Fly Rod and Reel Magazine 2009 March

Short Casts

By: Brent Prettyman

Photography by: Brent Prettyman

Click image for slideshow.

>Northeast Utah’s Green River harbors up to 20,000 trout per mile; thanks to flushing flows in 2011 those fish are now feeding on improved aquatic insect hatches and growing fast.

Rivers, Including the Bitterroot, Rebound After Fires

Submitted by Greg Thomas on Wed, 01/25/2012 - 12:48.

Environment

I remember the Bitterroot Valley's major fires in 2000 and 2003 and what that did to the attitudes of anglers—basically, it beat them down and many thought that the Bitterroot and its all important tributary streams would be destroyed, along with those native cutthroat and bull trout, and its non-native browns and rainbows.

But that wasn't the case, and I began documenting that in 2004, just a year after the fires, when I interviewedChuck Stranahan, a river protector and the owner of Stranahan's Flies and Guides in Hamilton, Montana. In addition, I interviewed the river's chief biologist, Chris Clancy and each of them, even early on, said the river was going to benefit from the blaze. Here are a few quotes from that interview:

Let Them Eat Tin

By: Ted Williams

Photography by: Mark Pokras

On a may pre-dawn in 2009 i held a quivering loon in my arms. It had crawled out of Big Island Pond and onto my beach, where it sought shelter against my canoe—a bad start to the day, because loons are a recent addition to this busy southern-New Hampshire lake. When I came in from fishing it had died of plumbism.

Plumbism (lead poisoning) in wildlife is caused almost entirely by ammunition and fishing tackle. The most common victims of tackle are birds that eat fish or dabble in bottom muck. Because they lack teeth they “chew” their food with gizzards, ingesting pebbles to aid the process. Frequently they mistake lost sinkers or jigheads for pebbles; in fact, they key in on them. Even more frequently, they eat lead-toting fish that have broken off anglers’ lines.

Back to the Past

By: Ted Williams

NEAR MY FISHING CAMP IN NEW Hampshire’s Rockingham County, there’s this archeological site said to have been constructed by ancient druids or their precursors. Several large, flat stones have grooves—blood grooves, we are told. Now that the site has been physically restored, a volunteer 501c3 citizens’ organization is attempting to restore historical function as well, including the sacrifice of virgins (though only on summer weekends for tour groups).