High Country Angler | Spring 22

Spring spring 20 20

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Timing the Spawn

by Landon Mayer

Powder River Adventure

by Brian LaRue

INSIDE THE 2022 "GOOD SAMARITAN" BILL

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SPRING 2022 VOLUME 19 • ISSUE 2

MAGAZINE CONTENTS 08

TIMING THE SPAWN

16

POWDER RIVER ADVENTURE

22 24 28 30 34 38 44 46

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BY LANDON MAYER

BY LANDON MAYER

PESCADOR TROUT HERO BAG

BY MARK SHULMAN

BUD ISAACS AND RESTORING THE COLORADO

BY JACK BOMBARDIER

THE TAPESTRY OF TIME

BY HAYDEN MELSOP

WET MEADOWS - AN INTERVIEW WITH CHERYL CWELICH

BY NANCY JOHNSTON BRAMLETT

FLY SELECTION TIPS FOR THE OPPORTUNISTIC TROUT

BY PETER STITCHER

GOOD NEWS AT LAST FOR GOOD SAMS?

BY TY CHURCHWELL

FIT TO BE TIED

BY JOEL EVANS

THE LAST CAST

BY JOHN NICKUM

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HCA Staff P U B LISHER S

J ac k Tallo n & Frank M ar tin

C O NTENT C ONSU LTANT L ando n M ayer

EDITO R IAL

Frank M ar t i n, M anagi ng Editor f rank@ hc am agaz ine.co m Landon Mayer, Editorial Consultant Ruthie Mar tin, Editor

ADV ER TISING

B r i an L a R ue, S ales & M a r keting b r ian@ hc am agaz i ne.co m D i rec t : ( 303) 502- 4019 M ar k Shulm an, Ad S ales Cell: ( 303) 668- 2591 m ar k@ hc am agaz i ne.co m

DESIG N

David M ar tin, Creative Direc tor & Graphic D esigner aisthetadesign.com

P HOTO G RAP HY

Frank Martin, Landon Mayer, Brian LaRue, Angus Drummond

STAF F WRITER S

Frank Martin, Landon Mayer, Brian LaRue, Joel Evans, David Nickum, John Nickum, Peter Stitcher Copyright 2017, High Country Angler, a division of High Country Publications, LLC. All rights reserved. Reprinting of any content or photos without expressed written consent of publisher is prohibited. Published four (4) times per year.

To add your shop or business to our distribution list, contact Frank Martin at frank@hcamagazine.com.

D i str i buted by H i gh Countr y Publi cati ons, L LC 730 Popes Valley D r i ve Colorad o Spr i ngs, Colorad o 809 1 9 FA X 719-593-0040 Published in cooperation with Colorado Trout Unlimited 1536 Wynkoop Street, Suite 320 Denver, CO 80202 www.coloradotu.org

ON THE COVER: Photo by Landon Mayer

TOC PHOTO:

by Brian La Rue

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TIMING THE

SPAWN

by Landon Mayer

T

he most popular time to target large trout around the world is during spawning seasons, because the fish are more accessible to anglers in more confined shallow waters, compared to deep or hidden environments where they hold during the remaining eight months of the year. The best example of this are steelhead that live in the ocean or giant lakes for the majority of the year, and that during the spawning season migrate up to thousands of miles in search of prime reproductive waters and substrate.

This becomes a thrill seeking sport—being able to see some of the largest fish the water can offer, and knowing they are overly aggressive. It is one of your best shots at a trout of a lifetime. The spawning season can be broken down into three stages: pre spawn, spawn, and post-spawn. Each stage has its own advantages, but the biggest thing to remember is once a trout decides it is time to spawn, it is no longer thinking about food and it should be left alone. This is why I devoted a chapter to ethical angling, to ensure the safety of future generations of wild trout. An angler should take no pride in snagging a trout off a spawning bed; it is the same as shooting a fish in a barrel!

ion!

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PRE-SPAWN

A key piece of the puzzle in timing trophy trout is knowing when to look, and timing the early stages of pre-spawn is not easy. This is when an angler earns his or her stripes by paying dues and covering water in search of gold. Yes, you will have many days under your belt where the fish are sim- ply not in, but know this: You will at some point also be the first to encounter a giant at its largest size and literally untouched by human hands! I begin hunting for early swimmers around three months before the spawn; for example, if the fish are known to spawn in October, I will begin searching in July.

Remember, it takes time for these gems to find suitable ground, and they can cover a lot of water to get to spawning areas. It’s key to know that this time of year requires a lot of swimming, but also requires a lot of rest and staging in deep runs, undercut banks, eddies, or simply deep, slow moving water. It’s like a swimmer relaxing in the hotel after a race… the fish need time to recover. They also need food to continue the journey. This is why you can have such a good

DEO!ay!

I V W E N od r Copy T u

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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chance at landing a pig: they are hungry, usually sharing deep runs with their targets, and they are not as wary as they will be once they remain in a less hidden environment for a while.

Once you locate staging grounds, know that fish will use the same “room” in waves to relax during the trip. Next is timing the bite for a pre spawn trout. It is common for anglers to think of big attractor flies to trigger a strike, but remember the fish are on the move, and not as aggressive as they will be three months down the road. I am a fan of matching the food from the water they came from, not the water they are in.

For example, if they swam up from the ocean, there is a good chance that they will react to an ocean-dwelling baitfish imitation like a Clouser Minnow, a surface/ bottom insect, and other aquatic life.

Two go-to imitations for pre spawn freshwater fish are my Mini Leech and Titan Tube Midge, to match the food found year-round in the still water they came from.

The key here is year-round. That makes the food you are imitating common grub for the trout that they will see all year.

As for trout that live in the same river system their entire lives, they will also begin to move toward prime spawning ground and come out of hiding. They don’t have as long of a journey so they can be quite large, but they will also need to feed to ensure enough bulk for the spawn. This is when you can time the big bite, like crayfish, leeches, mice, fry, and crustaceans—all big portion items for giants.

are simply concerned about the mission to reproduce.

This ritual can last up to three months, and the trout can spawn numerous times and on different redds as they continue to move upriver or cruise shorelines. I will not fish to spawning trout, and it is important to not stress the fish any more than they already are. You run the risk of killing the trout that are in full spawn or destroying eggs that drop out of the female, ruining future numbers of wild trout.

Yes, it is tempting to cast when you see the largest trout you have ever laid eyes on in shallow water after

THE SPAWN

When trout spawn, they are not concerned about food, they www.HCAezine.com

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a hard day of fishing, but we can all take pride in knowing we are doing our part to ensure the trout’s health and protect future populations of these magnificent creatures. The proper way to hunt for large trout at this time is to concentrate on deep turbulent water above or below the spawning ground where you know fish are not actively spawning, and drift eggs or streamers to different species of trout that are simply in the system to suck the eggs up like a vacuum.

Some of the largest trout I have seen are the ones looking for eggs during a different species’ spawn time, whether it is a giant rainbow in Alaska during the fall or a large brown in spring searching for an easy meal. Try this tip during the heart of the spawn, and you will soon learn why the tug is the drug!

POST-SPAWN

After the spawn is over, the trout that participated in the reproduction efforts are depleted of nutrition and need to gain back the body mass they have lost. Immediately after the spawning cycle, the trout can be skinny and not as exciting to pursue, but this does not last long.

Within a few weeks the fish begin packing back on the pounds and heal from any battle scars. This is when you can seriously hook some of the largest trout using every discipline—my favorite being the streamer bite.

While trophy trout can be lazy by nature, they are opportunistic and know that it is worth chasing down a big meal to put weight on fast.

Think of it like a grizzly bear packing on as much size and fat as possible before hibernating for the winter. Knowing that you are dealing with a starving predator, you want to cover a lot of water each day of the post spawn, and most importantly, you want to target ambush points in the river and still water where a giant trout could hold and not expend energy until its victim is within striking range. Two of my favorite target zones are areas like undercut banks at the tailout of a river run, and structure nestled on the edge of a drop line from shore on a lake. Try timing this bite a few weeks after the spawn for two months, and you will become a fan of the post-spawn bite.

About Landon Landon Mayer is a veteran Colorado guide and author of several books. His newest book, Guide Flies: Easy-to-Tie Patterns for Tough Trout, can be purchased on his website at www.landonmayerflyfishing.com. You can follow Landon on Instagram at @landonmayerflyfishing.

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Senior water rights, views of Chimney Rock National Monument, and first-rate fishing on the Piedra River, Devil Creek, and the property’s lakes and ponds.

With three miles of enhanced Weminuche Creek, five stocked lakes and four miles of national forest boundary, this 760± acre ranch offers world-class fishing and hunting with rustic cabins set in the Upper Piedra River basin.

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Located in the scenic Stillwater River Valley, the ranch offers 1,368± deeded acres, 65± irrigated acres, over a mile of blue ribbon trout fishing, modest improvements and gorgeous views of the Beartooth Mountains.

4,743± acres surrounded by federal lands and featuring a custom-built 600± sq. ft. cabin, three miles of a trout-filled spring creek, and huge mountain views.

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Anchored by 1,400± feet of frontage on the south bank of the Eagle River, this 37.55± deeded acre holding is a prime candidate for those seeking live water and private amenity access within close proximity to Vail and Beaver Creek.

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POWDER RIVER

Not

by Brian La Rue

ADVENTURE

t for the Faint of Heart!

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Spring 2022 • High Country Angler

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W

yoming’s Powder River is a relatively untouched watershed because of the difficulty of access— due to steep hikes and private land. One stretch, called Outlaw Canyon, was primarily the reason Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid made this their hideout back in the day! But if you’ve got an itch to fish some epic water, you’ve done your homework, and you are in pretty good shape, then try your luck this season!

“It’s a tough hike, one of the harder hikes in the West, so be prepared and in shape,” said Dan Pass at Two Rivers Inn and Thermopolis Fly Shop (https://thermopolisflyshop.com/), one of the few guide services in the area to book for this adventure. “Steep hillsides, poor trails, rocky slide outs, difficult footing and, best for last, an excruciating hike out at end of day.

“It’s a tricky place to fish, because it’s very dependent on water conditions,” added Pass. “If you get there during runoff or soon after, and the water is too high, you can't cross and you will only have a small access area between cliffs upstream and down, but if you wait too long, and the water is too low, then the fish will be spooky, and the hatches will be over. The perfect level is about 75 to 125 CFS. Anything higher is a no go for most folks. Lower flows are ok, but you better work on fly placement and a stealthy approach as fish will be skittish.

Once the river hits less than 20 CFS, leave the fish alone until next season. The water gets down to around 5 CFS at times, depending on the year. It’s definitely 18

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a high desert river with challenges of consistent water flow, but the fishery remains super resilient.”

As if flows and the strenuous hike aren’t bad enough, Pass says the canyon is home to some tough customers in the form of rattlesnakes. He suggests wearing snake gear on the trails and when moving through the scrub between spots. Waders would work, but most folks wear shorts in the summer, as it does get warm on the hike in by itself.

Ok, if this sounds like your kind of adventure and you are still reading, you will be rewarded with tons of elbow room without much, if any, competition for the day, and you’ll also enjoy catching tons of rainbows and browns. Pass says they like your standard dries and terrestrials, but some of the top patterns include caddis flies, mayflies, ants, beetles and of course, the big hatch is the golden stoneflies in June.

“The Powder is said to hold between 3,000 to 5,000 fish per mile, through this inhospitable area,” said Pass. “The trout average 14 to 16 inches and some in the 18- to 21-inch range do show on occasion. So, you know there are probably a few whoppers in there as well.

“Our team at Thermopolis Fly Shop is one of only four outfitters who can guide this section and we are also further authorized to offer an overnight guiding experience at Outlaw Canyon,” said Pass. “But book early for this special spot and let us worry about getting you onto the fish in this unique river. It’s an unbelievable location and one of the most interesting places in the West—full of history, beautiful views and incredible fishing.”

If you’re still wondering exactly where Outlaw Canyon and the Powder River is, it’s best dewww.HCAezine.com

scribed as a tributary of the Yellowstone River, flowing some 370+ miles. The river flows north, east of the Bighorn Mountains, and into Montana, where it joins the Little Powder on its way to the Yellowstone, some 50 miles down from Miles City, Montana. It got its names from some sand along its banks that resembles gun powder.

A four-wheel drive is often required for most of the access points to the canyon. I highly suggest letting someone like Dan or a guide on his team help you

Spring 2022 • High Country Angler

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access the river and get you down safely to the river’s edge. In my research for this feature and talking with Dan, it sounds like the hike from the access point down to the canyon floor will take you about an hour. If its an hour downhill, you know it will probably take close to double that coming out!

Take advantage of Dan’s unique overnight options and make that long, strenuous hike worth some extra time on the fish!

As anyone who has read High Country Angler for years, I often write about the Thermopolis area because it is still somewhat undiscovered when you consider all of these hard-to-get-to-spots like the Powder and the GreyBull (14 miles on a dirt road)—then of course you have Wind River Canyon and the Bighorn too—

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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what are you waiting for? Also try Boysen Reservoir!

Reach out to the guys at Two River’s Inn (https:// tworiversinnwy.com/) and make a week of it. And tell them Brian sent you; you’ll thank me later!

About The Author High Country Angler contributor Brian La Rue enjoys giving fly fishers ideas of where to go for an adventure. Feel free to reach out to Brian at Brian@hcamagazine. com if you want your lodge or guide service featured in an upcoming promotional marketing plan.

WESTERN MONTANA FLY FISHING GUIDE SERVICE Helena, Missoula, Bozeman, & Whitefish BOOK A TRIP TODAY! Atlasoutfitting.com 775-815-9211 Ikaikaflagg@att.net

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CLEAN A STREAM

BE A HERO

INTRODUCING THE

TROUT HERO BAG

BY MARK SHULMAN

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H

ow many times have you discovered trash left behind at your riverside, or on a hike? And often, no bag to put it in! I’d prefer not to stick a dirty beer can or greasy food wrapper in my gear pack, vest or the fleece lined pocket of my waders. Problem solved. Pescador on the Fly has partnered with Trout Unlimited and come up with the TROUT HERO bag! Light weight, easy to carry and most importantly, when full on your walk out from your favorite water, a sturdy cord loop to attach the TROUT HERO bag to wade belt, gear pack or vest. When you get home and are hosing out your waders and boots – simply wash out the empty TROUT HERO bag too!

Pescador on the fly has TROUT HERO BAGS for 5 bucks and gives a free one with their COMBO purchase.

Any angler can also get a free Trout Hero bag; just pay the shipping costs. You can find them under TROUT HERO bag at the Pescador on the Fly website. One angler or hiker, one TROUT HERO bag at a time – a small effort making a huge difference!

Pescador on the Fly are strong supporters of TROUT UNLIMITED. Please visit them at pecsadoronthefly.com.

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BUD ISAACS AND RESTORING THE COLORADO

by Jack Bombardier

O

n a Tuesday evening in February, there was a public meeting in Granby explaining the details of the new channel that will be built around Windy Gap Reservoir. This new channel will reconnect the Colorado River for the first time in over thirty-five years, and will in effect create over a mile of new river. The "connectivity channel" has been dreamt of for almost as long as the negative impacts of Windy Gap became apparent. But near the end of the evening's presentation, an unexpected piece of news was revealed that gave the night a very bittersweet twinge.

If you don't know, Windy Gap Reservoir was built on the Upper Colorado River in 1985 by Northern Water, to supply drinking water to growing communities along the Front Range. Although the dam doesn't look like a very imposing structure, it has had an outsize effect on the Colorado River. The "lake" itself that the dam creates is not large, but is very shallow which has the effect of warming the river water.

It blocks passage of bugs, fish and sediment, and was also a trigger to the outbreak of whirling disease in the 1990's that devastated the Colorado River's rainbow trout population.

For thirty years, residents of Grand County have been trying to scientifically prove the deleterious ef-

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

fects of the reservoir, and for the last twenty have advocated for a fix to the problem. That solution was to create a free-flowing stretch of river to run alongside the reservoir. This effort was led in part by Bud Isaacs. Bud was a successful oilman who bought property along the river to feed his love of fishing, only to see the river's vitality diminish in the years after Windy Gap went online. There is an excellent book about this whole story, Oil and Water written by Stephen Grace, which goes into the story in detail.

I wasn't a good friend of Bud's, but I did take him on a fishing float years ago, on my stretch of the Colorado fifty miles downstream from his. We've stayed in touch irregularly as he's on my contact list of people to whom I send my infrequent blog posts. He's often sent me a short appreciation of whatever it is I wrote about. Since getting feedback like that is the whole reason that I write in the first place, I've always liked knowing that someone was reading my missives and enjoying them.

Even though the connectivity channel, sometimes called the Windy Gap Bypass, has been talked about for years, it has only been in the last few years that it really picked up steam. As it inches closer to reality, my sense of excitement has increased. There are a lot of dams in this country that just shouldn't exist at all, or were built with short-term goals in mind that didn't take into account the longterm or collateral effects they've caused. www.HCAezine.com

This might be effects like blocking salmon migrations, or evaporating precious water by being built in the desert, or just by drowning healthy ecosystems. The problem is that dams are big, expensive projects, and once in place they are very difficult to get rid of. That is what make the Windy Gap Bypass so unique: the river is being restored but the dam and its functionality will remain, albeit it in an altered form. It will be a win/win scenario that should ultimately satisfy everyone, a very rare outcome in our contentious world.

The February public meeting was set to be the public debut of the Windy Gap Connectivity Channel. After years of planning and rumors, the actual design was unveiled along with the timeline for getting it done. I re-

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ceived notices from the Colorado River Headwaters shake the hands of those that were responsible, and Chapter of TU with the meeting details, and planned especially Bud. on driving up to Grand County to attend. Then I got Then a gentlemen named Tony Kay, who was inanother email, this one from Bud Isaacs, letting me volved with this crazy idea from the beginning, got know about the public meeting. He was hoping that up to say that Bud had also called him asking him to I might go and lend another voice of support to the attend. He said that he was on his way over Berthoud project. I told him that I was going, work and weather Pass when he had heard that Bud Isaacs had passed permitting, and that I was looking forward to seeing away earlier that day of a heart attack. This was the him. In the email I got from him the day before the public meeting, he wrote, "Thanks, it has been a Helping You Keep Your long battle. Write a short positive Eyes on the Big Ones response to the address on the notice, we need all the help we can get, you are the river, so it should Full Service mean a lot from you. Thanks, Bud".

Fly Fishing Pro Shop The day of the meeting, a snow & Guide Service storm blew in, and the thought of Schedule a making the drive to Grand County Trip Today! suddenly wasn't very appealing.

970-944-2526 So instead I did the Zoom thing Lake City, Colorado and attended the meeting virtually, which was better than not going, The Sportsman Outdoors & Fly Shop www.lakecitysportsman.com 970-944-2526 and definitely better than digging my truck out of snowbank.

The meeting began right on time, and the presenter's Power Point had lots of great details, including maps and a very long list of the expected long-term benefits of the soon-to-be free flowing river. The connectivity channel itself was not a mere pathway for the river, but looked like it would have meanders, riffles and pools, as well as a presumably healthy population of insects and fish.

With a little imagination, one could visualize standing in the middle of it, flyrod in hand. At the end, there was an opportunity for people to ask questions and comment on it. I chipped in my two cents, congratulating everyone involved for being able to put together such a unique and ambitious project. I only wished that I could be there in person, and to 26

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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"May simple joys in wild places enrich your life" - BUD'S INSCRIPTION IN MY COPY OF OIL AND WATER most shocking thing I'd ever heard over a Zoom meeting, or in any other venue. The man who was the most steadfast, long-standing and effective advocate for this project to restore the Upper Colorado River was no longer with us, or able to bask in the glory of a job very well done. Bud should have been there to receive well-deserved handshakes and pats on the back, but was instead gone. It was like Moses leading his people to the promised land, but not getting to enjoy the fruits of that freedom, himself.

Someday soon, the river will live again. The longterm benefits of that will long outlive me and anyone else who is reading these words. But it seems a cruel twist of fate that the man most responsible for that

happening will not get to wet a line himself in the river he helped create. It underscores the small amount of time we get to be on this planet, and how hard it is to leave it in better condition than we found it. It's too late to thank Bud for his efforts, but not too late to thank those who continue carrying the baton forward. So to anyone who played a role in this project, whether it be the planning of it or its upcoming implementation, thank you! And remember to tip your hat to Bud next year if you find yourself in the middle of the river he helped create.

About The Author Jack Bombardier is the owner of Confluence Casting and guides on the “lower Upper” Colorado River above Dotsero. He also serves on the Upper Colorado Wild & Scenic Management team, charged with collaborating to protect the river’s outstanding values.

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A GUIDE’S LIFE

•

BY HAYDEN MELLSOP

The Tapestry of Time

I

cut a generous chunk of summer sausage from the log, sliced it in two again, and handed him one of the pieces. My fingertips, pinched from the cold and slick with grease from the sausage, struggled to find purchase on the wrapper of a cheese stick, so I took the knife and, mindful of the potential outcome involving sharp knives and clumsiness, carefully slit a hole in the wrapper, extracted the cheese, and began to devour a late river-side lunch.

Rain fell steadily from a heavy sky, the tops of the canyon walls shrouded in mist, the north- facing slopes a striated mosaic of rock, pine, and snow. I shivered several times as I ate the sausage, a second cheese stick, a protein bar, and the last of a travel mug of hot chocolate.

“I’m surprised it’s taken this long for the rain to turn to snow,” I remarked, noticing the raindrops now making a heavier, slushier sound 28

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

as they settled on the raft. The downpour had started not long after we’d launched from the foot of the dam upstream, several hours past.

Light at first, for the last couple of hours it had increased in volume and intensity.

He nodded, continuing to stare out across the water toward the far bank. “I wish I knew what the heck the fish were eating.”

Earlier that morning in the fly shop, the guy behind the counter had enthused at the day’s potential, the overcast sky a portent of a great day’s fishing, sentiments we’d agreed with at the time. “The streamer fishing should be great, and look out for blue wings and midges coming off later in the day.”

Now we stood wet and bedraggled midafternoon along a saturated riverbank, proof if ever it was needed that, despite all the collective angling wisdom in the world, the angler is only www.HCAezine.com

ever half of the equation. My friend had brought downstream. The snow began to fall heavier. On a a brown and a cutthroat to the boat, while I was river renowned for its crowds of anglers, this day yet to feel the rush of my line tightening to a fish. we had it to ourselves.

Remembering another jacket buried at the Despite, or perhaps because of, my creeping bottom of my dry bag, I gratefully added the extra infirmity, I felt a deep gratitude for that moment, layer. This plus the fresh fuel in my belly began to for being on that river, surrounded by so much work its magic, shivers lessening and feeling re- beauty, in such company. Another thread, woven turning to my fingers and toes. into the tapestry of friendship and life, another “You fish for a bit,” I said. “I’ll take the oars.” tale to recount when perhaps the recounting of “Thanks,” he replied, mock sarcasm in his tales will be all we have left. Until then, I’ll keep tone. “Any ideas on what to throw?” crawling, shivering, scrambling, and tripping— “After watching me for the last hour, you’re whatever it takes. asking me? Unless you’ve got a kitchen sink on you, I can’t About The Author think of anything else.”

He stood and prepared to Hayden Mellsop is an expat New Zealander living in the step into the raft, a distance of mountain town of Salida, Colorado, on the banks of the three feet from bank across to boat, both slick with precipiArkansas River. As well as being a semi-retired fly fishing tation. He hesitated, changguide, he juggles helping his wife raise two teenage ing angles of approach before daughters, along with a career in real estate. placing a hand on my shoulder to steady his passage across, laughing as he went.

“A younger me would have Hayden Mellsop just stepped across that withFly fishing guide. Real Estate guide. out thinking. Now look at me.

I’m getting old.”

As I too clambered clumsily into the raft, I thought of our younger selves, of how we’d have stepped across easily, of the twenty-five years we’d been running rivers together. How many rivers, how many miles, how many fish, how much laughter over those times? Certainly, we were younger back then, Recreation, residential, retirement, investment. sleeker and more agile. Cer5IF EJõFSFODF CFUXFFO MPPLJOH GPS ZPVS TQFDJBM QMBDF BOE mOEJOH JU tainly too, we’d spent days on rivers colder and wetter than 1JOPO 3FBM &TUBUF (SPVQ 4BMJEB this.

0öDF ] $FMM XXX )PNF 8BUFST DPN I pointed the stern towards INFMMTPQ!QJOPOSFBMFTUBUF DPN the far bank and pulled on the oars, feeling them dig deep into the current, then pivoted www.HCAezine.com

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WET MEADOWS AN INTERVIEW WITH CHERYL CWELICH

BY NANCY JOHNSTON BRAMLETT

F

ascinated by the forward-thinking approaches of the Upper Gunnison River Watershed Conservation District (UGRWCD), I asked Cheryl Cwelich (UGRWCD Watershed Program Coordinator) to answer some questions about their focus on wet meadows and the important role they play in

improving natural water storage capacity. The upper Gunnison watershed, like much of the arid southwest, has a riparian zone that is a small fraction of the landscape, and therefore is over-pressured by wildlife and agricultural use. By improving the function of wet meadows and floodplains, water and soil is captured and slowly released after runoff events, which sustains base flows and maintains higher water tables year-round. And continued base flows equals better fish habitat.

Q: Tell us about yourself (background/ education) and your role with the UGRWCD. While I was working as a seasonal park ranger along the Arkansas River, I was introduced to water resource management as the park was re-evaluating its 20-year management plan. The Arkansas River encompasses a host of uses, including recreation, fisheries, irrigation, domestic use, transmountain diversions and is also impacted by “buy -and -dry" transactions.

I was hooked. My fascination with water led me to go back to school at Western Colorado University and graduate Summa Cum Laude in 2019 with a degree in Environment & Sustainability with an emphasis in

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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Water Policy and Resilience, and a minor in Recreation & Outdoor Education. It’s a mouthful!

Before this position, I worked for several years in the conservation world on land stewardship, a river recreational use study and improving operational processes. It is a great pleasure to now be working with the UGRWCD as their Watershed Program Coordinator. My job is primarily focused on leading the wet meadow and riparian area restoration effort in the Gunnison Basin in collaboration with a diverse array of project partners, including the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), United States Forest Service (USFS), Colorado Parks & Wildlife (CPW), United States Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) and many others.

Q: What is a “wet meadow” and why is it important?

Wet meadows and riparian areas serve as natural sponges to hold water in the soil, slowly releasing it after runoff events, ensuring continued base flows and maintenance of water tables throughout the growing season. Holding water in these systems later into the summer and autumn and during droughts benefits plants, wildlife, and ranchers. Wet meadows also help to regulate flashflood runoff events and improve base flows and water quality.

Many riparian areas and wet meadows in the Gunnison Basin have been degraded by erosion and past land uses, resulting in incised gullies and lowered water tables. Intense episodic droughts (such as in 2002 and 2018) have exacerbated these problems. As our temperatures continue to rise, droughts and intense runoff events that increase erosion are likely to become more frequent. Wet meadows and riparian areas increase the resilience of the ecosystem to drought by slowing down and spreading out water, which causes sediment to drop, and the water table to come up, thereby reconnecting the floodplain.

Q: What role do wet meadows play specifically in the upper Gunnison watershed?

nison Basin, yet provide critically important habitat for many species. These mesic areas, in an otherwise semi-arid climate, are vital to the life cycle of the federally threatened Gunnison sage-grouse, providing important brood-rearing habitat for the grouse to raise their young chicks. These meadows also provide important food and cover for insects, pollinators, neo-tropical migratory birds, mule deer, elk, and forage for domestic livestock.

Q: How do you establish wet meadows, what treatments are you using?

We utilize low-tech and process-based treatments that with minimal training, can be installed by anyone! This includes the wet meadows restoration workhorse—the “One-Rock Dam”—made up of many rocks, but is only one rock (about one foot) high.

This simple structure helps to slow water down in an overly incised channel to reduce erosion and drop its sediment load while also providing water a way to continue to flow through and over the rocks through the system. Other structures that we utilized to treat a head cut that is advancing up a drainage include a “Rock Rundowns” and “Zuni Bowls.” “Media Lunas” were installed to help to spread gullied water out in areas that were historically a wet meadow area.

Q: How do you feel about beavers? Pros and cons?

Beavers are amazing… in the right place. At their best, beavers provide a host of ecosystem services, including regulating stream flow and improving water quality. Due to their drive to stop the sound of rushing water, beavers can also block irrigation infrastructure and cause water to back up and potentially blow out a ditch. We are thoughtful about selecting project locations, and we work hard to ensure that we are communicating with any surrounding private landowners in the vicinity of our projects.

Q: What projects are underway and planned?

This upcoming 2022 field season, our partners in Wet meadows and riparian areas occupy a small the BLM, CPW, USFS, USFWS and NRCS have about proportion of the sagebrush ecosystem in the Gun- twenty projects scheduled in the Gunnison Basin. www.HCAezine.com

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Q: Do you have any recommendations for other watersheds based on your experience?

Know the players - collaboration and partner engagement are key to ensuring optimal response when working at the watershedscale across land ownership and management boundaries. Building trust and establishing credibility with local landowners is essential.

Find the best. Restoration treatments need expert planning and design to ensure effective response. Restoration experts are needed to train and oversee field crews and volunteers in building structures.

Plan ahead. Wetland delineation, permits, agency requirements and landowner agreements should be completed well in advance of work. Consult with the US Fish and Wildlife Service early about threatened or endangered species—our projects are within critical habitat of the Gunnison sage-grouse.

Keep learning. Sharing best practices through trainings with managers and landowners are critical for success and building local capacity.

Stick with it! Projects require repeat visits to treated stream reaches to monitor effectiveness, determine needs for modification, and maintain structures to ensure long-term success.

Be strategic. Conducting a climate-informed analysis can identify streams that would benefit from these restoration techniques and can serve as a starting point for field evaluation and prioritization.

Be patient. At least five years of vegetation monitoring are needed to document trends in response. Coupling vegetation cover data with repeat photos is a powerful tool to validate success.

About The Author Nancy Johnston Bramlett is Colorado TU’s Conservation Projects Coordinator.

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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Fly Selection Tips

PHT O O BY MARK JESOP

for the

Opportunistic Trout 34

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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rout aren’t so different from people in that if given the opportunity they are more than happy to lazily hang around and feed their faces! In the world of trout, the name of the game is eating more calories than they are burning, and with their menu consisting primarily of tiny midge larva and scrawny mayfly nymphs, when the opportunity arises for a trout to belly up to the bug buffet or grab an extra juicy invertebrate, they will eagerly take a bite at it! What I’m describing here is one of the core principles that drives trout feeding behavior, and that is trout are opportunistic feeders. Opportunistic feeding is defined as when trout are presented with the opportunity to easily acquire a high calorie morsel of food or get a lot of food, the green lights go off in their little fishy brains and they jump at the chance before the opportunity passes them by.

Understanding this primal motivation presents the fly fisher with three distinct opportunities to take advantage with some next level fly pattern selection, that in turn will mean more and bigger fish in their nets!

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Match to the Most Abundant Food – Meet the Trout at the Buffet

If you go to a BBQ and there are fifty hotdogs sizzling away on the grill, per BBQ etiquette, as long as the grill is packed with hotdogs you are welcome to come back for seconds, thirds, and even a fourth serving if you can stuff it in!

Trout are savvy investors and, in the energy de-

Spring 2022 • High Country Angler

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manding environment of the river, trout will actively track and target where the most abundant food source that offers the greatest concentration of calories. If you use a seine to sample the invertebrates in the water you can very quickly determine which hatch and patterns are the day’s equivalent of hotdogs at the BBQ. When you pull your seine out of the water and it is loaded with mayfly nymphs and only the random caddis larva or stonefly nymph, tie on 2-3 mayfly nymph pattern to join the trout where they are undoubtedly doing most of their feeding. If adult caddisflies are swarming the river in plague-like clouds, don’t just stop at one elk hair caddis, but tie on three and meet the trout as they gorge themselves at the bug buffet!

Tie on an Attractor Pattern – Stand Out from the Herd

floss, or a shiny metal beadhead and wire wrap, we are essentially giving our fly “a limp” separating it from the herd of healthy invertebrates and the trout can’t help themselves but to hone in and go for the easy bite!

Fish Oversized Flies – Like a Twinkie for Trout

After countless days of only tiny bugs on the menu, when a grasshopper or stonefly the size of

a T-bone steak splashes down, the trout will often race each other for the first bite! The trout’s attraction to BIG BUGS extends beyond the season, region, and elevation, often ignoring where these big bugs actually live. Whether it is a size 10 dry stonefly hitting a high mountain lake, or a mop fly swinging through the depths of a sleepy tailwater, trout are tempted to their core to cash in on these calorie-rich offerings before another fish does.

So, the next time you go to the water, take adThe opportunistic trout isn’t only interested vantage of the opportunistic feeding behavior of in the most abundant food, but like other alpha trout and appeal to their greed for easy calories! predators such as the wolf or lion, their attention Do this first by matching to the most abundant and aggression are inevitably drawn to prey they foods, second by fishing an attractor fly to imitate perceive as vulnerable and therefore an easy meal. an easy meal, and finally by offering a BIG BUG If we were to watch a pack of wolves stalk a herd of that might just prove too tempting for the fish to elk, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that let drift by. elk are on the menu, but my question to you is which elk will the wolves take down? As we watch About The Author the hunt unfold if one elk is seen limping outside of the herd, the wolves won’t hesitate to pounce, Peter Stitcher is an Aquatic Biologist and and they should be able to take down the wounded owner of Ascent Fly Fishing. Originator animal with significantly less effort than targeting of the Biologist Crafted Fly Selection, a healthy, fully mobile one. Trout are no different Peter and his team build their clients’ than these wolves and are always on the look out fly selections specific to the bugs in the for an outlier that appears wounded, vulnerable, waters they fish, when they fish them. or separated from the “herd” of the current hatch.

You can contact Peter or restock your fly By choosing an attractor fly pattern tied with a box at: www.ascentflyfishing.com. little extra flash, some brightly colored thread or

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GOOD NEWS AT L FOR GOOD SAMS

by Ty Churchwell

W

ho could forget the pictures of an orange Animas River running through Durango in August of 2015? After all, the images were extremely powerful and spread across the globe on social media and news outlets within hours of the accidental Gold King mine spill in the Animas River headwaters near Silverton. Today, the residents of Durango and Silverton are focused on the future health of the Animas, not on the spill. A year following the spill, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 38

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

(EPA) officially listed 48 mine sites near Silverton as America’s newest Superfund site. This is our course now, and we are well on our way to remediating the impacts of historic mining in the Animas River for the benefit of future generations of trout anglers.

In the Animas River watershed, orange water had silver linings. One of those benefits of the spill was the Superfund listing in September of 2016. This federal tool is the only tool available today to address a draining, abandoned mine. Under the Superfund law www.HCAezine.com

LAST S?

(the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act or CERCLA), only the EPA can treat mine water emanating from an abandoned mine. In the simplest of terms, the Superfund law shields the EPA from liability under the Clean Water Act. Additionally, the Congressionally appropriated federal money in the ‘fund’ is the source of dollars for such water treatment and other remediation activities at a Superfund site.

Superfund is not without its shortcomings, however. As an example, there are over 1300 Superfund sites in the nation, only a few of which are mine sites. Too, the ‘fund’ only has money in it when Congress says so during the budgeting and appropriations process each year. And no matter how much money is placed in the ‘fund’ for EPA projects, it’s never enough. This equates to an underfunded program insufficient to truly tackle the nation’s pollution problems, mining or otherwise. Additionally, and maybe most importantly, Superfund is only well-suited for the most egregious of polluting mines where human health risks are significant. Of the tens, if not hundreds of thousands of abandoned draining mines in America, only a small portion would ever qualify to be a Superfund site deserving of special lewww.HCAezine.com

gal attention and congressional funding.

The other silver lining to the spill was the attention draining hardrock mines received in the months following the spill. For many Americans, and especially members of Congress, the Gold King spill was the first they’d heard of abandoned mines and mining-impacted water quality. Few knew that roughly 40 percent of headwater streams in the west are heavily impacted by acidity and heavy metals, and that over 110,000 miles of America’s rivers are listed as impaired for heavy metals or acidity, and abandoned mines are a major source of these impairments.

These figures were not new to many, however— most notably Trout Unlimited. For decades, TU and other environmental and river advocates have been strongly urging Congress to do something about it.

Better funding for the Super ‘fund’ is one way to help, but money doesn’t fix everything. Liability issues under the Clean Water Act are actually as much of a concern as the funding piece. Again, it is only under a Superfund action that the EPA – and no one else – can treat mine water from a discharging, abandoned mine. Far too many of America’s draining, abandoned mines do not qualify as a Superfund site, leaving no legal mechanism by which anyone – including EPA – can clean up one of these sites.

I like to call these sites the “little bleeders.” By “little”, we are often referring to mine sites with small discharges of water less than, say, ten gallons per minute (GPM). To put this into perspective, the Gold King mine discharges about 400-600 GPM, and by itself is a major contributor to poor water quality in the Animas River. But a site discharging only 5-10 GPM by itself would not likely ever qualify as a Superfund site. So, if EPA can’t fix them, and no one else can either, then these sites will bleed toxic mine water into streams year after year, decade after decade, cumulatively degrading water quality until something is done to resolve the legal liability under the Clean Water Act. It would be one thing if the miners at these legacy sites were not dead and gone decades ago. The Clean Water Act would hold them responsible. However, at these abandoned sites there is no one to hold accountable, and EPA can’t legally fix these sites without a Superfund listing. It’s one of our nation’s most pressing clean water conundrums.

Enter a guy named Sam. Good Sam, to be clear.

Actually, it’s Good Samaritan. Typically, we know Spring 2022 • High Country Angler

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this term to mean someone who steps up to perform an act of kindness unselfishly for another. In the case of draining, abandoned mines, we use this term to speak of a non-responsible third party – who did not create the pollution in the first place and has no connection to the site in any way – who wishes to clean up one of these mines, but can’t without facing immense legal liability.

Unfortunately, the Clean Water Act (CWA) prevents such a cleanup, even though the law is wellintended and arguably the most important environmental legislation ever passed in this country. Like Superfund, the law is not without its shortcomings.

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Although the CWA is meant to make America’s rivers and waterways fishable and swimmable, in the case of abandoned mines, it discourages cleanups. Under the CWA, the law views potential Good Samaritans as if they are the polluters themselves. No distinction is made between the miner who is long-gone and the potential Good Sam who wants to clean up someone else’s mess.

The legal rub is this: The CWA requires polluters to obtain a discharge permit and actively treat their pollution source to darn near purity before discharging their wastewater back into a river for downstream users. The industry must maintain this discharge permit and clean their wastewater so long as the industry creates a waste stream of water. This is all well and good, until there is no one to hold accountable and no one to correct the pollution. Such is the case at an abandoned mine.

Unlike a factory which would cease to create waste if the factory halted industrial production, a draining mine will likely drain pollutants forever.

The scope of the problem of abandoned mines requires an allhands-on-deck approach. Wellqualified groups, such as Trout Unlimited or the Colorado Division of Reclamation, Mining & Safety, would like to perform cleanups at abandoned mines, but are dissuaded from doing so for the liability reasons noted earlier. For one, groups like these are not well-suited to hold discharge permits in perpetuity, unlike a municipality that runs a wastewater treatment facility for sewer water. One can assume a city will be here a hundred years from now – but Good Sams aren’t well-suited to take that kind of perpetual responsibility. Two, using a passive treatment system of settling ponds and/or engineered wetlands will enhance water quality but will never meet the high www.HCAezine.com

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water quality standards of near purity set forth in the CWA. This leaves the Good Samaritan in violation of the CWA and therefore open to fines by the EPA and lawsuits by downstream water users or citizens— even though the Good Sam has made improvements in water quality. Under current law, it’s all or nothing – clean a site up all the way to standards, in perpetuity – or be liable for the pollutants that remain after the cleanup. Proponents of Good Sam argue any improvement in water quality, over any period of time, is better than none at all. Good Sam seeks to provide some liability relief without harming the overall in-

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

tent of the CWA. Good Sam is intended to fill the void that the Superfund law doesn’t get. Good Sam would improve water quality for trout fisheries in the west, would support healthy communities and put people to work in a restoration economy. Good Sam is good for water.

After years of negotiations and discussions, the “Good Samaritan Remediation of Abandoned Hardrock Mines Act of 2022” was introduced in the Senate in early February. This vital, bipartisan legislation is being championed by Senators Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and Jim Risch (R-ID), with bipartisan

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co-sponsorship from other key western Senators including Colorado’s Michael Bennet.

If enacted, the bill would authorize a pilot program of 15 projects at low-risk sites to be performed within seven years of enactment by well-qualified entities, such as TU. The idea is to use a pilot approach to prove-up the concept and identify any shortcomings in the permitting process, then pass broader authorization down the road.

Getting a bill introduced in Congress is a major milestone by itself. Getting a bill to the President for a signature is quite another. But we at TU are deter-

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mined to find a solution to the vast problem of acid mine drainage from abandoned mines, and Good Sam is that fix. What we stand to gain are healthier, more productive trout fisheries west wide, and we will stick to it until this vision is realized.

About The Author Ty Churchwell is the Mining Coordinator for TU’s Angler Conservation Program, based out of Durango.

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FIT TO BE TIED

•

BY JOEL EVANS

What if there were only one?

W

IMPVED OR BEAD HEAD LECH HOK

: 6 STREAMER, 3X LONG, ALSO 10 - 2 THREAD : BLACK 6/0 FINISH THREAD : RED 6/0 TAIL : BLACK RABBIT HAIR, 1/8” STRIP T VERO AIL : BLACK MARIBOU BOY D : BLACK RABBIT HAIR, FIBERS TINSEL : FLASH, PEARL AND RED MIX BEAD : 3/16 GOLD TUNGSTEN WEIGHT : LEAD 0.020

hat if there were only one?

It’s a rhetorical question in the sense that is unanswerable. One fly pattern? What fish species, what PLAY VIDEO water, what season, what color, what size, what-whatwhat? To narrow and parvariety of ways, the leech can be presented to the fish tially answer those “whats,” I am thinking of trout in an with a great deal of eye appeal. Common moving and American lower 48 classic river or lake setting. Certain- still water presentations include upstream drifting and ly the answer—pretending that there is one answer—is downstream stripping, without weight for shallow tumhighly subjective and opinionated. Okay. bles, with weight for deep dives, forward weighed flies But for one fly that could cover multiple situa- for erratic motion, swinging, sinking and rising, and tions, a leech pattern stands the test of time. It can be every way you can twitch it to trigger the bite from the fished in small water to big water, shallow or deep, a sight sense. river current or a still water lake, summer or winter – in What if there were only one pattern? Well, there summary, year-round from high to low and top to bot- isn’t. But if there were, this would indeed catch a bunch tom. of fish, big ones I might add.

Brent Curtice knows something about this. Author of Fly Fishing for Trophy Trout, Save 10% - Use Promo Code HCA1703 Brent has chased and landed large Offer Expires 6/30/2022 trout in more places than I have even been to. Experience leads to expertise, which leads to assessing each unique water situation at hand as to best choice of equipment, approach, technique, and fly selection.

Fly selection isn’t the most important of these factors. Maybe unless we are talking about a specific match-the-hatch challenge.

Otherwise, the leech can cover a lot of scenarios when you arrive at the water. A good choice to begin with, and maybe the only choice needed.

Brent notes the several senses that trigger trout feeding behavior – sight, smell, sound, and taste. Of these, Brent says that sight is the most commonly used sense. Enter the Improved Bead Head Leech. Fished in a 44

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

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THE LAST CAST

•

DAVID NICKUM

Celebrating National Parks on Yellowstone’s 150th Birthday

"N

ational parks are the best idea we ever had,” according to Pulitzer Prize winner Wallace Stegner, the dean of western writers. “Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst.”

The national park idea was born 150 years ago this month. On March 1, 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed into law S.392, establishing Yellowstone as the first “national park.”

Yellowstone is a treasured place to many, and for me personally it has special significance as the place where I first landed a trout on a fly – a Yellowstone cutthroat from the Yellowstone River in 1994.

On the Park’s auspicious anniversary, we would do well to raise a glass and toast Montana’s Judge Cornelius Hedges. His name will be unfamiliar to most, but he may be the pioneer behind the national park idea, the reason Yellowstone – and the 62 other U.S. National Parks that have followed it – were preserved for our and future generations.

According to Nathaniel Langford’s The Discovery of Yellowstone Park – Journal of the Washburn Expedition to the Yellowstone and Firehole Rivers in the Year 1870, the Washburn party was camped by the junction of the Firehole and Gibbon Rivers (today’s Madison Junction) after having seen the Canyon, Yellowstone Lake and the Upper Geyser Basin. The group started discussing what might be done with the remarkable lands they had explored. Langford wrote: The proposition was made by some member that we utilize the result of

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High Country Angler • Spring 2022

our exploration by taking up quarter sections of land at the most prominent points of interest, and a general discussion followed. One member of our party suggested that if there could be secured by pre-emption a good title to two or three quarter sections of land opposite the lower fall of the Yellowstone and extending down the river along the cañon, they would eventually become a source of great profit to the owners. Another member of the party thought that it would be more desirable to take up a quarter section of land at the Upper Geyser Basin, for the reason that that locality could be more easily reached by tourists and pleasure seekers. A third suggestion was that each member of the party pre-empt a claim, and in order that no one should have an advantage over the others, the whole should be thrown into a common pool for the benefit of the entire party.

Mr. Hedges then said that he did not approve of any of these plans – that there ought to be no private ownership of any portion of that region, but that the whole of it ought to be set apart as a great National Park, and that each one of us ought to make an effort to have this accomplished. His suggestion met with an instantaneous and favorable response…

This story was commemorated by the naming of the mountain overlooking the campsite at Madison Junction as “National Park Mountain.”

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of the Gunnison National Park is home to a world-renowned Gold Medal population of wild rainbows.

Beyond our state’s borders, National Parks have protected fisheries from the brook trout of the Great Smoky Mountains to the salmon runs of Alaska’s Katmai National Park.

The national park idea has only grown in importance and impact in the 150 years since Hedges sat with his fellow explorers at a streamside campsite and suggested that the areas they had explored should be forever protected for the public benefit. So the next time you find yourself fishing at Yellowstone – perhaps even on the Madison River or lower Firehole, looking up at National Park Mountain – take a moment to reflect on Judge Hedges, and to thank him for the vision and public-mindedness that led him to propose preserving In the years since 1872, the national park Yellowstone as a National Park. And let’s work idea has expanded to other treasured loca- together to continue that legacy by conserving, tions in the U.S. and across the world. Here in protecting, and restoring the trout and waterColorado, we have four National Parks and for sheds of our parks, so that we can pass them on anglers they have special significance. Rocky to future generations.

Mountain National Park and the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve will provide future habitat for vibout The Author tal strongholds of native trout (Greenback and David Nickum is the Executive Director of Colorado Rio Grande cutthroats, Trout Unlimited and is filling in for the “Old Professor” respectively, are being rein this issue’s Last Cast. stored in the two parks), while the Black Canyon

A

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WHEN: June 12-18, 2022 WHERE: AEI Base Camp - Taylor Park, CO COLORADO TROUT UNLIMITED'S

River Conservation & Fly Fishing Youth Camp

WHO: Youth 14-18 years COST: Registration fee - $50 (due with registration forms), Tuition - $600, Scholarships available

Learn more & apply today: coloradotu.org/youthcamp 48

Application Deadline: April 10, 2022

High Country Angler • Spring 2022

www.HCAezine.com