The San Juan County Forage Fish Protection Project improves protection of beach spawning forage fish habitat through targeted field research and mapping efforts that will lead to regulatory protections, restoration project identification, and long-term conservation via acquisition and easement for newly documented sites. Research efforts focused on filling recently identified gaps in knowledge about where surf smelt and Pacific sand lance spawn in San Juan County. Documentation of forage fish spawn should afford the site some immediate protections through local and state regulatory programs. Friends of the San Juans collected nearly 400 samples from over 200 beaches that were either not previously sampled or under-sampled. Survey efforts focused on one egg forage fish sites, newly mapped pocket beaches that were not sampled by previous efforts, under-sampled sand lance spawning beaches and conservation priority regions. Previously unknown spawning was documented at 5 new sites for surf smelt, including one of the previously unmapped 1-egg sites. In addition, the spatial extent of spawn was extended at a known smelt spawning site and two additional 1-egg sites were mapped, including one sand lance and one smelt. 1.16 Miles of marine shoreline was assessed and identified new forage fish spawning beaches (positive samples). Project results have been presented to the San Juan County Marine Resources Committee and Salmon Recovery Advisory Committee and the updated SJC ArcGIS forage fish geodatabase has been updated and provided to WDFW for incorporation into the Salmonscape priority species and habitat mapping platform. With these data gaps filled, conservation, restoration and regulatory programs will have greater ability to protect critical forage fish spawning beaches, a primary objective of the San Juan County Salmon Recovery Plan. Community engagement activities associated with the project also helped improve awareness of forage fish spawning habitat and its role in salmon recovery. Sixteen volunteers were trained and provided 442 hours of field assistance to the project. Over 150 private shoreline landowners provided access for research.