Hi, I'm Ray Pelland. I've been building these specialized watercraft (first under the Kingfisher name, now River King) and refining this basic design since the fall of 1990. At that time, as far as I know, there was only one other company producing any kind of pontoon style boat for flyfishing. That company was Water Otter, owned by a very nice guy, Darryl Osborne, in Hamilton, Montana - who again, as far as I know, came up with that major advance beyond the float tube. The Water Otter company is still producing a one-person kick boat style watercraft under that name and is still in Hamilton, although under different ownership.
This first Water Otter was six foot long and didn't have oars or an anchor. It was a very basic version of what we now call a "kick-boat". A friend who lived down the street from me in Sandpoint, Idaho had purchased one and when I saw it leaning up against his garage out behind his house I suddenly imagined fishing all those long and under-fished stretches of river that were impossible to get to from the road - most of it, water that would have been deadly to attempt in my float tube.
At the time, I knew about the larger whitewater pontoon boats that some folks were using on Idaho's big rivers. The problem was they didn't have anchors or a deck to stand on - two items any serious fishing boat had to have, in my opinion. In a burst of enthusiasm, I spent the next several evenings after work building my own version that combined the features of the kickboat and the whitewater pontoon - and I added a few ideas of my own. I built the prototype out of plywood and foam floatation blocks. I gave it its maiden voyage the next weekend on the Clarks Fork in Montana on the long stretch between St. Regis down to the where the Hwy 135 bridge crosses the river to the south bank. That first experimental boat still didn't have any oars - I used my float tube fins - but I did bring along the mushroom anchor and line from my john boat as an afterthought. The anchor got stuck behind a log on that first float. Rather than lose the anchor I carefully removed my waders and most of my clothes while sitting on that small deck. I slid in, pulling myself down the line hand-over-hand against the current to the bottom at about 12 feet - where I un-hooked it and pulled myself back to the boat.
From that experience I decided that the kick boat concept was a good step forward - but for the big rivers I sometimes liked to fish like the Clark Fork, the Missouri, the Yellowstone, the Kootenai, the Deschutes, etc. I needed a small inflatable fishing boat that would be larger than the Water Otter and would have some big boat features - like a pair of oars and a real drift boat style anchor setup. I didn't want a whitewater cataraft but it would have to be capable of handling some serious water. That concept became the first "Kingfisher" early in the summer of 1991.
This first Kingfisher was an 8 ft model with a cedar frame and aluminum pipe cross braces. I bought my first dozen Hypalon tubes from a company in Hungary. They were building RIB "sport boats" - the motorized rafts raft-like tubes that wrapped around the bow of the solid bottom and ended a foot behind the transom. I just asked them to make an eight foot long by 21 inch diameter inflatable cylinder where each end terminated with that same cone design they were using. So I didn't have to send drawings or anything.
I had to wait three months for them to build the tubes and for the container ship to arrive, time that I used to work on the rowing frame design. When the tubes arrived I fitted them to the prototype frame I had built and shot the picture for the ad that would appear in the next issue of Flyfisherman magazine. While I was waiting for the ad to appear I tested this larger frame design on my local waters and worked out some minor bugs. A week after the ad appeared I got a call from a guy in Huckleberry, Montana up by Glacier National Park. He became my first customer.
From the very first I used the same rowing components that the larger whitewater catarafts used - strong oarstands, 5/8 inch shaft oarlocks and large diameter Carlisle whitewater oar shafts and blades. That turned out to be a good choice because I soon found that I could run that boat through some pretty big waves and still have the power to control it. Each model year, and the evolutionary changes that came with it, were designed for my own needs rather than for some "market" that I perceived to be out there. As a business enterprise I'm afraid I'm hopelessly stuck following my own visions in that respect. Fortunately, there are a few others who appreciate and share these particular views. I am an avid fly fisherman - and I like to fish for almost any species in any kind of water. I love river drift fishing in the West, I enjoy still-water fishing for big trout or bass in lakes and ponds, and I'm a big fan of skinny water inshore fishing along the Gulf coast. Except for the first one, those are all fishing adventures that can't be done well with a conventional drift boat. And even then, shallow fall water with its exposed rocks, which provides some of the best fishing all year, can be problematic. And of course, drift boats must be trailered.
For all these wide-ranging needs, I require an inflatable boat with a strong rowing frame; a boat that's easy for me to handle by myself, but big enough to bring along my dog and maybe a friend or two. And I need a boat that breaks down to a small size for travel. But mostly I demand a low-profile boat that fishes very well in all types of water. On the pages of this website you can see where this has all led me.
Part of the great pleasure I get from building these boats is refining the design each year as I or my customers get better ideas or as better materials become available. Although I'm always experimenting, I try to limit my major changes to once a year (officially on Jan 1) and I try to make any changes backward compatible if I can - but I'll probably never get to the place where I think there are no more improvements to be made.
By the mid 90's I was building enough boats that I needed to fabricate my own tubes. Depending on suppliers for this key part of my products was too costly and created too many complications. So, using my electronics and aerospace background, I designed my first rotary hot air welder. It was pretty crude but it got the job done and taught my what a really well designed hot air welder should do and how it should perform. My next one used stepper motors for precision seams and was computer controlled. It was such a nice machine that in 1996 I started a company on the side to further develop and manufacture these welders. That company became moderately successful but when it reached about 15 employees it was obvious that I was in over my head trying to run two groing businesses. I sold my share of that business back to my investors and since then have stuck with boat-building which is my passion.
All together there are about 750 Kingfisher (or River King) catarafts in existence out there some place - with a few more added every year. About two-thirds of them ended up in the Pacific Northwest but I have sold PFC's all over the US, Canada and even a few to S. America and Europe. During a couple of years in the mid '90s I had several employees and was building well over 100 boats a year out of my Sandpoint, Idaho shop. Since moving to the Olympic Peninsula of Washington state in 1999 I have stopped doing the shows and any serious advertising and I'm basically producing only as many boats as I can by myself - with a little part time help occasionally. My only sales outlet is this website. I'm fishing and traveling more these days - and building boats has become fun again, like it was when I first started out.
Over the years Kingfisher (or River King) introduced many of the features that are found on most PFC's these days. Some of these include: -
I have gradually migrated my designs into larger boats - in the 14 to 18 foot range now. That's mostly because there seem to be dozens of smaller boats in the 8 to 12 foot range these days and they have pretty much become a dealer market. Even though there are many fine fly-shops and dealers out there, I prefer to sell my boats directly to my customers; I really enjoy that one-to-one contact. Building and selling these larger boats, which often require some customization, allows me to do that. Also, since I don't make as many boats as I used to, I can now buy the tubes from NRS or other quality manufacturers.
All in all, it's been a lot of fun. I've had an excuse to "test" my boats every year on some of the finest fishing waters in North America. I've met, swapped tales and shared the holes and runs with some really fine folks. If I had to do it all over again - I probably wouldn't change a thing.
