years ago and this is what he told me:

Apparently, boat traffic was considerable and since the willapa is not what you would call a large river by any means, many of the locals were getting fed up with the traffic. This was when driftboats were just coming into fashion and fishers weren't used to them in large numbers. The locals then went to the then department of game and struck a deal whereby the landowners would not post their land to tresspassing IF the dept. of game would adopt a boat restriction during the winter season.

The rest is history. Now, we have a formerly great river that has a majority of it's land posted and still no use of boats.

I have two different emotions here. First, I don't mind the boat restriction at all because I hate boats on small rivers. On the other hand, I'm pissed off at the locals who wasted no time posting their land once the restriction was in place. I have a few friends that live out there and I have seen first hand the greed and lack of trust the locals have in guys who simply want to respect the land and fish. On the occassions I have approached property owners, I have been rejected 3 to 1 over the years. Sad deal.....it used to be one of my favorite rivers.