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Dam Removal: Not a passing fancy
By Chris Wood Last week, I saw a video celebrating the removal of the Tack Factory Dam on Third Herring Brook in Massachusetts. Like all dam removals, it involved many partners especially the North and South Rivers Watershed Association, local TU chapters, the MA/RI Council, NOAA, and Steve Hurley of the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries…
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Thanks Joe
By Chris Wood “I was the first person Charles Gauvin hired at Trout Unlimited when he became CEO in 1992. He wanted to hire Steve Moyer, but Steve and Michelle just had their first child, and Steve thought the organization’s finances were too unstable. At the time Trout Unlimited had a budget of $2 million…
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Where skill, joy and service unite
By Chris Wood After I graduated college, my older brother, John, introduced me to a friend who was a Jesuit priest. At the time, I was a somewhat aimless bartender, ice cream maker and assistant high school football coach. One night after dinner and drinks, Father Donald asked me three questions: “Chris, what do you…
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The future offers hope
By Chris Wood Jake Marshall, whose Dad helped to organize TroutFest, a huge TU event in Texas that raises a lot of money for youth education through the Tomorrow Fund, said he was there “to help conserve our water s.” Laurel Smith, a graduate of the amazing Georgia Trout Camp, said she was there “to…
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Red light — Green light
By Chris Wood The other morning, my friend, Brent Fewell, an attorney who worked at the EPA under President George W. Bush, wrote: “Had dinner and a very encouraging conversation last evening with seven prominent GOP Senators who want to make the environment and conservation a greater priority for the GOP, a return to Teddy…
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Wild and Native: Rules of the River
Last week, Trout Unlimited posted a clip describing the proper way to de-bone a trout. Perhaps predictably, this was met by a few howls of outrage. “How can the organization that practically invented catch-and-release advocate eating a trout? Shame. Shame!” The fact is, however, that not all wild fish are equal, and whacking one can…
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New science promotes trout recovery
By Chris Wood Some define conservation as overseeing loss. Loss of wetlands; loss of open space; loss of water quality; loss of species. Aldo Leopold harkened to this when he wrote in the Sand County Almanac that “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds.…
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