Daily Fly Fishing News

When MidCurrent moved its editorial offices to Fort Collins, Colorado this summer, we weren't yet prepared for the fermented froth gushing non-stop from the many boutique breweries in town.

But we've gotten used to it.

New Belgium, Odell, Linden's, Coopersmith's and other small and not-so-small (Budweiser has a plant about three miles removed from main street) breweries seem to think Fort Collins a fine place to brew the world's third-most-popular drink after water and tea. And it's hard not to notice the necessary variety of names that mark each beer as different from any other: Isolation Ale, Mothership Wit, Dunkelweiss 30° (Drunkelweiss?), Albert Damm Bitter and Sigda's Green Chili are all on our list to try. (Full blogger's disclosure: we intend to pay for all.)

But our favorite new beer name in recent weeks comes from overseas, from the Wylam Brewery, a "virtual pub" located in the UK. Wylam's "Dognobbler" is "named after a famed fishing fly regularly seen on the River Tyne, this excellent new pale ale has an emphasis on bittering and aroma hops. The three hop beer is refreshing, golden, crisp, bitter and hoppy with more than a little attitude - an [sic] superb additional to the Wylam range of ales."

Anyone else run into memorable (for any reason) beer labels lately?

Here's a gear item sure to drive the "go-light" anglers crazy. "The no-bulge pockets keep everything hidden from view, and the jacket's 'weight management system' uses extra fabric in the shoulders to help support the weight of your gadgets." On GearJunkie.com, Ryan Dionne reviews the $75 ScotteVest Pack Windbreaker.

Last month's gigantic landslide in Washington state's Cascade Range forced the Naches River out of it's normal path and threatened to strand bull trout and migrating steelhead, so dozens of biologists have been working frantically to transport fish out of isolated pools. "The landslide that inundated the Naches River last month created a barrier of millions of cubic yards of silt, mud and rock that slowed -- and likely confused -- spawning salmon and hungry trout. Then workers opened a freshly dug river channel that stranded small fish in ponds and marshes." Shannon Dininny for the Associated Press.

If you are just beginning to fly fish for trout, "mending" can seem like one of the more daunting skills to learn. Phil Monahan demystifies it for you this week in "Mending: Upstream or Down?" on MidCurrent.

Excerpt: "MENDING is an aspect of fly-line control that many anglers have trouble with. Here's a very simple definition: mending is the process by which you counteract the effects of current on the fly line, thus enabling a longer dead drift."

Master tournament caster Steve Rajeff demonstrates the three common styles of spey casting, including traditional greased-line, Scandanavian, and Skagit.

Excerpt: "Over a hundred and fifty years ago in Scotland, there was a style developed just called traditional 'spey casting.' It's where we use a fixed line -- perhaps 80, 90 or 100 feet long -- and you lock it down and maintain that distance. You pick up the line, making a tremendous D loop behind, and cast out, changing direction."

"As water temperatures drop, fish generally migrate to deeper pools or to those areas of the stream where currents are the slowest or softest. Because most coldwater lies have slow currents, the flies we present will drift by at a very slow rate, and fish unfortunately get plenty of time to evaluate it." Rich Culver delivers excellent advice about why soft, "self-motivated" tying materials make more sense as the temperature drops. In Alaska's Capital Cities Weekly.

Author and guide Pat Straub spent a couple of days on assignment in Craig, Montana for us last week. His mission: to talk with the good folks running the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Program (TRCP) and to find out what was new with the organization. For those who don't know, TRCP is a non-profit corporation that works to preserve the traditions of hunting and fishing -- not an easy task in a country where perhaps 25% of the population fishes and only 10% of the population hunts. They deal with a multitude of issues, from roadless access to mining and energy development to climate change. Of new interest to anglers is their Marine Fisheries Initiativ -- an effort to end the boom-and-bust cycle of commercial fisheries management -- and their push for improvement of the Clean Water Act.

TRCP is also important because it takes its political "agnosticism" seriously; you'll find just as many Republicans as Democrats and Independents donating to the cause.

Read Straub's report on what the TRCP is doing today. Since TRCP is on top of virtually every key issue affecting anglers and hunters today, it's a great overview of why and where all conservation non-profits need support.

I had the pleasure of spending a lunchtime with Jerry Hubka and Rick Takahashi not too long ago. The two fly fanatics, ex-art teachers and long-time friends told me about the challenges of putting together their new 1000-plus-pattern book on midges. "It just kept growing and growing," Takahashi said. "When we started, we thought that 400 patterns would be a lot to handle." Hubka commented, "The hardest part ended up being deciding which patterns we couldn't include."

Modern Midges: Tying and Fishing the World's Most Effective Patterns
was published by Headwater Books in September and contains an enormous library of flies and recipes. If you fish or tie midges, I think the book belongs on your list.

Charlie Meyers also wrote about the book for the Denver Post: "The book on midges just completed by Fort Collins anglers Rick Takahashi and Jerry Hubka ranks among the most useful fly-tying compositions to hit the shelves in years."

Little-visited but with enough water to fill a few fishing lifetimes, Tasmania was the debarkation point for European trout that were later distributed to New Zealand, Australia and other fisheries of the region. A new clip from the brand new DVD "The Source: Tasmania offers an intriguing glimpse of fishing "way down under" with a look at trout fishing on the island's western lakes.

Apparently stung by the plans of Seattle-area chefs to participate in the TU-sponsored Savor Bristol Bay campaign that we mentioned this weekend (see "Chefs Serve Up Warning with Salmon"), "Gail Phillips, the president of Truth about Pebble, a group of mine supporters, sent out her appeal for a boycott via e-mail to her 'family and friends' -- including the chefs." Mary Pemberton of the Associated Press.

At right, a picture of the Bristol Bay shoreline.

Orvis has a pretty choice job opening in the fly-fishing industry for someone with solid experience in both fresh- and saltwater fly fishing and a desire to work on category development for fly rods and fly reels for retail, catalog, web, and wholesale. You can read the full details and job description here.

Choosing a bag for your fishing photographic needs can be a difficult one at best. For the average photographer, there are endless models and styles to choose from. But it can get especially confusing once you add in the factors of water and weather.

I've personally taken to customizing my own with dry-bags, high density foam, and fly reel cases -- pretty handy if you have or can get hold of extras. But if customization is not your thing, the New York Times Style section just put up a review of five bags camera bags compiled by nature photographer Joe Decker. It's a small review, but exposes some of the bigger brand names and offers good a launching point to a larger search if need be.

"Each time one violently struck at our flies, you could almost see the cartoon 'bubbles' above the froth. It was like fishing in an arcade game, where the bass were abundant and programmed to strike anything that entered their watery domain." Sam Fried writes about a recent trip to central Oregon to fly fish for smallmouth bass on the John Day River. In the New Haven Register.

"Where Salmon Rule," naturalist David Quammen's piece in National Geographic on Kamchatka salmon is a detailed look at the land "created by nature as if for the very reproduction of salmon." He covers salmon biology, politics, poaching and culture in a thorough and thoughtful discussion of one of the peninsula's key species, and seems to fall in line behind the belief that Soviet-era politics might have been better for the fish.

This week several Seattle chefs will serve up a message with their tomato- and lemon salmon dishes: "You're eating an increasingly scarce resource." As Mary Pemberton of the Associated Press writes, restaurants -- with the help of TU's WhyWild program -- will display recipe cards and table displays drawing attention to the plight of Bristol Bay's sockeye salmon population, which is threatened by the development of the Pebble Mine.

Bill Logan ties flies. Little flies. And big flies with little details. "You need to examine Logan's creations with a magnifying glass to appreciate the minute detail that he reproduces with bits of fur and feathers. His flies transcend the line between fly tying and fine art." Bill Becher on ESPN.com.

Andrew C. Revkin also profiled Logan for The New York Times back in 1998: "Wielding a paintbrush with bristles finer than a baby's lashes, he dabbed varnish onto a near-perfect imitation of a green drake, or Ephemera guttulata, a burrowing aquatic insect. Hidden in the one-inch curl of the creature's body was the only obvious sign that it was not real -- a fish hook."

Of course Logan is only one of many tiers practicing the art of ultra-realism in fly creation. More devotees: Graham Owen, Steve Thornton, and Paul Whillock.