Picture this. You’re sitting on a rock, tailgate or a patch of nice ground along the river’s edge either by yourself or with good companionship. It’s been a long day on the water and the sun is making it’s daily move behind the clouds and the mountains. There’s always that one person, usually me, that
Brook Trout and the Ghost of Henry David Thoreau By Jeff Reardon Henry David Thoreau has always had a mixed reputation here in Maine. Sure, he may have been a giant of American literature and patron saint of th e environmental movement, but he got nervous when his Penobscot Indian guide left him alone at
By Dave Ammons For about two weeks in late June, the garden off the cabin deck explodes in the brilliant red-orange shades of the Papaver rhoeas, common poppies whose seeds were first sown in that spot by my grandfather years ago. I imagine him scratching the soil, strewing a few handfuls of seed indiscriminately, perhaps
TU’s work in West Virginia is improving conditions for trophy wild brook trout such as this 15-inch fish. By Mandy Nix Some have said that our history is in our trees, but for many others, there’s a blueprint of history in every ripple of water. It’s in the icy trickle from a limestone spring, and
Editor’s note: Building off the success of last year’s Native Odyssey campaign, Trout Unlimited is sending four of our brightest college club leaders in the TU Costa 5 Rivers Program to explore the home of the world’s largest runs of wild salmon: Alaska. Starting July 5, these students will explore the Kenai Peninsula, Bristol Bay
By Sam Davidson A man I and many others considered a great American passed away last Saturday: Senator John McCain of Arizona. I was in the mountains over the weekend, with no cell service, so I didn’t learn of his death until Monday morning. I was surprisingly moved by the news. I felt like we
Damage from the Nov. 30, 7.0 magnitude earthquake on the highway exit ramp nearest to the Trout Unlimited office in Anchorage. By Jenny Weis I found myself still tip-toeing around my house Saturday morning as I cleaned broken glass and straightened bookshelves, over 24 hours after the 7.0 earthquake that rattled Anchorage last Friday. I
By Scott Willoughby I’ve never really been what the gang over on Santa Claus Lane might describe as “Christmas-y.” But I’ve always thought I’d make a decent pagan. Never having formally studied paganism, I’m not entirely sure why, although I do enjoy hanging out in the woods quite a bit, especially over a good Yule
Trout Unlimited has undertaken several movement studies to determine when and where Bear River cutthroat trout move. These studies have helped us identify conservation needs such as removal of barriers blocking spawning runs, and to determine if fish successfully access upstream habitat after barriers are removed. Following trout movement in the Bear River Cutthroat trout
By Toner Mitchell For the past 10 springs, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish has hosted a release of Rio Grande cutthroat trout fingerlings at the – as of 2014 – Rio Grande del Norte National Monument just west of the village of Questa. Initially the event drew decent crowds, 10 to 20
By Harv Forsgren Editor’s Note: This post originally appeared in the Salt Lake Tribune as an opinion piece in March of 2019. In Utah about half of our national forests — over 4 million acres — are designated as “inventoried roadless areas.” When a 2001 federal rule was being drafted to guide management of roadless
by Andrew Reichardt It’s funny to think about how I first got involved with Trout Unlimited. It wasn’t on a beautiful brook trout stream in the mountains of western Maryland or a meandering limestone creek in the valleys of Southern Pennsylvania. It was sight fishing for carp on the muddy waters of the C&O Canal
Shane was one of 12 in attendance on an all-expenses-paid fly-fishing trip intended to show appreciation for active and retired armed service members in Alaska sponsored by Kinross Fort Knox and Trout Unlimited.
In central Appalachia, installing natural gas pipelines often involves trenching through wild trout streams by the dozens. Inevitably, that leads to problems. Storms pelt construction sites, sending plumes of sediment into waters. Stream crossing procedures fail. Restoration is not completed. All this puts coldwater resources at risk. Several major new pipelines have been built in
Today, the House Natural Resources Committee passed three bills that would better conserve habitat and sporting opportunities in some of California’s most productive coldwater fisheries and upland hunting zones. Trout Unlimited has worked for the past five years to help develop these measures and provided written testimony to the committee in support of today’s markup.
Growing up in New Mexico, I took for granted that there were fishing spots where no one would want to go. Steep hikes, brush and snags everywhere, places that required too much work to get to. “Joke’s on them,” was my thinking; if only people knew that it was so much more fun than work. The people who knew
One of the fundamental precepts of science is that, to understand a phenomenon or a system, it is necessary to observe change over time, the rate of change, and the influence of causal factors. In other words, to monitor and measure. Yet frequently resource managers are stretched too thin to do consistent monitoring of salmonid
It was not a bad place to be looking for wildlife. There were deer, elk, and moose everywhere. Our best elk sighting was on the second to last day, when we came over a pass. Down in the valley we saw a group of about 50 elk, two bulls were fighting, their antlers clacking when they crashed together. From that exact spot at the top of the pass, we also saw a bull moose kneeling beside a lake, and four mountain goats along a ridge above him.
Volunteers are an inspiration to the work Trout Unlimited is doing
It would be years before I caught much more apart from a few fishing trips in the mountains for brook trout and a couple others on a nearby lake for rainbows.
