Fly fishing has many creative participants and a dedicated following.  The amount of gear available out there is astonishing and it would be impossible to sample it all.  Being a guide allows me to try a lot of rods and reels that my guests have brought and there are definitely some beautiful rods being made out there these days.  The tendency has been to build faster, harder, stronger; but there has been equal attention put into the softer and slower presentation rods like the Scott F1 and now F2.

The Scott F2

 

 

Scott Fly Rod Company has balls for sure.  They have a hip and photo rich ad campaign that creates a lifestyle image around the company and when they launched the F1 series a couple of years back I remember thinking WOW!  A fibreglass rod series introduced when the industry trend is wrapping blanks for speed.  A throw back in material for sure but enough to catch the interest of our guides Jonny 'Bravo' and Joel Whalen.  They both bought this awesome little pieces of Colorado architecture to do battle with the cutts in some of our smallest waters.  They both purchased one weights matched them with Sages ultra light Click 1 and began a small stream love affair.

It's a super cool little rod which waves like the wand of a sorcerer in the right hands, picture hiding behind a stand of grass and with a couple of flicks of the wrist you can cast the  fly, stack a mend and let it drift softly into the basin sized bucket where trout lips is softly sipping.  As you raise your  arm to set on the poor creature, the arc in the rod doubles over and an epic small stream battle ensues.  The soft blank of the rod allows for short and aggressive runs into the undercut absorbing the tension put on the tippet...truly a small stream specialists rod of choice.   One of our newest clients Jerry Skurka from the Chicago area brandishes this fine little weapon on the countless spring streams of the Driftless area in Wisconsin.  His is a three weight F2 and I gave that rod a few throws on one of our small streams and found it to be an incredibly acrobatic rod.  You can definitely get tricky with these little gems.

For reels I've been married to Bauer for a long time.  I've had some of their reels for 8 years and have never had them fail.  The cork/ceramic drag system is impeccable and smooth beyond compare.  Most of their reels are equipped with this system.  The one fall back of this drag system is wear in the drag knob which can cause the knob to back off during weather changes which is fairly constant in the Rocky Mountains.  This is easily fixed by adding washers which can be sent to the customer by Bauer or you can choose to step away from this system and go with their new Rogue series which is where I have been lately.  A sealed drag system with ultra smooth resistance, the large V arbour allows for excellent line capacity in an extremely light weight reel.  For the Columbia River this is essential as the runs can put you so deep into your backing it is essential to step up a reel size in order to handle the brutes in the massive current.  Having a light weight large arbour allows this to happen without messing up it's balance with the rod.  They have some cool colour options including a splash colour which is added on at a reasonable cost.

Bauer Rogue Series

From the Lens of a Raven

My main guide and main man Joel Whalen has some mad skills; definitely inflicted with the midas touch.  We've been really blessed to have him in our lives over the years, he's a man of great talent, deep commitment and integrity.  Here is the result of countless hours of editing, dragging camera gear into river valleys sometimes to capture sometimes nothing, sometimes a few things  and in the odd moment the true magic of the natural world as seen through his lens.  This is a compilation of that effort....ENJOY!

(press link below)

Love Flyfishing 

Where I've Been Lately....

Looking For Customers on the Ganges

After a brief trip to Thailand to drop off materials and patterns for my tiers myself and my beloved Leah hopped on a plane and flew to India, a country I've wanted to visit for a long time.  I had an idea of what to expect from the numerous stories Leah had relayed to me after her previous journeys to there.  I was excited to land in Calcutta after a couple hour flight from Bangkok on Air Asia and taste the air of India.  And it tasted how I thought it might....not too good.  But a city of that size and level of poverty is going to have shitty air, there were a lot of old vehicles coughing and spewing there way through the Calcutta streets. After a few days in Calcutta we hopped on a train and headed for Bodghaya; the site of the Bodhi tree where the Buddha achieved enlightenment.

The town of Bodghaya is poor, intensely poor and there had been a massive Buddhist pilgrimage to the town just prior to our arrival so the town had been pushed to it's already meager limits and there was literally excrement in the streets; in a small gutter on the side of the walkway, one false step and you'd be in it....a far cry from the gravel freestone riverbottoms that my sandles are normally used to stepping on.  They were not happy about that experience. Aside from that the temple grounds surrounding the tree was beautiful and full of devoted Buddhists who had made the pilgrimages from northern India, Bhutan and other countries.  It was a powerful feeling to be there and I will hold those moments in a special place forever...it was beautiful.

After Bodghaya there was a brief stop in Veranassi, perhaps the holiest city in the world and certainly the focal point of the holiest river in the world the Ganges.  I liked Veranassi and although I had heard the city was dirty it was quite a step up from our two previous stops of Calcutta and Bodghaya. The level of devotion of the Hindus to their holy river the Ganga is impressive.  Every day hundreds of thousands  of Hindus bathe in the river, a river that has a cholera bacteria level that is off the charts.  The banks are lined with 'ghats' which include a burning ghat where their dead are burned and then put into the river a process which cleanses the soul. 

This rivers cholera bacteria count is 3000 times acceptable levels and water tests indicate that the river is septic.  Still miraculously and perhaps magically, there are quite a few fish in the river, one of our guides mentioned catching fish over 40 pounds, some kind of cat fish. I witnessed quite a few fish rising in the river which amazed me.  Biologists are stunned that fish do live in it and I watched a few people sipping out of it!!

Laundry on the Ganga--the Spin Cycle

Ahmdebad was our next stop and it was a nice one. It's a clean city that seems to be experiencing some economic growth and has become one of India's business centres.  This is home to Aura Herbal Wear; a company that Leah found  years ago owned by Arun and Sonal Baid.  Aura is a natural dyeing company and produces large quantities of natural dyed fabrics like organic cotton and silk. It was beautiful to watch the fabrics run through the dye baths and walking through the factory felt healthy as all products are made from plant dyes.  There fabrics are gorgeous and feel great on the skin, Joel and I wear a lot of shirts made from their dyes guiding and I would love to see a company like Patagonia using there product for the 'organic' clothing line, cause really what's the point in having an organic cotton shirt when it's been soaked in a chemical dye bath.  Kind of kills the organic side of it.  They are taking this to the next level and are hoping that this will become the way of the future for the garment industry as they have seen first hand what the many chemical dye factories can do to the water of their homeland.  They are lovely people with big hearts and clear vision, it's nice to see that some people are working towards positive change.

Organic Cotton Running Through Indigo Dye Bath

  We spent another week in India before flying into Singapore and then on to Bali.  It was an amazing contrast going from Chennai in India to Singapore.  Singapore is spotless, the pollution is minimal and the city is strikingly modern.  The Marina Bay area might be the nicest section of a city I have seen, some amazing design concept went into the construction of that place and I'm looking forward to returning to the city on my way back to Canada at the end of the month.  But for now it's beautiful Bali and my introduction to surfing and yes I've been getting crushed out there.  The surf was rough the first five days and the ocean really beat the shit out of me, but it's settled down quite a bit and life on the board has been a lot easier and a little more fruitful....it's not the easiest sport to learn tho.

In my previous blog entry I mentioned that I hadn't heard from anybody in my angling world, not a peep and that entry was followed by a rash of good bookings so that was nice.  Almost all of the bookings are for August and that month is getting full in fact the 8th to the 16th is fully booked.  Snow levels are low at the moment but the last few springs have brought some late snow so we'll see what happens there; but if things continue as is then we'll be looking at some good angling on the Elk for opening day in mid June and the West Kootenays will be happening in early June as long as there is warm weather to get the caddis moving.

Joel is currently editing another fly fishing video and I will be posting that on my site and on my blog in the next few weeks and I will also be doing a gear review based on our experiences with what we played around with last summer.  We all got to try some new stuff last year and there are definitely some standout items that I don't mind plugging.  'Til then.....

Life in The Fast Lane, Ahmdebad

A Little Too Much Time on My Hands...

Wow, winter is here in the Kootenays and in full progress and as snow accumlutates on the ground I keep wondering if it's time to just put my boat away and forget about angling until 012.  My last venture on the water was on the Elk River and it was less than pleasant in terms of temp. and when the sun tucked in behind the clouds the moderate fishing went to poor.

The guiding season seems to be a long way away and now that I finally have some time to myself I've had a chance to catch up on emails and send photos etc. to a lot of my guests and friends.  Not sure if anybody has checked their emails lately but I haven't got one reply which is odd.  I thought this was the time of year to reflect on the past angling season and start making plans for next year but haven't heard anything back yet....from no one....nope not a thing.  HELLO  OUT THERE!!!

So in the meantime I'm tying flies, streamers mostly but some prototypes to bring over to Thailand in the next month.  Looking forward to getting there and visitng the flood receding Kingdom and enjoy a lot of what it has to offer which is great food, good people, warm climate, ambient restaurants, Buddhist values and high level of service.  The Thai's know that as a foreigner you'll never totally feel at home in their country, it's culturally too different, but as a tourist you'll experience a level of hospitality in all facets of service that will make you feel as welcome as you possibly.  I've also got a few cool new patterns to pass on to my tiers for production for next year's fly bin.

I'm feeling that next year will be a good year for us at Freestone, we've had some early interest on some big trips and our fly shop in the Stanford Inn will be re-opening again along with the Indian kitchen next door which was closed this summer due to the illness of chef Cashews wife.  As far as I know her health has returned to normal and the restaurant will feature it's full menu.  Beers and curries on the patio outside the shop and the restaurant overlooking the Elk River has been a favourite of our guide staff and guests over the years.  Our guide staff and customers are colourful to say the least and some of the alcohol fueled banter flying around that table in the evening is priceless.

I organized my fly boxes yesterday and it was an interesting venture.  For those of you who have seen my boat box, you would probably understand what kind of undertaking this would be.  I have an undetermined number of flies in there and as the season progressed more patterns were introduced as some were taken out and in the end I had a melting pot of patterns intermingled throughout the box's various compartments.  It was a total shit show.  The mess really progresses when I'm hunting for that right pattern.  The one that seems to be the one and only of that day.  During one such hunt for a Mahogony Dun, I pretty much upturned my box to salvage the last few and managed to scrape by on the remnants of that pattern.  Then about two weeks later I actually upturned the box entirely in the middle of my boat and certainly lost a few but manage to 'stuff' most of them back in randomly.

As I sorted through the entire contents of this box I realized that it must have been a good mayfly year as I had few of my favourites left.  There were a lot of has beens that I uncovered; shit that I thought was the bomb a few years ago because it had a couple of banner days before it's productivity vanished into the ethers.  I also realized that when it comes right down to it, I use about a dozen flies on the Elk about 99% of the times and that the arsenal contained within this box could likely be halved.  Hard to explain why a certain pattern may only have a short time to shine within a hatch period, I mean a dun is a dun you would think.  After years of playing this game, it has become apparent to myself and my guides that there are certain characteristics of a fly that make it a consistent pattern.  Wing position, body material, legs, colour, size all have to do with it and when I'm searching for or tying new patterns, I will incorporate a bit of all that into the fly. 

I could post the top 10 patterns of all our guides and it all likelihood about 7 of the 10 would be shared amongst the 5 or 6 of us with the other 3 being made up the 5 of that favourite dozen.   As I add patterns to my fly catalogue I am generally staying within the formula of that top dozen, changing things like hackle wraps for better buoyancy or wing colour for better visiblity.  It always seems that when I bring in the 'new' stuff the patterns that the guides and fish eat up the most are the ones that are only slight variances of that top 12.

I would love to list them for all of you to see but that would be like Belichick posting the Pats playbook on nfl.com.  Not a great idea.  But if you come into the shop in the Stanford next year we could sell you a couple of them ;). 

Off to Thailand at the end of the month for some tying and some eating in sweet Old Siam!!

Guiding Season Over...Not Sure Why

The Elk River Valley Looking North

Well it was a great year and while I'm reflecting on it I think I'll change fonts...Not very exciting on the options but I felt a need for change!!!  Welcome to Trebuchet font...I'll have to find more later.   The Elk River started late and fished well throughout the year; mayflies were abundant as were golden stones and caddis.  Our hopper season never really happened which explains the 300 or so dozen Fat Alberts I still have sitting in my fly bins.  Usually the guides will eat through 200 of those in the last six weeks of the season but they never really found their groove this year. 

In the West Kootenay the Columbia River was excellent as points and frustrating at others...it's a neurotic tailwater but I grow fond of it the more I learn about it.  Hooking more fish with different methods as the years pass by and finding more and more spots.  The sorrounding waters are supporting really good numbers of rainbows (although smaller) and the fish are more consistent and willing than they are in the large tailwater.  Combining the two provides some variety for a trip here and I certainly enjoy sampling both over a three or four day trip.  Caddis, Golden Stones and Ants were staples here along with some olive/black streamers.  Dredging up big rainbows was most often accomplished with large, black stonefly nymphs.  I love spending time here in Septmember and early July; that's when these rivers really shine and this part of our guiding region is definitely growing which I'm really excited about.  Both Spencer and Joel have worked the oars over here and have become competent in guiding it's waters and we are looking forward to starting over here in early June if spring and summer arrive as they normally should.

It's Not Just About the Angling Sometimes

I'm going to miss this gig and has I put away my boat rods, sort through my fly boxes and take out the garbage many awesome moments are brought to mind by the individual items.  The fishing is still awesome but the weather can be a bit tough.  Above are some of the recyclables removed from my boat throughout the season.  The box on the right  is from the Scelfo group and is one of five drops to the recycle depot (notice Fireball on left of box).  I thought of going to South America but I think that will be on hold until next year as Thailand and the fly business demands some attention. 

So thanks to everybody who came and fished with us and anyone who took the time to read this blog....I'll keep posting the odd tid bit here and there and will provide some links to some things that I think are worth checking out.  There's a lot of cool new video happening in the fly fishing world and the content is not so troutcentric which I find refreshing.  Other fish are finally starting to get there due credit for their natural beauty and predation instincts.  Until later....

Yes, the Columbia is on Fire

Yesterday was one of the days on the water when you feel your being thanked for something you've done....a good karma day perhaps. After some moderate success on the Columbia and an aborted treeplanting mission; Joel, Spencer and myself heading out early, that's right EARLY!!! to the Columbia River to do battle with some of the rivers fine rainbows.

I was up at 4:30 tying streamers and sipping on coffee anticipating a day of dredging for meat. When we got to the river it was 8:30 am, which for us is early. Being freestone guides there is not much use or need in getting your feet wet until later in the day as the river warms up and the fish began feeding. We had decided some needling was in order so the early start gave us some time to really fish the runs thoroughly.

The water looked good, levels have dropped and some of our favourite structures have begun to show themselves. The day started with big stonefly nymphs and the streamers that I spent the wee hours tying up. They went to work fairly quickly with some decent fish striking our offerings and one pig destroyed Spencers nymph rig leaving his indicator bobbing around in the back eddy like the remnants of a ship wreck.

As we ventured down river the nymph stuck some more nice fish but we fished a dry in behind the nymph and streamer on one run (little bit unorthodox) and it started turning fish and some really nice ones as well. By late noon the caddis dry was crushing big rainbows off the banks and each deflection seem to be holding an active 18 to 20 inch well fed rainbow.

The strength of these fish is impressive, swimming around in that tailwater builds there muscles and the battles were epic. It was by far the best day I've spent on that water and the recent angling reports from the other guides are supporting the same conclusion we had...the river is on fire. Really sweet day, thank you fish :)

West Kootenays Update

It's nice to be home in my favourite little town of Nelson; weather's good, company's excellent and the fishing is good as long as you stay away from the Columbia River for now which is just starting to settle into it's fall levels. I've been out on the Columbia a few times and have stuck some really nice, strong fish but there just isn't enough terrestrial and October Caddis activity to really get them excited although the evening fishing can provide some decent dry fly action. Streamers and nymphs are hooking the odd fish but locating the feeding fish has been sporadic at best.

The other streams in the area are fishing really well at the moment, all dry flies and all leggy/foamy type stuff which has been a lot of fun to fish. The Columbia is continuously dropping and we will be hitting it hard over the next few days and the hot weather in the next week should get some hoppers out and the river dropping will provide some more habitat for the hopper eating trout.