Innholdsfortegnelse for February - March 2017 i Fly Fisherman

MOST READERS OF FLY FISHERMAN are already familiar with the outstanding charitable organizations Project Healing Waters Fly Fishing and Casting for Recovery (CfR). One uses fly fishing to assist in the physical and emotional rehabilitation of disabled veterans and active military personnel. The other uses fly fishing to provide physical and emotional therapy for breast cancer survivors. They were two great organizations operating in parallel but separate universes until both groups recognized that there are disabled veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or from physical disabilities such as amputation, and also have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Recognizing an opportunity to serve disabled veterans who are fighting battles on two fronts, the groups have developed a fly-fishing retreat for 14 women that will take place at Harman’s Luxury Cabins…

"IF YOU BUILD it, he will come,” went the line from the 1989 Kevin Costner film Field of Dreams , and that is precisely what Colorado State University (CSU) is hoping to accomplish. When Professor Robert J. Behnke (affectionately known to the fly-fishing community as Dr. Trout) passed away in 2013, his death left a huge, trout-shaped hole precisely where wild trout lovers the world over can’t afford it. Despite all the great conservation work carried on by many dedicated individuals and organizations, prospects for wild trout in America are tenuous at best. Anglers are generally aware of threats to coldwater fisheries from pollution, disease, invasive species, unregulated logging, grazing, and displacing of native fish through the reckless stocking of hatchery fish, but other dangers are insidious and loom on…

AS AN OLD SPORT, FLY FISHING CARRIES WITH IT MANY TRADITIONS, CUSTOMS, AND INGRAINED ROMANTIC NOTIONS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT HOLD FOREVER TRUE. Fly fishing is not alone—the swaggering pirate on the cover of The Saturday Evening Post long ago traded in the cutlass and brash belt buckle for an AK-47 and an outboard motor. “The times, they are a changin’,” as Nobel Prize winner Bob Dylan warned in song. There are still the holdouts fighting the good fight, smoking pipes and fishing cane rods along mountain trout streams, but the image of who we fly fishers are, what we look like, and what we do is changing rapidly. Apart from television advertisements for brokerage firms and natural male enhancement products, the only time the public sees us is…

A SCHOLAR AT THE GANDAN TEGCHENLING MONASTERY EXPLAINED TO ME THAT TANTRIC BUDDHISM ISN’T MERELY A RELIGION BASED ON SEX POSITIONS OUTLINED IN THE KAMA SUTRA. I was not completely shocked to learn that Western culture has created an inaccurate generalization of an entire religion based on scandalous images of foreigners. Tantric Buddhism (more accurately described as Vajrayana Buddhism) teaches a path to enlightenment through the ritualized practice of hundreds of different sutras, and the Kama Sutra is the only one that focuses on sensuality. Unlike Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, which all worship external deities and seek a future paradise, Vajrayana Buddhism’s “pathway to enlightenment” attempts to create paradise in the present, through practice, repetition, and isolation. Meditation, physical manipulations like sex or yoga, chanting, and memorization are all potential…

THERE IS A lot of good information about fly tying out there. Between books, magazines, and the Internet, there is no shortage of adequate instruction and advice on almost all aspects of fly tying. Except for the apparent stepchild of fly tying: thread. Much of what’s been written about this important tool is false or misleading. Note that I used the word “tool” rather than material. In my mind, thread is a tool chosen to perform a specific task. I own no less than 1,000 spools of thread in a huge range of sizes, colors, and configurations, and while every one of them is good for something, none are good for everything. A large selection lets me choose the right tool for the job in every instance. You don’t need…

SURFACE STEELHEAD Thank you for the entire Oct-Nov-Dec 2016 issue, and especially the great article “Dry Line Steelhead” by Dana Sturn. It was a treat to read the well-deserved praise of Bill McMillan’s book Dry Line Steelhead. Both these writers have added so much to the traditions of fly fishing for steelhead. . . including the specific techniques for using a dry line. Their hard work over the decades has added so much to our understanding of this type of steelheading. It took time, but eventually fishing close to the surface became an accepted part of our tradition. I still remember the day in September 1984 when I saw my first “dry line” steelhead rise to a dragging 5-inch-long, seriously overdressed 2/0 Green-butt Skunk, which looked like a green and…

IN 2001, A licensed angler could kill up to 30 wild steel-head per year in the state of Washington. In spite of the drastic and obvious statewide decline of the species, fisheries managers still allowed obsolete regulations. That same year, the Wild Steelhead Coalition (WSC) formed in Seattle. Under the leadership of cofounder Rich Simms, the group set a top priority: to stop all intentional sport harvest of wild steelhead. “In Washington, there’s an awareness around salmon because they are a food fish and such a part of Northwest culture. Steelhead were never considered food. It’s always been anglers who appreciate them,” says Simms. “What’s so special about this fish is their natural history and the niches they inhabit, the journey they take out to the Pacific, and then, their…

EVERY YEAR IN LATE MARCH AND EARLY APRIL, THEO COPELAND AND I SEARCH THE LOWER REACHES OF THE WATAUGA RIVER TAILWATER IN TENNESSEE, LOOKING FOR EVIDENCE OF THE BRACHYCENTRUS CADDIS EMERGENCE. We’re often alone in our habitual evening search in a section of river nicknamed The Country Mile, which extends from the CSX railroad bridge near the town of Watauga to the river mouth at Boone Reservoir. The river here is home to a wild rainbow trout population reminiscent of the Missouri River below Holter Dam in Craig, Montana—with some of the best dry-fly fishing east of the Mississippi. The caddis hatches on the Watauga are more intense than most other Southeastern tailwaters, and the event draws fly fishers from all over the East Coast. The Watauga’s neighbor river, the…

There is an old Mongolian legend about a hard, long winter that trapped a massive, living taimen in the ice. Starving villagers survived the winter only by eating chunks of flesh hacked from the taimen’s back. In the spring, the ice melted, and the great taimen climbed up out of the river and ate the villagers. There’s a spark of truth in all myth, and the truth is that human beings have been hacking away at taimen populations for many generations. The winters are long, cold, and hard. Adult taimen instinctively move to deep, slow overwintering holes where they can find protection from anchor ice and ice floes, and these spots are known to “sport” anglers who use bait and treble hooks with the goal of posing with giant dead…

FERNANDO, THE CHARISMATIC and passionate host at Asunta Lodge, says that pacus are sometimes mistakenly referred to as “freshwater permit.” The reality, he told me while sharing an ice-cold beer on the evening of our arrival on the Sécure River in Bolivia, is that “permit are actually saltwater pacus. Most fly fishers just don’t know any better.” I’ve caught a few pacus over the years; the first time was in Argentina when I was guiding in the early 2000s. At that time we thought they were purely vegetarians, and we cast flies of spun deer hair trimmed to resemble fruit falling from the trees. That worked sometimes. On other occasions, we’d hit rock bottom in frustration, and thread real fruit or nuts on a hook to get a pull. The…

Things You Find Along a River Filmmaker Jako Lucas was on an exploratory trip deep in Siberia looking for taimen and nelma (sheefish) when he found a relic from another age: the Ice Age. To get to the unfrequented fishing spot, he took two different chartered flights from Moscow, motored up the Lena River on a mothership, then flew by helicopter into the remote reaches of a tributary. “Nobody goes there,” said Lucas. If they did, they would have already found this prehistoric mammoth tusk. His companion Rok Lustrik first saw the tusk lying along an eroded riverbank, and when Lucas saw it, he realized it was a rare museum-quality find due to its size and good condition. Instead of trying to export the tusk from Russia, the pair of…

1 Do No Harm Your first gut reaction to a snag may be to jerk, or yank the hook to free it. This rarely does anything but bury the hook, or even break a rod tip. Instead, relax, assess the situation, and make a plan. 2 The Tease When you’re casting to a shoreline and overshoot your target, chances are that the hook is not stuck at all—it’s just resting in the grass or branches. Stop. Take a breath, point the rod tip at the fly, and slowly tease the fly toward you. Most of the time the fly slides into the water or gently drops to the surface. If the leader is wrapped around a branch one revolution, pull the fly close to the branch and give it a…

MONGOLIA IS A REMARKABLE PLACE, and its people are truly wonderful. While the fishing is so often what draws people to this enchanting land, it is often the sheer beauty of the landscapes and smiling faces of those met along the way that keeps them coming back. Mongolia is the least densely populated country in the world. It is roughly the size of Alaska, yet outside of the capital city of Ulaanbaatar the remainder of this vast wilderness is sparsely populated by nomads who live off the land tending their herds of cows, sheep, goats, yaks, and camels. There is no property ownership outside of Ulaanbaatar. No fences, very few roads, and what people you encounter once you leave the city will likely be on the back of a horse…