A Deep Passion For Fishing Bites Guide At Very Early Age

A steelhead fishing trip down the upper Rogue River with his father turned Casey Malepsy into a fishing guide-to-be at age 7.

“I was fishing with a black and silver Hot Shot plug, and I caught a 14-pound steelhead,” said Malepsy of Shady Cove, Ore. “My dad took a picture of me, got it in the Fishing and Hunting News, and I won the contest.”

“I knew then what I wanted to be, and I haven’t let anyone or anything stop me,” he says.

Now, 12 years later, Malepsy is knee-deep in his dream life on the river as a modern-day Huck Finn.

The teenager is a peach-fuzzed veteran in the grizzled world of fishing guides, willing to pass on college, wealth and maybe even a family so he can make the outdoors his personal office.

At 19, Malepsy already has guided for four years on the Rogue, branched out to Alaska’s famed Kenai River and set his eyes on a future of deep-sea and even tropical guiding.

Oregon has about 150 licensed guides. They get $100 or more to devote their equipment, knowledge and a hard day’s work toward giving clients a chance to catch fish.

Teenage guides are a rarity in the West, and those who pick up their guiding licenses before their driver’s licenses tend to be the sons of guides who get a slot in the family business.

But Malepsy is one of very few to strike out solo at such a tender age, and he’s holding his own, both as a fisherman and businessman.

“I’ve been with a few other guides, and Casey really knows the river and he’s as excited to be there as you are,” says Steve Homan, a Shady Cove backhoe operator who has booked trips with Malepsy on the Rogue and in Alaska.

“On a scale of 1 to 10, he’s a 9 now, and he’s going to get better,” Homan says.

Malepsy stands out as much for energy and business savvy as for his fishing prowess and boyish looks.

He’s taken his Casey’s Guide Service marketing strategy on the road, by hustling customers at large outdoor shows throughout the West.

“I can see myself doing this for many, many years,” Malepsy says. “You can’t make a real good living at it, but I don’t want that to stop me from doing what I love to do.”

Malepsy’s childhood reads like a river-boy’s pedigree. He caught his first Rogue steelhead when he was 4, hooking it while sleeping on his grandmother’s lap in a driftboat. At 10, he started rowing fishermen in driftboats, a task many fishermen never learn.

He bought his first driftboat at 12 and began guiding professionally at age 15 when he finally persuaded an insurance agent to issue him a liability policy.

“When I was in the middle of high school, I just devoted myself to fishing,” says Malepsy, a 1994 Eagle Point High School graduate. “I quit sports. Every spring and fall, I was fishing all the time, and I haven’t stopped.”

All that romanticism comes with tradeoffs.

He’s broke, lives with his parents, doesn’t have a girlfriend, and suspects the vagabond life of guiding may keep him from having anything resembling a normal family life.

“I don’t think about it too much, to tell you the truth,” Malepsy says. “I’m so focused on my business. If having a family doesn’t happen, that’s OK, too.”

“Getting started is real hard for anyone, even if you have a dad who’s established,” said Bill Urie, president of the Rogue River Guides Association. Now 32, Urie started guiding when he was 15.

Malepsy eventually would like to guide bonefishing trips or deep-sea adventures in the tropics, and Malepsy already has a special U.S. Coast Guard license to operate 60-ton vessels.