Tom Bie is the founder, editor, and publisher of The Drake. He started the magazine in 1998 as an annual newsprint publication based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. He then moved it to Steamboat, Colorado (1999), Boulder, Colorado (2001), and San Clemente, California (2004), as he took jobs as managing editor at Paddler, Senior Editor at Skiing, and Editor-in-Chief at Powder, respectively. Tom and The Drake are now both based in Denver, Colorado, where The Drake is finally all grows up(Swingers, 1996) to a quarterly magazine.

Shades of Green

There are green rivers; and then there is the Green River. In the latest edit from Bloodknots, the crew strokes oars in the brown- and ‘bow-rich waters below Utah’s Flaming Gorge Dam. Featuring Zeal Optics, Western Rivers Flyfisher Guides, some baetis, and one badass Airstream.

Tracking Disappearing Steelhead

Puget Sound steelhead populations are in severe decline. And most stocks have earned a “threatened” designation under the ESA, including Nisqually River fish. This year scientists are tracking juvenile steelhead from the Nisqually in an attempt to find out why they are not surviving long enough to make it to the ocean.

CA Coho Seek an Unlikely Sanctuary

Warm Springs Dam was completed in 1983 to control flooding and provide drinking water for Sonoma County, CA. It backs up miles of Dry Creek in the Russian River watershed. Salmon and steelhead in the Russian suffer from a plethora of problems, including the current drought. Its coho are particularly imperiled, and up whole California…

Skiff Stories

Every flats skiff has a story and Hell’s Bay Boatworks has teamed with angler/videographer Trapper Rudd to chronicle those narratives. Rudd will be traveling the coastal US to feature HB owners and their unique whips starting this spring. This is the series intro.

Save Sandflea

Alejandro Vega Cruz, better known as “Sandflea”, was introduced to the greater flyfishing community in Beattie Outdoor Productions’ film The Scorpion Expedition, which toured in 2013. Sandflea, based out of Isla Holbox, Mexico, helped organize the colorful mission that took a group of anglers to five remote atolls located due north of Progreso, in the Gulf…

Steelhead Want Up The Crooked

Steelhead want to swim up Oregon’s Crooked River. But they only make it about a half mile before hitting their heads on the Opal Springs Hydro Project, a diversion dam impeding migration. Half of the fish are captured and trucked over, while the other half turn around and get lost. Fish passage over the dam…

AK Gets a Say in BC Mining-Boom Saga

Native Americans, fishermen, and environmental groups in Southeast Alaska continue to criticize British Columbia mining projects, decrying the potential to destroy downstream fisheries. At least five of these mineral holds are located in “transboundary” watersheds of key salmon rivers—the Taku, Stikine, and Unuk—that originate in BC and flow into AK.

GEOBASS Guyana

Guyana lives next door to Venezuela on the Caribbean coast of South America, where the flyfishing frontier is defined by rainforest rivers and donkey-sized arapaima. In GEOBASS’s latest epsiode the band reunites to battle debilitating illness, ticks in unsavory places, and a mixed bag of Guyana’s underwater goodies.

Public Fishing Access Update: Weber River

Last month, the Utah Stream Access Coalition (USAC) announced it had won its longstanding Weber River case. Judge Keith Kelly of Utah’s 3rd District Court confirmed that the Weber was navigable where it crosses over the landowner defendant’s properties. That ruling has led to many questions over the past couple of weeks, and USAC has prepared…

California Drains Delta Habitat Project

California’s Bay Delta Conservation Plan includes an ambitious scheme to build massive twin tunnels through the California Delta. The idea is to transport—or steal, depending on your viewpoint—water from the Sacramento River to Central Valley farmers and thirsty cities in SoCal. Estimates for the plan range from $15 billion to over $60 billion. Until now, included…

Desert Gold

Arizona is all about the carp in the latest Find Your Water vid from Redington. Here, ambassador KC Badger lives far from trout country, so he chases “trash fish” across urban Phoenix. Get ready to start tying dog food flies.

Idaho Creeks Released from Rehab

In 1992 Idaho’s Bucktail and Blackbird creeks looked like bad acid trips, running shades of neon blue and green. Neighboring Panther Creek had formed a lethal “chemical dam” and all three streams were devoid of salmon, trout, and insects. Regional biologist Chris Mebane says, “It was about as lifeless as you can get outside of…

Oregon Dams Slated for Demolition

Two more deadbeat dams are slated for demolition, beginning this summer. Fielder and Wimer dams on Evans Creek, a key spawning tributary in the Rogue River basin, have inhibited fish passage for over 100 years. Sitting derelict the last four decades, breeching both dams will open 70 miles of steelhead and salmon spawning grounds. Federally…

BNP DD

National Parks for Bahamas Bonefish

America’s National Park System includes more than 400 areas covering approximately 84 million acres. Hundreds of millions of visitors enjoy these protected lands annually, and within their borders development ends, species like buffalo roam, and native trout live free and prosper. National parks are awesome that way and they are not limited to the U.S. NP…

Save Dorado

#savedorados

Golden dorado are streamer junkies feared by skittish baitfish everywhere. In the Salta Region of northern Argentina, they are also threatened by overharvest, habitat degradation, and poorly understood ecological factors. A new study led by a team from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst Department of Environmental Conservation, aims to address those concerns in order to preserve the species…

Fly Fishing Utah Stream Access Laws

Fly Fishing Utah Stream Access Laws

Anglers Win Access in Utah

Good news arrived last night when Utah Stream Access Coalition (USAC) announced it won its longstanding Weber River case. Judge Keith Kelly of Utah’s 3rd District Court confirmed that the Weber is navigable where it crosses over the landowner defendant’s properties, which means that the resource BELONGS TO ALL OF US. “In the 26-page decision, the…

Montana Wild

Montana Went Wild. It Worked

In 1974, Montana killed the hatchery machine and curbed trout stocking. Thanks to trailblazing efforts of steadfast biologists like Richard Vincent, wild fish, on rivers like the Madison, have since flourished. In the Montana Story: 40 Years of Success, filmmaker Shane Anderson details how going wild works and raises the question: Why not? Stay tuned…

bristol bay DD

Pebble Seeks PR Magic for Unpopular Mine

Pebble Limited Partnership (PLP) has played another card from its ever-thinning deck. It has retained the services of Clintonian Secretary of Defense William Cohen (who worked with Bill from 1997-2001) and his company the Cohen Group, which, “assists multinational clients from all sectors to pursue business opportunities and overcome problems in quickly changing markets around…

Rusty

Rusty Fly

Meet Keys’ captain, Derek Rust, in the latest flats-fishing edit from Dan Decibel. Says the filmmaker, “Every time we fish, we always have an awesome time on his boat. We look for bonefish, permit and tarpon when the weather allows. Whether we catch fish or not, you can always bet on some crap talking during…