Still time to catch another 30-incher. Photo by Arian Stevens
Measure Up
I wish I had a photo of that moment. I don’t. You’ll not be able to see it. I’ll not be able to forget it.
Declan Roger's captures Clyde's good side.
Clyde Resurrected
I recently received an AA unity chip for four months sober. In an episode of The DrakeCast with Elliott Adler, I spoke often about “the curse” Clyde has been in my life. Today I realize much of that curse had less to do with the car than with my own attachment to the chaos surrounding it.
A beaver-dammed spring creek on new public land
Colorado’s Newest Public Water
There’s a certain solitude and wonder that only public lands can provide. It’s freedom in its most tangible form. These places have given me some of my strongest memories, but it is no longer safe to assume they’ll remain public forever.
The author and a fishing friend, paying their dues to Festus.
Benevolent Ass
There is a holler high in the hills of East Tennessee, guarded by an ornery old ass named Festus. His bellows shake the walls of the valley night and day as he protects his livestock and property. Donkeys are stubborn and strong-willed guardians; known to fight off all manner of danger to protect their herd. Festus looks over a group of about forty cattle and is warden to a small creek that borders the pastures he roams. A small creek with big trout.
Ian Slater (L) and Nathaniel Linville, after winning the 2026 March Merkin with nine permit.
PC: Lea Luna Productions
Seven
Daybreak on the last day of the March Merkin permit tournament in Key West. The sky is virtually cloudless, the winds light. It’s not what Nathaniel Linville and Ian Slater had in mind. “We like it when it’s tough out,” Linville says. In 2024, he and Slater had won the Gold Cup tarpon tournament in horrific conditions. “Our strength is outlasting and outworking everyone else when it’s like that.”
Pabst and pitbulls go well together
Crisis Antidote
I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to split western hemlock. Especially a piece with knots and badly twisted grain that is still a bit green. But I have. Our remote Forest Service cabin in southeastern Alaska was pretty well-stocked with stubborn piles of it.