The return of the Elwha’s steelhead Give a rainbow trout a direct line to the ocean and you have a potential steelhead. Throw a dam in its path and watch anadromy hit a wall. Salmonids in Washington State’s Elwha River, on the northeastern edge of the rain-soaked Olympic Peninsula, found their long-lost gateway to the…
Revivalists and renegades in South Florida’s Everglades It begins as a subtle unzippering across the surface. Nothing more than shape and motion—forcing the brain to calculate distance to target, direction of movement, and speed of travel. These computations form the basis of what comes next: an attempt to drop a bottlecap-sized fly in the path…
The West may experience a lengthy runoff in 2019 While it’s always tricky making May or June runoff predictions in March, Snotel data from around the West indicates that snowpack levels, especially in Southern Colorado, Southern Utah, and parts of California’s Central Sierras, are poised in 2019 to create high flows or a long runoff…
THE YELLOWSTONE RIVER’S pristine headwaters are tucked into some of the most remote land in the Lower 48, draining roughly 70,000 square miles across Wyoming and Montana. These wild waters serve as a stronghold for native Yellowstone cutthroat, and, combined with Yellowstone Lake, make up the largest inland population of cutthroat in the world.
The familiar tug, the comforting bend of the 7-weight, and another Michigan smallmouth—this one, 17 inches. Not a record, but it came to my net in a peculiar spot in an unaccustomed location; along a stretch of the Kalamazoo River west of Marshall, Michigan, where the tree-lined banks now give way to clear-cut fields and…
Mid-June after a May-long drought and, weeks before we thought they would, the rivers had begun to “take shape,” an idiom I’ve always loved for its suggestions of primal formation and rebirth. What was just days prior a brown blob squirming primordially down from Rogers’ Pass is suddenly the jade-green Blackfoot, its boulders and riffly…
WHEN IT’S TOO HOT TO FISH, Yakima River guide Nate Rowley snorkels his favorite trout water. He’s been snorkeling a lot lately. On a scorching August afternoon at a coffee shop in downtown Cle Elum, Washington, he reports his findings from a stretch of the Teanaway River, one of the Yakima’s more significant tributaries, protected…
STATE OF ARMS AS WOULD ANY GUY SPAWNED FROM THE gravels of Oregon, I had deep reservations about driving the backroads of my home state in a rig blasphemed by California plates. It was a red Tacoma with a watertight canopy and a rod rack permanently bolted to its hood, an otherwise brilliant fishing truck,…
EVEN IN THE END, Cliff Hansen—one of the most influential advocates of local control and state rights in Wyoming history—thought it was a good idea. But thank the river gods he didn’t get his way back in the day. Otherwise, the Snake River in what is now Grand Teton National Park would be a whole…
Washington’s Olympic National Park is best known for iconic steelhead rivers such as the Hoh, Bogachiel, and Sol Duc. It’s also home to America’s largest dam removal project, which was completed on the now free-flowing Elwha River in August 2014. Here, contributor Brian Irwin recounts his days pouring drinks in the park and exploring a…
DEEP INSIDE MOST TROUT anglers lies an understanding that the existence of clean water and healthy public habitat are what get us out of bed in the morning, especially on weekends. Many have sacrificed lucrative careers, either by stalling out in the middle when the job-responsibility-to-annual-vacation-day ratio became optimal for fishing, or by running away…
The flashing freeway sign reminded us that high winds had closed I-25 to light and/or high-profile vehicles. This wasn’t a problem for Clyde. Ford built him in 1974 weighing just under 5,000 pounds. Its big-block 460 engine alone weighs more than 700. We weren’t getting blown anywhere. Instead, we were comfortably cruising north riding low…
Sagebrush and brown rolling mounds. Ripping wind and an Arctic shoulder-season. One righteous truck stop bar, where dollar bills wallpaper smoky internals. And iffy gas station burritos at 6 a.m. There you have Alcova, Wyoming… at first glance.
MENTION THAT YOU’RE PLANNING A TRIP to Colorado’s Gunnison River, and a likely response will be something like, “Oh, cool—are you fishing Black Canyon or floating the Gorge?” Which makes perfect sense. After all, between the famed salmonfly hatch and national park status of Black Canyon, and the horse-pack/ rafting reputation of Gunny Gorge, it’s…
DURING THE WANING DAYS OF SUMMER 2000, guide Dave Deardorff rowed his drift boat one stroke too far. Idaho’s lower South Fork of the Snake had fished well that afternoon. Cutthroat sipped BWOs under tormented skies, while Deardorff storm-jumped his way downstream. Finally, something angry surrounded him and his two clients. He sunk oar blades…
The state fish and game departments for Washington and Oregon both face a major dilemma: how to adequately protect what remains of their wild steelhead, while also continuing to produce hatchery steelhead for the many anglers who like to bring one home for dinner.
Almost Every Northwest Angler living within 100 miles of the Columbia River or its tributaries has a weekly, if not daily, if not hourly, ritual this time of year: checking the salmon and steelhead counts passing over eight dams on the Columbia and lower Snake rivers—Bonneville, The Dalles, John Day, McNary, Ice Harbor, Lower Monumental,…
The Sacramento There’s a special kind of summertime heat reserved for the valleys of California. Even up north, triple digits are common in the Sacramento Valley, which is where I found Clyde parked in Ryan Peterson’s driveway, its black exterior soaking up every ray in Redding. With no AC and an afternoon departure, my first…
You’ve never fished San Francisquito Creek. And if something isn’t done about Searsville Dam, you never will. Stanford University owns the dam, which was built in 1892. It buries the confluence of five redwood- and fir-shaded salmon creeks that now run salmonless out of the Santa Cruz Mountains. They all came together beneath what is…
Citing warnings from agency and independent scientists, four conservation groups filed suit today against several federal agencies and officials of the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe (in their official capacities) for violating the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and ignoring the best available science and threatening the recovery of killer whales, Chinook salmon, and native steelhead by…
Think of Canadian delicacy “Poutine” much like you would a savory ice cream-Sunday—only substitute vanilla for French fries, chocolate for brown gravy, and nuts and a cherry on top for a heaping dollop of cheese curds. Sounds gnarly, but it’s actually quite brilliant… so long as you limit your intake in accordance with the Surgeon…
There aren’t many rivers in the Rockies more appealing in late September than Colorado’s lower Taylor, which sits halfway between Crested Butte and Gunnison and is known nationally for its monster, mysis-shrimp-filled rainbows that inhabit the short tailwater section below Taylor Park Reservoir. The river received national attention of a different sort in the spring…
Located in a rugged side-pocket of eastern Montana, little Fort Smith is a big flyfishing destination. There are few roads and plenty of river; more browns and rainbows per river mile than humans per square mile; and limited amenities exist other than fly shops, outfitters, and a few fishing resorts. Life is good, if you…
Steamboat Flyfisher has traversed several storefront locations over its more than a decade long morphology. From its Old Town Square digs to its newer, plusher location on Yampa Street, the shop today sits a rollcast away from the Yampa River, where across the street you can peer over the bridge railing, break out your rod,…
Next time you’re driving around fishing the rivers of southwest Montana and you’re in the mood for a little adventure, try driving the High Road. This rough-and-tumble 20-mile county road connects Twin Bridges to Melrose and the Big Hole River to its confluence with the Jefferson. But before you start out, learn from the mistakes…