Articles

The tao of fly fishing

How do we get to the heart of the sport?

by Todd Tanner - Thursday, Jan 4th, 2024

Evening arrives on a river in Iceland (photo: Chad Shmukler).

If you spend much time around anglers, you’ll hear the following questions on a regular basis.

“Catch any?”
“Fish here much?”
“What did you get him on?”
“What rod are you using?”

They’re valid questions, all of them, but they invariably steer us towards small talk and away from the heart of things.

Fly fishing the urban guts of Houston

Largemouth, carp, speckled trout, panfish, gar and more in Houston city proper

by Chris Hunt - Tuesday, Jan 2nd, 2024

Rob McConnell with an Amur gras carp from a Houston city ditch (photo: Chris Hunt).

Sometimes it helps to not know what you’re doing.

It forces you to mine your ingenuity — to fall back on what you do know, and use that filed-away information to solve the task at hand. For a lot of us fly fishers, that’s how we learned the craft. A bit at a time, learning lessons along the way. Trial and lots of error. And it never really stops. As long as we keep fishing, we keep getting better.

Let's stop the tiny tippet nonsense

Go big on your tippet to give trout a fighting chance

by Chris Hunt - Saturday, Dec 30th, 2023

Photo: Earl Harper

One of the more unfortunate fads in fly fishing is the perceived need to cast to and hook trout with what amounts to micro tippet. Granted, today’s monofilament and fluorocarbon technology is pretty stellar, and 18 inches of 7x tippet is stronger now than it was even a decade ago. It’s still overkill.

A newbie learns trout Spey

Exploring the challenges and advantages that come with two-hand casting for trout

by Spencer Durrant - Saturday, Dec 23rd, 2023

Photo: Spencer Durrant.

I repeated the three-step mantra while untangling myself from a mess of shooting line. Years ago, one of my fishing buddies told me Spey casting was a simple, three-step process. His description was the mantra I repeated, but I was starting to doubt my memory since I’d yet to throw a decent cast.

Earlier, before heading to the river, I’d called my friend Brett to see if he wanted to tag along.

“I’m trying out that trout Spey stuff,” I said. “It should be a good time.”

“I can’t today, but let me know how it goes,” he said.

Salmon and mining interests competing over 'new' rivers

As glaciers retreat, salmon and mining companies both seek to lay claim to new habitat

by Chris Hunt - Thursday, Dec 21st, 2023

An abandoned mine on the banks of the Tulsequah River in British Columbia (photo: Chris Miller).

As a changing climate forces glaciers to retreat in northern British Columbia and Southeast Alaska, new stretches of river are appearing, and wild, wandering salmon are finding and using this unveiled habitat, a new study finds. And, researchers say, as climate change continues to shrink glaciers, more of this “new” habitat will be exposed and available to Pacific salmon. But, don’t get too excited. Salmon aren’t the only beneficiaries of these newly exposed and soon-to-be free-flowing watersheds.