Currently browsing… Fly fishing
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What to do if we can’t fish?
Native Colorado River cutthroat trout. Kara Armano photo. Luckily, I've still been able to fish. Thanks to living over 8,000 feet and having plenty of high mountain streams and lakes, I have lots of options. At least so far. I recently went to beat the heat that was nearing triple digits to a new-to-me high…
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A summer for Plan B
When water temperatures approach the mid-60s on your favorite trout stream, it's time for a back-up plan. Chris Hunt photo. The calendar said it was June 18. Not even summer yet. But we hit the mid-90s two weeks earlier and the heat hadn’t really let up. Sure, you could get away from it up high…
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Tips for chasing coastal cutthroats in the Pacific Northwest
Coastal cutthroat trout from a stream near Ketchikan, Alaska. Chris Hunt photo. By Chris Mayes The coastal cutthroat trout is a fish of many names: sea-run cutthroat, blue-back, harvest, among others. Regardless of the name, most Pacific Northwest anglers agree the coastal cutthroat is a fantastic gamefish for anglers of all ages. Often the top…
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Barbless Flies for happier fish and happier anglers
A big cicada fly prompted me to become an advocate for barbless hooks. It was a great fly, tied by a friend and proven effective over and over on a host of different waters. Like many of us, I was conscious of the importance of pinching down the barb on my flies to make releasing…
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From the vault: Everything but the fish
Editor's note: This piece was published originally in TROUT Magazine in the winter of 2019. Boating and fishing take us to some pretty amazing places. I personally of am the opinion that taking photos should tell a complete story, not just a piece of one. The below piece here is as it was published in…
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Is catch-and-release angling all it’s cracked up to be?
Releasing a nice brown trout back into the river. Kirk Deeter photo. Is catch-and-release angling overrated? It is if the only thing that matters is numbers of fish caught… In 1936, the late, great Lee Wulff said, “game fish are too valuable to be caught only once,” and the “catch-and-release” movement was born. I’m a…
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Chasing wild trout on Pennsylvania’s storied Spring Creek
The famous Spring Creek, Pennsylvania. Derek Eberly photo. Beware the first-cast fish ... it's almost never a good omen Many years ago, I was fishing on the Shenandoah with my friends Mike Dombeck and Bruce Babbitt, who had just stepped down as the director of the Bureau of Land Management and secretary of Interior, respectively.…