Be Part of the Story
Our Stories Topics Podcast Articles & Guides About Beyond Our Stories Be Part of the Story
Subscribe on YouTube Join Our Newsletter Sponsor a Story

Organization

Trout Unlimited

United States, with the coho work on the north coast of California.

A newly rebuilt stream channel at Hancock Springs, with logs laid along fresh banks and bare soil either side. Nobody is in the picture. It illustrates the kind of habitat work described on this page and does not show this organization or its staff.

TL;DR

Anna Halligan directs Trout Unlimited's North Coast Coho Project, and she is one of the two people filmed for Celebrating Mendocino Coho Returns.

Mission: To bring together diverse interests to care for and recover rivers and streams so our children can experience the joy of wild and native trout and salmon.

Trout Unlimited was started by anglers and has been a fishing conservation group since 1959.

Good News Network named the group in September 2026 among the coalition credited with the record Mendocino coho return, alongside NOAA, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, The Nature Conservancy, timber companies and local tribes.

Why OGSP Recommends It

One Good Story Project recommends Trout Unlimited because its North Coast Coho Project shows how patient, hands-on restoration can help salmon return. The organization works with NOAA to remove barriers from Northern California waterways and reopen spawning habitat. In January 2026, its biologists found ten coho nests in Neefus Gulch, where the fish hadn’t spawned in more than 70 years. Trout Unlimited also documented this work in its short film, Celebrating Mendocino Coho Returns.

Visit Website

Related Topics

Environment

Related Resources

Split frame from the film. On the left a salmon lies in a shallow gravel stream. On the right a woman in a knit cap, glasses and a down vest stands beside a fallen log, with the on-screen caption not once but twice is incredibly exciting.

Celebrating Mendocino Coho Returns

Front cover of Undammed by Tara Lohan. A blue river winds down an orange background, with the title in dark capital letters across the top.

Undammed: Freeing Rivers and Bringing Communities to Life

An angler casting a fly line in a wide river, with two more figures far upstream and forest on both banks. No face is readable. It illustrates fly fishing as a subject and does not show this show's hosts or guests.

The Barbless Podcast Channel

Two spawning coho salmon, deep red, in clear shallow water over gravel, seen from below the surface. Nobody is in the picture. It illustrates the fish counted in a spawning survey and does not show this department or its staff.

California Department of Fish and Wildlife

An old metal culvert sitting above the water at the end of a small stream, hemmed in by fallen logs and grass. Nobody is in the picture. It illustrates the kind of barrier this person's work removes and is not a picture of her or of her project.

Anna Halligan

Ways To Get Involved

Find a chapter or give at tu.org. The coho program has a separate address at northcoastcohoproject.org.

Key Takeaways

  • Reports more than 350 staff, about 400 chapters and around 300,000 members and supporters.
  • Its North Coast Coho Project covers coastal streams from San Francisco Bay to the Oregon border.
  • Anna Halligan directs that project, and it appears in the 2025 film about the record season.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Trout Unlimited?

Trout Unlimited is a conservation group working on rivers and streams across the United States. It organizes through local chapters and its stated purpose is the recovery of water where wild trout and salmon can live.

What does the North Coast Coho Project do?

The North Coast Coho Project is Trout Unlimited's restoration program for coho salmon and steelhead habitat on California's north coast. Its own site says it installs large wood to give fish cover, removes barriers to fish passage and develops projects that reduce the sediment washing into streams.

How long has the North Coast Coho Project been running?

Trout Unlimited wrote in April 2025 that the project had been running for twenty-five years. That fits its own earlier account, because the Barbless podcast episode of December 2019 says the program started twenty years before that. The wording on northcoastcohoproject.org, nearly two decades, is older text left in place.

Who does Trout Unlimited work with on the California coast?

Its own site names timber and gravel companies, wine industry leaders, private landowners and state and federal agencies as the partners in the North Coast Coho Project.

Become a One Good Story Insider

Get the inside scoop and be the first to know when we add new films and content!

Be Part of the Story