So, what’s a guy to do when he’s getting a bit stir crazy and the fishing’s lousy? Head to the desert! A little place called Valley of Fire State Park (VOF). It’s in Nevada, about 60 miles northeast of Lost Wages. It was 30° F and snowing at home the morning we left. Eight hours of driving later, we were in VOF, basking in the 80° F heat. It had been nearly seven months since we’d felt temps like that. It didn’t even bother me that I was hours from the nearest native trout stream.

We spent four glorious days working on some serious sunburns. Hiked some pretty trails. Took 500+ pictures. Not a care in the world.

I though I’d share some pics with you (a bunch) in case you want to enjoy some vicarious warmth.

Enjoy!.

One such “extinct” trout was the Pyramid Lake strain of the Lahontan cutthroat. Historically found in ancient Lake Lahontan and its tributaries, its territory shrunk as the lake receded. The fish were still found in Pyramid Lake and its tributaries into the early 20th century until the lake became a source of water for irrigation. When the lake levels dropped too far, the Pyramid Lake Lahontans could no longer reach their spawning tributaries. And the fish was thought extinct by the 1940′s.

In the 1970′s, a fish was found in the Pilot Peak range in Utah that didn’t belong in the Utah mountains. Don Duff sent information to Dr. Robert Behnke about this fish. Dr. Behnke identified the fish as the missing Pyramid Lake strain of the Lahontan cutthroat. (I hope to provide more of this story at a later time.) These fish have subsequently been restored to Pyramid Lake. A brood stock has been kept at Pilot Peak to help supplement the National Hatchery’s brood stock. The Pilot Peak project is on the property of Steve Doudy, who has been the caretaker of the population in the creek and in the brood stock (both of which are on his property).

This past Wednesday I had the privilege of spending the day with Dr. Behnke and some of the morning with Don Duff and Steve Doudy at the Pilot Peak brood ponds where we planned on helping spawn the Lahontan cutthroats. (More about the Pilot Peak project in another post later.)

Interestingly enough, Dr. Behnke, who was so instrumental in the identification of this strain of cutthroat, had never been to the Pilot Peak brood ponds. So my fishing buddy, Dan Line, decided to invite him. Since our trip seeking the extinct Alvord cutthroat a couple of years ago, we (actually Dan) have been in contact with Dr. Behnke as efforts have been made to try and keep at least a phenotypical remnant population of the Alvords alive. Dan invited Dr. Behnke to spend the morning with us at Pilot Peak and then help us give a presentation later that evening to our local TU chapter (Cache Anglers) about the Alvords.

My memory stinks—I’m lucky to remember details of what happened yesterday, let alone a year or more ago. Dr. Behnke’s got an incredible memory. The day was filled with his remembrances. Just ask him a question and he would fill us in with all the minutiae of dates, people, places and events. It was incredible to learn firsthand a few of the many things Dr. Behnke has been involved in with the conservation efforts of native fish and also with the furthering the world’s knowledge about fish.

I would imagine that someone as knowledgeable and experienced as Dr. Behnke could easily become snooty, arrogant or condescending, but he was extremely polite, patient and entertaining. And there is a fiery side to him as well, especially when it comes to tracking a fish’s ancestry through meristics versus genetics (Dr. Behnke is firmly in the meristic camp). (Hopefully some more about this topic in another post.)

I think I’ll write a couple other posts about this day and issues and conversations that surrounded it. I just needed to get a post up now while I had the time and inclination to write it. Hopefully I’ll become a bit more of a regular writer again.

Don Duff  is another instrumental and passionate man when it comes to fish. I’ll have a post dedicated to him later too.

PS The next issue of Rise Forms is nearing completion (Scott’s been a very busy man, and therefore very lazy about anything writing related, but things are getting better.)

If you want to be on the cutting edge, and you haven’t signed up for notification of the premiere edition yet, head over to Rise Forms now and sign up.

We have a great line-up with some excellent fiction, art, poems, a personal narrative, and a book review to kick off your winter reading.

They are touched, in some way, by the object of their passion—a wisp of ether; a mere glimpse of the past—but to them it is often enough.

A few months ago I spent a couple of days on my homewater away from home. It was more crowded than I’d ever seen it before, but Dan and I found a few stretches if open water. The fish seemed skittish. Or maybe hesitant. As if they had been fished over already. Or maybe they were toying with me—trying to get as close to my fly as they could without getting hooked.

Along the grassy bank I saw a sizeable fish repeatedly rise. I clambered up his side of the river a good forty feet below him, then cut a wide swath around his lie and made my way back to the water’s edge thirty feet above him. I was afraid I had mentally mismarked his location as I didn’t see any movement where I thought he was. I slowly worked my way downstream, letting my fly swing free below me in the current. I was 20 feet upriver from him when he rose again. I dragged the fly toward me then flipped a rolling cast, landing the fly half a dozen feet upriver of him in his feeding lane.

The fly reached the target area and the fish dutifully rose to meet the fly. He gave the CDC emerger a good nose bump as I set the hook into an expanse of blue Wyoming sky. In fact, twice in three minutes I tried lassoing the clouds with a sudden jerk of the rod. The second time put the fish down for good.

I know slow takes, and these were not them. This wasn’t a case of pulling flies past teeth. Nor was it a case of beginning-of-the-season-jitters. These were complete misses. Purposeful misses. On the part of the fish.

They were getting as close to the fly as they could without getting hooked. Tempting fate and a barb they came again and again. In eddies and chutes. Through slicks and riffles. A mile upriver and two miles down.

It was frustrating as the count grew: first just a couple fish, it quickly multiplied to what seemed like a score or more of them had snubbed me and nearly as many fly patterns. Eventually I came to recognize their point—to see their game for what it was.

I swear, these fish were counting coup.

I could play the game too. I began reaching out my coup stick with the same chutzpah the fish had shown. I reached into their element, and no matter how darting the peck, for just a moment, they reached into my element. I counted myself fortunate to touch without touching something I could not hold.

And on that day, the ethos of the coup was enough.

My grandson, William

I know I’ve been offline for some time now, but life has been hectic. Good news today though—I’m a grandpa! (yeah, way too young for this to happen, I thought, but apparently not).

His name is William. He is 19″. 7 lbs. 0 oz. Baby and mother are both doing well. Father? Well…you know, chip off the ol block—he’s doing fine.

In my last post I posed a little challenge to determine the two places I stopped. I said it was a trick question, and Harry was pretty quick on the draw when he said “bike trip” and “foolishly didn’t take a fly rod with you.” The fly gear was left home on purpose. Foolish? Hmmmm…jury is still out. Where were the two stops? Red Lodge and home and for the same reason: saddle sore!

In looking at a map of our motorcycling trip, it would probably be hard for a diehard fly angler to comprehend how one could choose to leave the fly gear behind with so many tempting choices in the path. Not to sound boastful (if that’s the right word), but most of these places I’ve been to multiple times and are a 4 hour drive or less away—it doesn’t elicit a great pull on me to fish them. But it does leave me in awe of the amazing opportunities I have to fly fish within a relatively close distance of home. I’m truly fortunate.

So a friend, Paul, invited me to come along with him and a few other guys for an annual trip they started doing a few years ago to Red Lodge, Montana. I jumped at the chance. These aren’t anglers, strictly biking. In fact, Paul is a bit of a speed junky (snowmobiles, jet skies, motorcycles, etc.). My wife and I went with him and a few other couples for a five hour bike ride a few weeks ago. He liked my riding style (fast), and that’s why he invited me for the Red Lodge trip.

We took a circuitous route to Red Lodge, not the fastest route. In fact, my father-in-law asked how long it took us to get there and how far it was. When I told him it was about 460 miles, and it took us 12 hours. He said that we must have been going awfully slow since that would average out to about 40 miles per hour. For those of you who might be motorcycle riders, you’ll understand that frequent butt breaks are important. And, one of the guys needed to stop every 100 miles to refuel. Plus, there is The Park.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Yellowstone as much as the next person, but it can be a real trial for those of us with traffic patience issues. Many of us who visit it, or the surrounding area with any amount of regularity find it both funny, and irritating, that people will stop in the middle of the road to take pictures of deer, elk, moose or bison. Or flowers. Really. (If you haven’t been to the park before, just picture a narrow, two lane road with virtually no shoulders.)

So, there we are, putt-putting along at 7 1/2 MPH. Then some stop and go stuff. And what should we find? Some guy stopped (which automatically means that that lane is now blocked) taking pictures of flowers. Again, I love flowers, but, aw, come on people!

And then the construction. We happened to pull up to some stop-n-go traffic just in time to hit the tail end of a pilot car line. When we got to the traffic stopped going the other direction, Paul decided to count how many cars were waiting in line. 278, with a couple dozen more rolling up right behind them. Boy, I’m glad we got there when we did!

Just outside the very northeast corner of the park (probably the least visited area, but it does have Slough Creek and Soda Butte Creek) is Cooke City. That’s where the grizzly attacked the three campers, killing the one. It’s a fun little town, but more importantly, it’s the gateway to Beartooth Pass.

If you aren’t familiar with Beartooth Pass, you’re missing out on one of the most spectacular drives in the lower 48. The summit is nearly 11,000 feet (10, 947), making it one of the highest roads in the US. It is amazing to look down at snow in August. A large section of the road is brand new, making it an incredible ride for the motorcycle enthusiast (just make sure you aren’t stuck behind cars so you can really enjoy those corners).

This page has some great pictures and video of the road (none of it taken by me).

I tried taking some video (you’ll see it below), but ran into a couple of problems. For those of you who have ridden cruisers (that’s what the Harley-type bikes are called, as opposed to bullet bikes, etc.), you’ll know that these machines are a bit on the rough side—not very smooth. Your head can do a lot of bouncing around. At least, mine does. And just about everything else bounces around too. I took my Kodak Zi8 camcorder and taped it to the inside of my windshield in hopes of capturing our trip. Well, you can see some of the results in the little bit of video I put together. It’s a bouncy bugger! Also, I couldn’t see the screen, so I never knew if I got the thing turned on or off. At one point in time I didn’t get the thing turned off, and I ran out of battery before making it anywhere close to Beartooth.

Click here to view the embedded video.

On the other end of Beartooth is Red Lodge. This is the first time I have ever been there, and I can say that I’ll definitely be back. It’s a nice little town with some incredible background scenery. We decided to avoid traveling through the park again, so the next morning we left for Bozeman, crossing Yellowstone River (which I have never fished outside of the park) then rode south along the Gallatin River (another one I’ve never fished).

I must say, that for being a bike ride, I was looking at a lot of water as we rode past rivers. I did see a number of rises and quite a few anglers and wished I were on the river too. Maybe I’ll sneak a rod along with me next year.

The practice of catch-and-release seems to be a commandment, not to be violated. When scientists or environmentalists or even widely admired writers on the sport politely suggest that it sometimes makes sense to keep and eat what is hooked, the reaction can be indignant.

Why is that? What if nature might be better off if we eat fish that are invasive species, for example? Does research show whether fish feel pain?

Read the comments left after each of the six panelists make their point. It is telling to see how “regular” people stand on the issues.

Maybe this will jump start more serious discussion on fish and pain? We’ll see.

…a multi-disciplinary performance piece about the art of angling called “Fly Box.” Suchy’s mixed-media presentation – which incorporates live original music, photography, video, poetry, textile art and actual fishing flies – will premiere during the Racine Art Museum’s Meet Me on the Patio event on Friday, Aug.
12.

Read the full piece.

Many currently in the sport often wonder if another angler is a BTM angler or ATM angler (before THE movie or after THE movie). Will this new mixed media presentation be enough to spark the next generation of anglers to join the sport causing all pre- “Fly Box” anglers to curse the post- “Fly Box” anglers? Only time will tell.

(If somebody goes, see if you can sneak in a video camera inside your hat, cleverly aimed through the hole you poke through the dotted “i” in the Orvis logo. It will be like those pre-DVD releases of movies still in the theater you can download by torrent. (At least, that’s what I’ve heard. I wouldn’t know from personal experience.) Please be a little more discreet than these folks.)