FOCUS But as the last grasps of sunlight cling to the world, this giant fish passes from view, disappearing into the realm of lore and legend as so many have before. A final question remains: How many more times will this scene play itself out before taimen are lost forever?
FOCUS Trout have always been at the top of my species list, and I’ll spend more time and energy to catch a trout than anything else.
© Photo Teddy Cosco
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The Soul of Fly Fishing
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ON THE CONTRARY... Jim McLennan Fly fishing a certain way just because it’s how things have always been done can stifle creativity and innovation—and prevent you from catching fish. However, when it comes to contrary thinking and innovation, a few unusual flies and methods have (pardon the expression) emerged recently. Along with these are some that are still gestating and in the pre-emergence stage.
HIKE-IN FLY FISHING AT ITS PEAK Teddy Cosco Springtime in Nova Scotia can be T-shirt time or a victory for the stubborn will of winter. The fishing season ends in October and doesn’t open again until April, so by the time spring arrives anglers throughout the province are champing at the bit to get out of the house regardless of the weather.
CAN FLY FISHING SAVE MONGOLIA’S TAIMEN? John Van Vleet Before the mid-1990s, very few anglers had even heard of a taimen, let alone traveled halfway around the world in pursuit of one. In the decades since the initial outfitting operations were put in place, taimen conservation efforts have resulted in varying degrees of success. Now, with the help of fly anglers around the world, the Taimen Fund stands at the forefront of Mongolia’s efforts to protect these monstrous, yet surprisingly fragile, fish. But will it be enough?
YELLOW SALLIES, FROM TOP TO BOTTOM Danie Erasmus Yellow sallies are one of the most well-known, and arguably the most abundant, stoneflies across North America. Fish feed on all the different life stages of this insect making it of great importance to fly anglers. From life cycles and distribution to nymphing and dry-fly fishing, this is the ultimate guide to everything you’ve ever wanted to know about this colorful little yellow stonefly.
INSIDE 12 42 46 50
Stream Lines Profiles Long Lines Wandering Currents
54 58 64 65
Stillwater Secrets On the Vise End of the Line Water Marks
© Photo Derek Olthuis | © On the Cover The Bug Parade
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STREAMLINES
Streamlines on Taglines
Derek Bird I’m always willing to share a few fly-fishing secrets. My favorite fly, for example, is the one the trout are taking. My favourite season is the one when trout are biting. My favourite stream is the one where the trout are plentiful and the anglers are few. © Illustration A.D. Maddox admaddox.com @admaddox999
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The Soul of Fly Fishing
T
hough we’re taught not to, most people do judge a book by its cover. I only know this because people often judge a magazine by its cover as well. I rarely write about the magazine, but I’m going to take a break from talking about fly fishing to discuss the magazine. Although, it’s a magazine about fly fishing, so I suspect there will be an intersection between the two. The tagline is the phrase just under the magazine’s name on the cover. It’s a phrase that the editorial team feels is essential to the core vision, enough that they allot space on every cover, which is one of the most coveted (and dissected) spaces in the magazine, for the very reason most people ignore the cliché. If you viewed covers back to the magazine’s inception, you’d notice we’ve displayed three taglines over the years. The first reflected a moment: “Where fly-fishing elements unite”. We designed it to complement the magazine’s name and if you read one of my first columns I actually defined Fly Fusion as “the perfect cast, the perfect drift, and the perfect take” all intercepting at a specific moment. Granted, fly fishing is made up of many imperfect moments, but we felt it prudent to reflect a trajectory toward perfection rather than focus on tangled leaders and rat-nested reels. As an editorial team, one of our goals was to help facilitate Fly Fusion moments for our readers. We believed that if we could create a community around education and instruction, and complement that portion of the editorial with world-class photography and knowledgeable and relatable editors, that we’d always come close to enhancing our readership’s moments on the water. With each issue we designed and sent out, our goal was not so much to be like a guide, but more like a mentor who’s also a flyfishing partner, with the full knowledge that this type of relationship at its apex, sees the student grow to mentor others one day.
In the spirit of this core vision, I once wrote a failed TV commercial for the magazine. It failed because we never shot it, and I suspect the reason we never shot it was because the team did not share my enthusiasm for the idea. As disappointed as I was about never shooting it, I also understand. I’ve come up with other brilliant ideas that we carried out only to find they were not as brilliant as I believed them to be. Since I know it will never get shot, I’ll explain it to you. A guy gets up early and drives over to his buddy’s house to pick him up to go to the river. He’s just bought a new truck and wants to take it on its inaugural fly-fishing trip. He gets to the house and has to wait in the driveway for half an hour before his buddy appears at the door all disheveled. When his buddy finally gets to the truck, he recklessly throws all his gear on top of the driver’s gear. To add to the driver’s frustration, his buddy spills his coffee on the seats and doesn’t wipe it up. Then as they drive away, his buddy leans into a nostril-assaulting fart, which completely desecrates the new-truck smell. Completely annoyed, the driver slams on the breaks, kicks his buddy out of the truck, throws his gear to the side of the road, and drives away. Determined to not let anything detract from his inaugural trip, he carries on to the river. On the way, the driver sees a broken-down truck with a stranded traveler looking under the hood. He stops to help and finds it’s one of Fly Fusion’s editors, and they decide go to the river together. The editor grabs his or her gear and places it in the Good Samaritan’s truck. The tagline at the end of the commercial is “Fly Fusion…pick one up. We’ll be the flyfishing partner you always wanted.” Now that I explain the commercial, I realize it’s probably better I went into this line of work rather than advertising. It gets the point across though. We wanted to be informative and relatable and we believed the tagline
on the front of the magazine enabled us to stay focused on our goal. Then we grew. To say the growth was unexpected is not completely accurate. We expected it in the same way a guy expects a girl, who’s completely out of his league, to say yes to a date. The idealists on the team expected it to happen, and the realists on the team often explained all the reasons it couldn’t happen. With growing pains came our second tagline replacing the first: “North America’s Fly Fishing Authority”. The tagline was a stretch goal. We believed we were that (or at least could attain that); we just needed others to see that we were. Our team set the goal and then we watched the magazine’s trajectory trend from national to international as we shared our platform with editors, writers, and photographers from the Dean to the Deschutes (well beyond that actually, but I’m a sucker for alliteration). Now fast-forward to the most current issues with the updated layout. The new format ushered in our latest tagline: “The Soul of Fly Fishing”. Without a doubt it’s my favorite of the three. I believe it’s the one that most succinctly captures each dimension of the magazine’s core. It pays homage to our roots in that it relates to the desire to connect with the audience, and it acknowledges the fact that borders do not confine our readers. It’s cohesive and connecting in an era where we celebrate diversity. In our tagline it’s soul as in “music has soul”. It’s soul as in “the soul of a fighter”. I feel like I should also define it by what it’s not. It’s not soul as in the political race to capture the votes of the American religious right or the emerging religious left. It’s soul as in that which connects us, not that which divides us. It’s not the Greek definition of soul, as
that which leaves the body for eternity after one passes. It is, strangely enough, more synonymous with the original Hebrew definition of the word, which more closely relates to throat. If I may take some liberty here, it is that which connects the head to the chest…that which connects knowledge with the place where we feel strong emotion. The soul of fly fishing draws on all aspects of our pastime and provides a platform for learning, enjoyment, and discussion. The soul of fly fishing recognizes that if
our head always leads the way then the mystical becomes lost to us. We may understand the depths of entomology and the perimeters of the proper casting stroke, but we easily lose our way if we’re only focused on science and technology. And if, on the opposite end, we merely focus on the feelings we get from standing under towering peaks and listening to the euphony of the stream as it passes us, then we will likely miss the opportunity to catch the persnickety trout that’s feeding just inches from the logjam. Maybe a person shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but as fly anglers we know learning to read the surface brings us at least a step closer to understanding what’s underneath.
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