Innehållsförteckning för Summer 2021 från The Drake

LIKE MOST BUSINESS OWNERS who enjoy attending consumer shows, I missed the face-to-face interaction in 2020 that would have normally taken place with our readers. For all the small talk on trout or travel or the latest carp fly, the first and most eagerly asked question I often received at those shows was, “Where’s Clyde these days?” If you are new to The Drake: “Clyde” is a 1974 Mercury Marquis that filmmaker RA Beattie and I purchased in Fort Collins, CO, in summer 2010, ostensibly to shoot the Oscar-winning video Guiding Goes Gangster. Clyde then sat in my garage for a year and a half, until the winter of 2011, when former senior editor Geoff Mueller, writer Will Rice, and photographer Copi Vojta (now of Fly Fish Journal) took him…

NO ONE EVER THOUGHT they’d be catching Atlantic Salmon in Washington’s Skagit River, famous for its native steelhead. But that’s exactly what happened in fall of 2017, after a saltwater net-pen near Cypress Island collapsed on August 19, releasing more than 200,000 non-native Atlantic salmon into Puget Sound. Outcry from conservation groups, anglers, and several Puget Sound tribes led to swift action, resulting in the Washington State Legislature passing a law that phases out non-native finfish aquaculture by 2022. Unfortunately, lawmakers whiffed on the chance to create more meaningful protection for native salmon and steelhead by not outlawing open-water finfish aquaculture outright, as Alaska, Oregon, and California have done, and as Canada’s current government has promised to do by 2025. In January, Alaska Rep. Don Young and three co-sponsors introduced…

SUMMERTIME IN IDAHO’S high desert can suck for flyfishers, especially in 2021. The air temps seem to always be in the mid-90s or greater. Most of the streams and lakes are surrounded by crop fields and wind farms. Signs at state and county parks in the region warn of rattlesnakes (I haven’t seen one yet, but it seems like an ideal setting). I’ve also been told certain species of tarantulas have been introduced to quell a recent infestation of hobo spiders (my fear of spiders knows no bounds). Much of the water leaves a lot to be desired as well; this isn’t the clear, high-mountain flows most think of in the Gem State. In many parts of the Snake River mainsteam, you can drop four feet of anchor line without…

Artist Trevor Hawkins When anglers talk about their favorite artist’s “breadth,” they are normally referring to the wide range of species or seasons or environments that a particular artist can portray. But there is also the breadth within an art form, like painting or drawing, and in this regard, the work of Australian artist Trevor Hawkins runs an incredible spectrum. Hawkins began as a landscape artist, but also draws incredibly realistic portraits of horses and dogs and, of course, fish. He can switch from a watercolor headshot, to an ocean scene requiring technical pens, to a circular abstract that looks like stained glass found in an old church. —TB TREVOR HAWKINS ART (Facebook) Wings2Water What can always be found in airports other than stress and indignity? Thousands of idle passengers.…

THE CREATOR SAVED the best for last, painting detail and reason into the aquatic layer of the landscape, culminating in the genetic and ecologic wonder of the Columbia River Basin—a highway of life embedded in the masterpiece we inherited. What I find most impressive is not the vastness, the diverse anadromous lineage, or the life-sustaining nutrients brought inland from the sea, but the delicate ecological threads woven into the folds; thousands of pencil-thin arteries nourishing diverse and resilient fisheries. On its western end, winters dish out uninterrupted strings of sunless days. Moving east, those gray skies bring concrete-like snowfall to the Cascades; the divide between wet and dry. Occasionally, winds blow the gray blob even farther inland, and snow blankets the peaks and ridges rising from the desert. To process…

MY INTRODUCTION TO FLYFISHING began in a garage. Three of us built a rod vault using a green ammo can for the reels, white PVC piping for the rods, and a case of cold Rainier for creative lubricant. I’d stripped in a few palm-size trout from streams in the North Cascades, but it was in that north Seattle garage that my husband and our roommate used Super Glue to piece together what flyfishing would come to mean. Those who build their own rod carriers might be called resourceful, creative, or frugal. But viewed in the context of our true motivation—wanting to avoid breaking down and re-assembling rods between a multitude of Puget Sound fishing spots—the most accurate word might be lazy. Whatever the reasoning, ours ultimately proved its worth one…

THE FIRST FLOOD TIDE came in like a parade, and I watched it pass from the sidelines. While others poled around an emerald sea of spartina, I slogged away at my desk. During each morning commute, staring off the road into the wetlands, the sight of a tailing red offered a brief dose of adrenaline, followed by bitter contemplation about the nature of capitalism. When I finally scored a day off, the flood tide was an afterthought, with the moon now more sliver than pie. I pulled up to my honey hole, where a drainpipe fed a series of creeks fanning out to the flood plain. Redfish like this spot, and so did I. My goal was to not only recharge my batteries, but to address the skunk factor: I…

It’s just before 7 a.m. on a Sunday in May, and once again I am entranced. The river, smooth and glossy, reflects the new greens of the forest along the banks. Cormorants race downriver, as a pair of osprey turn their circles higher up. I string my rod as fast as I can, but the beautiful morning light distracts me from the task. So does the knowledge that beneath the surface a legendary migration of fish pushes upstream. What really blows my mind, though, is that I am only four miles from the White House as the eagle flies. And if luck holds, I’ll soon hook into an American shad, an anadromous brute whose runs and acrobatics make me giddy. So it goes at Fletcher’s Cove, gateway to the Potomac…

EVERY FEW YEARS, a relatively large, well-known company from outside the flyfishing industry will briefly dip its toes into the sport. Such was the case in 2009, with Oakley sunglasses, which generously blew through its marketing budget by sending a dozen dealers and media types down to fish Mexico’s Pesca Maya Lodge. Rogelio Velasco opened Pesca Maya in 1996. Twenty-five years, a handful of hurricanes, and countless permit later, it is still going strong. The most laid-back lodge in the Yucatan sits oceanfront about three hours south of Cancun, just north of Ascension Bay, where I fell so in love with the location, guides, drinks, vibe, and exceptional fishing, that I’ve returned nearly every year since, with friends in tow. Anglers have several multi-day lodges to choose from when fishing…

FROM THE HILLS of North Georgia to the Blue Ridge Mountains, Adirondacks, southern Catskills, Maine Highlands, and into New Brunswick, there’s a familiarity to an eastern brook trout stream that seems to ignore latitude. Moss-covered boulders, rhododendron leaves floating in the eddies, and cold, clear water glinting in what little light finds its way through the hemlock canopy. Everything is painted in a pale green wash. And brook trout are rising—to bluewings, caddis, ants, beetles, crickets and hoppers. If it wriggles, flutters, or skitters, a brook trout will eat it here. You rarely need more than a few attractor dries on one of these creeks. Brookies love bugs. With one notable and unfortunate exception. The hemlock woolly adelgid—or HWA—is an invasive, highly-destructive, sap-sucking insect in the aphid family that is…

THE DAY AFTER Sam Lockwood graduated from University of Wyoming with a degree in wildlife management, he drove seven hours from Laramie to Sunlight Basin—also in Wyoming—crossing nearly the entire state diagonally in order to put his education to use. He started his new job the following morning. “We had a big party the night before, so when I showed up in Cody I was in bad shape,” Lockwood said, adding that his degraded condition might’ve helped him overcome his first-day jitters. “The guy in charge wasted no time, and pretty soon I was on site where they had trapped an adult grizzly. I had to dart the bear and get to work.” He describes those post-college days as a young Game and Fish intern as some of his happiest.…

SINCE 1841, my family has owned a parcel of land along the banks of the St. Lawrence River. In a spot where the river funnels between a series of islands and the mainland, our property tapers to a point that juts into water, creating a current seam that is ingrained into my earliest memories. I exist because of this river. My mother met my father on the point when they were both aged two, when her family rented a cottage from his. The river flowed differently back then, prior to the construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway. But you can see in old photographs that the current seam along the point was the same. We were anchored off the edge of that seam, working around submerged rocks that I’ve cast…

MY OLDER BROTHER Charlie—the red-haired menace of my youth, and the protagonist of so many fishing adventures—came to visit me in Canada. It was mid-August when I picked him up from the airport. He was hungover and indignant, as one of his rods had been lost in transit. We headed straight for a well-regarded trout stream in southern Ontario where there were rumors of giant browns, stopping eight hours later at the local fly shop to book a half-day trip with some dude named Larry. We woke early the next morning, bleary-eyed and desperate for coffee. My brother stumbled around the campsite cursing Air Canada and searching for his waders. By 6:30 we were at the shop, where we found Larry leaning up against his truck, drawing on a smoke.…

Let this be a warning to you and to me and to all the other salmon killers out there; to the moochers and trollers and dam builders; the seiners and gillnetters; sushi chefs and leach mines; treaty breakers, billy clubs, old-growth bulldozers, and an ocean of plastic; to fillet knives, fish farms, and this ever-warming world, let this be a warning: These fish will outlast you. I’ve seen kings blinded by eagles, clawed from rivers and tossed bankside, tails still beating, writhing snakelike over gravel to find water and make their final punch upstream. Kings don’t die like you and me. And it won’t matter who you are or how you die or if you go with grace or some measure of dignity—as a martyr, a mother, or a saint—because…

The very best trout fishing occurs, as everyone knows, at night. Or a week before opener. Or two miles upstream. Or that one evening in July on your way to the airport when the hex hatch fills the air with so many swirling bugs that they split your headlights like snow. The best fishing occurs when you’re not there. This came to me as we broke down our rods one August evening deep in Wisconsin’s Kinnikinnic River Valley. We hurried in the fading light because a long, steep climb lay ahead, and we had to navigate a switchback featuring crumbling ledges and rattlesnake holes. It was no time to admire sunsets. “But the trout are just starting to feed,” Wally complained, stowing his waders in an oversized pack before snapping…

AN EIGHT-INCH BROOK TROUT takes my caddis by the hemlock log. He dives into the cave beneath the waterfall, and for a moment I fear I’ll lose him on a submerged branch. My three-weight bends as I pull him out. His orange belly flashes like a pumpkin and his broad back looks like sunlight struggling through riffles. Because his body is full, and because Dad and I packed in a skillet, I place my forefinger on the roof of his mouth and bend his head until it lays flat on his spine. I find a young moosewood sapling, break it off at the Y, and push the stick through his gills down to the groove. Being a typical catch-and-release flyfisher, the weight of the fish balanced on the stick is…

MEMORIAL WEEKEND is typically a time to avoid fishing. But Clyde opens doors. And gates, with bass ponds behind them. I’m not a private-water-with-pellet-fed-trout guy, but access to an un-public largemouth lake in Tennessee? That’s another matter. Thanks to the generosity of Mr. and Mrs. Johnny Carrol Sain, Clyde had been resting peacefully in their Dardanelle, Arkansas, yard since I abandoned him at Little Rock’s Ozark Angler fly shop in June 2019. I’ve never met Johnny’s wife, but I don’t know many spouses who would be cool with having Clyde as a lawn ornament for two years. Johnny said he “fielded a few purchase inquiries from the locals.” That may sound like a joke, but I assure you it isn’t. If awards were given to cars for “most purchase offers…

WHEN CHELSEA SCHMITT told her parents that she was taking the test to become a charter-boat captain in Alaska, they were not elated. With a fresh degree in international relations from the University of Oregon, she had traveled the world for a bit, including trips to Africa and Korea, but quickly found out that one of the penalties of wanderlust is that it doesn’t pay. As it turned out, she ran out of money in Homer, Alaska, where, after a few seasons as deckhand on the thirty-six-foot Irish Mist, she decided to become a captain herself. “Growing up, our parents always pounded into our heads that you can do whatever you want. It doesn’t matter if you’re a girl or a boy,” said Chelsea. “They weren’t very excited when they…

“DALE SLIPPED AT the kid’s pond a few days ago and I couldn’t get him up.” There was an air of apology in my dad’s voice, but sitting there at dinner I felt a stab of nausea below my sternum. On this expansive, isolated Idaho plain, no sign exists at “the kid’s pond” to keep a pair of intrepid nonagenarians away, so why wouldn’t they be there? (When my dad started his story, my first thought was, “Of course they were at the kid’s pond!’) Years evaporate in a moment for fishing buddies. Many of our days on the water are lackluster, but when so many are spent with another, there exists a mystique—an actual imprint on one’s life. There are many who won’t understand this, but the more fortunate…

YOU’LL KNOW THE bucket when you see it. It might look like much of the water you’ve been casting to all day, but any angler understands that to focus only on what’s visible is to ignore many of the forces at play. This is about instinct. If seeing is believing, then feeling is as close as you get to knowing. And if there is a fish there (which you just know there is), then it must be a good’n. The bucket, in this case, is tucked against a steep bank lined in elephant ears and rimmed on three sides by the broken, waterlogged trunk of a large pecan tree. Only two things are clear: There is definitely a big largemouth in there; and you don’t stand a chance of getting…

THIS YEAR I HAVE been trying to crack the code of the Lower Stanislaus, which flows out of Goodwin Dam in California’s Central Valley. During my first two outings in February, the USGS reported flows of 350 and 400 CFS, which was low enough to cross in some places and, while a bit skinny, had some good holding water (none of which I was able to capitalize on). Fast forward a few months to mid-summer, when the water managers were fulfilling orders, and the daily flows were up to 1,500. It was a totally different river, with water roaring through trees and over hiking paths. Former runs and holes were replaced by rapids. Trying to cross or even wade past ankle-level was not advisable. The return path up to the…

I had different ways of occupying myself while I lay awake. I would think of a trout stream I had fished along when I was a boy and fish its whole length very carefully in my mind; fishing very carefully under all the logs, all the turns of the bank, the deep holes and the clear shallow stretches, sometimes catching trout and sometimes losing them. I would stop fishing at noon to eat my lunch; sometimes on a log over the stream; sometimes on a high bank under a tree, and I always ate my lunch very slowly and watched the stream below me while I ate. — Ernest Hemingway, The Nick Adams Stories In my sleeping bag on the east slope of the Andes, a few yards from what…

IT WAS LATE MORNING on a sunny, calm, late-summer day. I’d been wade-fishing for a couple of hours along the Colorado River, a few miles downstream from my home in Carbondale. The only visible insects were a few tiny mayflies and midges hovering about twenty feet above the center of the river. There’d been no sign of feeding trout other than two small browns fooled by the little nymph on my dry-dropper rig. As the day warmed, I decided to walk along the bank and look for fresh stonefly cases on the rocks. But I ended up looking harder for the beer I’d left cooling somewhere along the river. Nevertheless, I spotted a large dragonfly nymph crawling onto a dry, sun-covered rock about five feet from the water. A closer…