Leaders: Wisdom never expires
It's the June edition of Leaders, our links roundup, featuring the big public lands battle, the wisdom of guides and land-watchers, gear reviews, technique primers, and more.
Current Flow State Crew:
Welcome to the June edition of Leaders, where we collect the best links and general fly-fishing-related happenings that have crossed the transom, to inspire you, feed your obsession, to help make fly-fishing a bigger part of your life.
I monitor as many fly-fishing related emails, sites, and resources as I can to try to bring the best of the best to the group.
I'd love to hear from you about what you want more of! Members can post comments on the site directly below. 🎤
120 Million Acres: Time to go all-in for public lands
The Bloated, Bad Budget Bill is in the Senate, one step closer to passage.
The latest bad news? New bill language opens up a massive chunk of public lands to the "able to be sold" category. It mandates some be sold off every year of the budget to cover the shortfall from tax cuts it creates for the super rich.
We've talked a lot about public lands here. But it's now time to look at this map created by the Wilderness Society and come to terms with what you, yourself, stand to lose access to should this budget pass.
It made me nauseous to see this all put onto something tangible.
And I didn't even have the heart to look beyond my usual places, here in Oregon. What I saw here was bad enough. Beavertail campground down to Mack's Canyon on the Lower Deschutes, a place the CFS crew was fishing a couple weeks ago for the Maupin Meetup. Dotted with areas that might be up for sale, turned into houses, or private steelhead lodges.
The lower Deschutes canyon, below Mack's Landing. Plenty of spots for lodges and development in there. The area around Whitehorse Rapids...a future whitewater theme park? The Dalles Rod and Gun Club, and people in the little town of Dant won't like that. And, a whole patchwork around the Metolius river and Black Butte outside Sisters. Surrounded by possible privatization. Subdivisions, here we come.
A variety of favorite rivers in Oregon will have large swathes of their surroundings cease to be public land under the new budget bill.
Look up your favorite places. Spread the word. As anglers, public lands are the greatest gift we have received. They are unique, in this country, on earth. We have a job to do, to make sure they're healthy and available for the next generation.
Wes Siler
And, as a postscript, Kirk Deeter makes the point that it's perfectly fair to expect anglers who don't care enough to advocate for public lands to stop fishing them:
Angling Trade
Upcoming events
It's officially summer. The big event is "Go Fishing" and it's happening now.
But, if you need something in between, here are a couple things I've caught wind of:
June 17th: Tomorrow! NYC! The Fly-Fishing Film Tour (F3T) is getting a rooftop screening in Times Square, courtesy the NYC chapter of Trout Unlimited.
I'm going to be the city next week. Want to go? Give me a shout. It'd be fun to enter the casting competition, I've never cast a fly rod on a rooftop in Times Square. If you missed the F3T this year, you can read my recap of this year's films here.
June 28th and July 12th: The Native Fish Society is hosting Smallmouth Bass fish-a-thons in the Umpqua and Molalla rivers. Bass are voracious predators, and love to munch on juvenile steelhead smolts. The NFS is doing its best to help remove some of those smallies, whose territory seems to grow every season, before they're able to gobble up all the out-migrating juvenile steelhead.
August 23: Rogue Spey Clave, at Griffin Park in Grants Pass, OR. Get dialed in before summer steelhead season heats up. Don't take my word for it, let these two comedians can spell it out:
Send me a link to a fishy event happening near you! CFS reaches members and subscribers from the great states of New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Idaho, Montana, Florida, California, Oregon, and Washington (in no particular order) as well as Australia, Italy, and Switzerland across the water. Our numbers grow every week!
I'm just most clued-in on stuff going on in my backyard. I'd love to feature events near you. Share something fishy you're stoked about, and I'll make sure to let others know.
Leaders ➰
Mindset 🧘♂️
I'm not crazy about mosquitos. I will slap every horsefly that lands on me. But I generally consider myself a Friend of Bugs. Why? Well, lots of reasons. Not least of which they are the primary food for two my favorite creatures: birds and trout.
So I was alarmed and moved by the Guardian's stark cataloging of the global decline in insect life. The numbers are staggering. (link)
What's even more challenging is the culprit isn't clear. Climate change. Yeah. But what else? The Scientific Fly Angler looks at neonicotinoids, a category of insecticide that has become much more prevalent across the country in the past twenty years. (link)
The knock-on effect from bug decline with bird life is clear. Ed Harper has spent 46 years doing the same loop, counting birds across Montana, and has seen fewer each year. (link)
So, what is to be done? My grief was just about at the breaking point when Bill McKibben delivered news of a hopeful avenue. Solar farms with native underplantings are bug factories. And in places like Germany and Vermont solar developers are bringing large chunks of land back into biological business, as the rarely-disturbed solar panels provide ideal habitat. (link)
In Oaklahoma, a simple fix. Pulling cows back from the river, creating a protective riparian buffer, resulted in cleaner water and more space for wildlife. (link)
Further south, on the Colorado, as it reaches its terminus in the Pacific, The Fort Yuma Quechan Tribe is using native plants to rewild the river, and rebuild the river's natural flow. (link)
Environment ⛰️
The Missouri, the Mighty Mo, has long been one of the most productive rivers in Montana, in terms of trout-per-mile. The fish have been getting bigger, eating heartily, but the lack of big-water runoff flows that clean silt off the bottom means their diet has changed from emerging mayflies and caddis to silt-dwelling insects like scuds. (link)
"Shifting baseline syndrome" is the ultimate "shoulda been here yesterday," at a generational level. Due West Anglers looks at how the good old days were in fact both good and old. (link)
Think you know your browns from your bulls? Take the Montana Department Bull Trout ID quiz. (link)
Tools 🎣
Is there one rod to rule them all? Could it be a five-weight? Yellow Dog Fly Fishing put a bunch of rods to the test. The trials included dries, nymphs, streamers, and more. You'll be surprised learn which affordable five-weights performed. (link)
Wader comfort and technology has come a long way. Specifically regarding egress to go to the bathroom. Guys got zippered waders, and gals (finally!) have the drop-seat. Francesca Krempa reviews the five-best waders for women. (link)
Technique 🤺
📽️ Every fly angler should know how to swing soft hackle flies. It's the easiest, most tried-and-true technique, and has been around forever. And, it has huge applications to swinging flies for steelhead. Fly Fishing Team USA angler Lance Egan breaks down rod, line, leader selection and how to swing soft hackles. It takes a bold man to fish a tangle-magnet three-fly rig. (link)
Call it what you want: Uncle Gusty, the big W, Breezy. Whatever you call it, don't call it by its name when you're on the water. The superstitious among us believe you may invoke an even greater dose of the wrath of every fly-fisher, the wind. John Juracek breaks down how to keep your casting sound, even when it's blowy. (link)
Forget about five weights, if you're fishing for Mako sharks off San Diego with captain Conway Bowman. He's got custom-built twenty weight (20!) rods for those half-ton monsters. This interview goes into great depth with Bowman, who has a most excellent philosophy around scouting (link)
Conservation 🌲
It's inevitable you'll get tangled in the trees. But making an effort to pull your flies out is important. Not only will you be practicing Leave No Trace and removing any actual and visual pollution, but you'll probably save a bird or two who might have mistaken your flies for the real thing. George Daniel on "No Fly Left Behind" (link)
📽️ We've had a lot of "words from the old-timers" this Leaders. But there's always room for one more. Captain Steve Huff, a guiding legend. Meet the real deal. (link)
Community 🏘️
📽️ The fly-fishing and rafting community are kissing cousins, though there's no job in fly-fishing like that of a sweep boat captain, using mega-long front and rear oars to position a barge full of gear through big rapids. Watch Driving Sweep to see the perils and pleasures. (link)
📽️ On the other side of the sweep is the Grand Canyon dory, a four-person wooden drift boat-style craft piloted by the folks with the most chutzpah on the river. About Damn Time is a film about the first female dory pilots, and their struggle to emerge from the literal kitchen to the captain's seat. (link)
Now that the Copco dams on the Klamath are breached, and the river runs almost-fully clear to the ocean, a group of 43 indigenous youth launched last week on a first descent down the river. (link)
Lie thou there, for here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling.
— Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, Act 2, Scene 5
