Articles

SPAM Entrepreneurs from Indiana

A story so preposterous on the face of it, and yet so obviously true

by Tom Davis - Thursday, Apr 2nd, 2020

Photo: Michael Hicks / cc2.0 modified

Here’s a subject line you don’t expect to see in your Inbox: SPAM Entrepreneurs from Indiana.

The thing is, I already knew the joke. The email, from my pal Pete Fleischman, referenced a story he’d related on a molasses-slow afternoon of smallmouth fishing on the Menominee River a few summers back—a story so preposterous on the face of it, and yet so obviously true, that as Pete was telling it my mouth fell open. It pretty much stayed that way for the duration of the tale, and for several disbelieving minutes after.

Some days, fishing is work

It can be fruitless, or it can be rewarding, but work is involved

by Chris Hunt - Wednesday, Apr 1st, 2020

Photo: Eric Lawler

Some days, fishing is easy. Willing trout come readily to hand, unable to resist the bugs danced across the water with a fly rod.

Some days, it's labor. It can be fruitless, or it can be rewarding, but work is involved. Sometimes a lot of work.

Oasis

What is the marking of time, but a way to spend it?

by Jon Tobey - Tuesday, Mar 31st, 2020

Photo: USFWS / cc2.0 modified

The bottle smashed against the pavement right next to the old man’s foot, startling him. He instinctively spun the shopping cart in the direction of the attack. A bunch of bangers, pandilleros, on the far side of the chain link were already walking away laughing and joking.

A bird in hand

Every decision in the turkey woods is a questionable one

by Johnny Carrol Sain - Thursday, Mar 26th, 2020

Photo: Johnny Carrol Sain

Faint streaks of pink already stretch over the mountains. I’d lingered over that second cup of coffee too long.

I shove shells into the shotgun and set off at a fast walk to my listening spot nearly half a mile away. Whip-poor-wills whistle a lonely farewell song to the night as the strengthening voices of diurnal birds fill the woods. I haven’t heard a crow yet, and that’s good news. In my experience, crows and turkeys usually clock in at the same time.

How to help fly shops and guides during the coronavirus pandemic

Fly shops and guides are the tangible heart of our sport, here's how to help them

by Chad Shmukler - Wednesday, Mar 25th, 2020

TCO Fly Shop in State College, PA. All stocked up with flies and gear, but not customers (photo: George Costa).

With much of the country on lockdown, or preparing to go on lockdown, as part of an effort to stop the spread and rapidly intensifying growth of COVID-19 cases in the United States, small businesses are already feeling the sting of a contracting economy. Chances are, like me, you already know a handful of small business owners that are struggling to figure out how to keep workers paid or even employed, doing the math on whether to take on more debt (in the form of loans) during an economic downturn, or even those that have already made the decision to shutter their operations.