In August 2020, Congress did something remarkable. In the throes of a heated political campaign season and in the middle of a deadly viral pandemic that was literally killing Americans left and right, the nation’s legislative branch set aside its daily political rancor and passed the Great American Outdoors Act.

Fly fishers tend to rely on perception. And that perception often becomes our reality. For many Northern Hemisphere anglers, particularly those who fish the high-elevation rivers and streams of the Rocky Mountain West, we spend the months of May and June dredging deep runs in cloudy water hoping to pull a big, belligerent trout off the bottom as we power through heavy, turbid spring flows. The folks out east may get to enjoy springtime dry fly fishing, but those of us who live where towering snow-capped peaks predominate the landscape, spring is runoff season.