poacher

AK Guide Nets Criminal Charges

GALLATIN COUNTY, MT—Alaskan fishing guide Michael P. Duby, 37, is a poacher of extraordinary photography skills—especially when it comes to taking self-incriminating images featuring a blood streak of illegal elk, deer, and antelope carcasses. For his efforts, Duby has received a suspended 20-year prison sentence, as well as $15,500 in fines and restitution. But wait,…

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USA

Made in USA

Finally a site highlighting those companies that are keeping it homegrown in the good ol’ U.S. of A. Fuck Yeah Made in USA has a segment on L.L. Bean’s in-house boot manufacturing process, in addition to clips from New Balance, Wilson Footballs, and many more. (Although there are several noteworthy examples within the flyfishing industry not…

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Elwha

Elwha River: Why Wild Matters

Drake contributor Chris Santella recently reported on Washington State’s Elwha River (“Bye-Bye Elwha”) and the removal of its two dams slated for later this month. Additional plans for the river include nonnative fish planting in the middle and upper Elwha in conjunction with a $16 million hatchery funded by taxpayers for the Lower Elwha Klallam…

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Drake Magazine Roadless Areas

Keeping Roadless and WSA Areas Wild—and Accessible

There was a Western Governor’s Association annual meeting held on June 29, 2011, in Coeur d’ Alene, Idaho. And among the various sessions was one called “Restoring and Managing the Health of Forests in the West.” A worthwhile topic, right? I mean, who’s not for healthy forests? So I checked in via YouTube to see…

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BIG TROUBLE ON LITTLE MOUNTAIN

Big Trouble on Little Mountain

We’re miles from the truck and 600 feet below the canyon rim when the first raindrops dimple Trout Creek. Charlie Card has spent his entire life in this country and guided it professionally since he was seventeen. I figure that makes pulling the plug his call. “What do you think, Charlie?”

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Carp_Slam

Carp Slam 2011

DENVER—The Annual South Platte Pro-Am Carp Slam commences this Saturday on the metro-sensational section of the South Platte River. So far the tourney/fundraiser has raised more than $27,000 for Denver-area habitat improvement projects. Catch a carp, avoid E. coli infection, and support the cause.

WORTH THE WADE

Worth the Wade

The water’s surface is oily and shiny and silver and orange. The outgoing tide is tepid, with the current passing between your legs being the only indication that you’re wading, because the water is the same temperature as your shaking, nervous body. “Remember to breathe.” Vision drifting in and out, eyes straining for focus. Legs…

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BROWN TROUT

Brown Trout

It isn’t those first, crisp, mahogany-spinner mornings that get me, the ones ending with a warm afternoon and a few straggler hoppers still clicking. It’s the days that come a couple weeks later, after the onset of frost, when the first nasty cold front under low-lying clouds makes you hustle through the wadering process because…

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BYE-BYE ELWHA DAM

Bye-Bye Elwha Dam

Members of the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe will tell you that 100-pound Chinook salmon once returned to their namesake river on the northeastern tip of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula. While no one can substantiate the existence of these behemoths, one thing is certain: The construction of the Elwha and Glines Canyon dams between 1913 and 1927 cut…

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