SCOF 56 - SUMMER 2025 - GOOD BOY

ep. one: Uneasy Listening the lads recap the 49th issue and try not to throw up ep. two: SSO Debrief the lads siddown with Jeff Wright and Ryan Stephens to talk about another successful southern striper open. ep. three: SCOF 50 Recap the lads recap the 50th issue and talk permit fishing with Declan "Gecko" Rogers ep. four: films and shine the lads drink high octane moonshine and discuss the state of the fly fishing film industry ep. five: The Buzz Fades the lads recap the Emergence Convergence with a South Carolina reservoir biologist

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ep. six: Helene and 3 Cats the lads talk about Hurricane Helene with the Headwaters Outfitters crew, and what it could mean for business, and the fisheries. ep. seven: Forks of the River the lads attend a festival designed to help the shops and guides that were hit the hardest by Helene. ep. eight: the Sherpa and a Warehouse of Coyotes the lads waterboard Todd Gregory, founder and owner of Towee Boats. Between gasps for air, he talks about his much anticipated model "The Sherpa". ep. nine: Family, Plastic, and one Badass Drifter the lads get a tour of the new welded plastic drift boats from Blue Ridge Boatworks

CAST

new episodes whenever we feel like it S.C.O.F MAGAZINE

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T h e evo l u t i o n o f a f l y an g l er c or resp on d s d i re ct l y to t h e p ac e a t w h i c h t h e y f i s h . E v e n t u a l l y, t h e u r g e s t o s i m p l y c a t c h a f i s h , catch a l o t o f f i sh , an d catch a b i g f i sh g i ve way to a ng l i ng intenti o n — t h e d e s i r e t o f i s h o n o n e ’s o w n t e r m s.

H o w w e wa n t to f i s h i s a cl ear l y -d ef i n e d ap p roach years i n t h e m a k i n g , a sy n t h es i s of p erson al exp er i en c e an d p referen c es mixed with the tutelage of traditions, peers, and mentors.

C a st s a re l ess f re q u en t , b u t m ore m ean i n g f u l — we se e, h ear, an d — most importantly — feel more.

Pa c e i s m i n i m i ze d b u t awaren ess i s m axi m i ze d , an d ob ser vat i on becomes paramount. We spend days, sometimes weeks, in wai ti n g f o r t h e h a t c h , a n t i c i p a t i o n s t e a d i l y b u i l d i n g . F i n a l l y, w h e n p a t i e n c e h a s b e en a d e q u atel y an d t h orou g h l y teste d , a m ay f l y em erg es . On e ca st i s a l l i t t akes b u t t h at m ay al so b e al l we g et .

Ou r f i s h i n g i s i n s p i re d by t i m e an d p l ac e, an d t h e p l ac es t h at i n s p i re u s tel l u s to t a ke as m u ch t i m e as we can , to sl ow d o w n .

In doing so, we find there is always more to be observed, l ea r n e d , a n d fel t . I n cl u di n g t h at on e, sp e ci f i c f i sh .

Presenting

CL ASSIC

Fis h Slow, Fe e l More

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Ava i l a b l e at Yo ur L o cal F ly S ho p

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letter from an editor by cola

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haiku / dispatches

by hank / scof group chat

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Bassapalooza 2025 Featuring Slayer by cola

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Going in Blind: A French Polynesian Gamble

photos and words by Kirk Marks

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Forty Miles at Night by cola

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photos by cohutta gang

Catfish Blues – a reverence for summer suffering

by C.H. Daniels

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Tarpon on the Line - Tortilla in my Pocket

by Gecko

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Chased by Everything

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by Gavin Griffin

The Most Imperfect Streamside Dog

Chases the American Dream by cola

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SWEET LIL ROD a new rod review column

by scott stevenson

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NEW SHOP WHO DIS interview by by JD Miller

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WESLEY'S BUOY TRAP photo essay by Wes Frazer

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Are the Trout Watching, Too?

by Frank Draper illo by Hank

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Vicarious Fly Fishing

by JD Miller

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BENCH PRESS - The Ass Kicker

by Nick Williams

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THE BACK PAGE by scott stevenson

illustrated by hank

photo by Alan Broyhill

s.c.o.f SUMMER 2025

issue no. 56 Good Boy

Managing editor

John Agricola

Editor at large

Michael Steinberg

Creative Director & Design Chief

Hank

Director of Advertising

Samuel Bailey

Merchandiser

Scott Stevenson Media Director

Alan Broyhill

contributors: Kirky Marks CH Daniels Gavin Griffin Declan "Gecko" Rogers JD Miller Nick Williams Wes Frazer Frank Draper Managing editor emeritus: David Grossman Creative Director emeritus: Steven Seinberg copy editor: Lindsey Grossman ombudsman: Shad Maclean general inquiries: southerncultureonthefly@gmail.com advertising information: sam@southerncultureonthefly.com cover image: Good Boy's Fly Shop, Hank and Edward Hopper back cover image: SHI TZUH, scott stevenson

photo by Alan Broyhill

CLEARLY

INNOVATIVE.

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Introducing Magnitude Clear Trout floating line. A specialty line for the moments when you need to be stealthy and precise.

Go ahead, shorten your leader, throw the perfect cast and know you’ve got the right line to reel in that elusive trout.

Duracoat Specialized dual-polymer design optimizes line stiffness, slickness, and abrasion resistance while significantly reducing line memory and tangles.

EST + EST+ - proprietary slickness additive that provides unmatched durability, smoother shooting, and eco-friendly performance.

Clear Floating Technology Clear Floating Technology uses naturally buoyant polymers for the ultimate in stealthy presentation and best-in-class durability.

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Forgotten Coast Fly Co. Tarpon Retreat - Shot by Wes Frazer p. 102

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A letter from Cola, the managing editor

Dear Readers, Welcome back to another break from the grind of a world that keeps trying to convince us politicians and billionaires are steering our happiness. Around here, we know better: bass, trout, tarpon, and a cold beer on a tailgate still do the trick. And if the suits really are pulling the strings, well—then it’s already too late, and we might as well doom-fish. Healthier than doom-scrolling, anyway.

Issue 56 is stuffed with lore and fishing ephemera, wrapped up by Hank in a format fit for the Sistine Chapel ceiling. The Vatican passed, so you get it digitally—graffiti gospel for your browser window.

Inside, Gecko’s tarpon tale will leave you gut-punched, like you fought the fish yourself. Wes Frazer’s photos wander from bar to bench to bow. Rodents make appearances, too—this time as flies, skated across moonlit seams for butter browns that hit like vampires in the night. And because we’re sentimental degenerates, we even found room for a few tributes to the streamside pets that love us more than we deserve.

As summer fades, we brace for hurricane season and fishing that dries up faster than duck hunting in Alabama. But SCOF has never been about conditions—it’s about community. We’re the graffiti on Southern water towers: messy, defiant, impossible to ignore.

So hit follow, subscribe, and keep reading. It’s the best damn free content in the South—and you know your boss isn’t paying you to work anyway. See y’all this fall with more stories, more photos, and probably more trouble than we planned.

Best, Cola

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Haiku by hank

Row your boat Merrily (BARELY) Shoal cut blades slice through the seam Life is but a dream.

dispatches

A Flawlessly fuNCtional, all-

-around performance FLY ROD

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Bassapalooza 2025: Featuring Slayer!

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By Cola layer didn’t actually reunite for Bassapalooza 2025. But you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise once the thunder started rolling and the mullets started flying. Sometimes however, after screw-facing your way into jaw-grinding euphoria, you realize something glorious: you’re smack in the middle of a culture clash. And as a destitute flâneur of the Southern experience, I’d be remiss if I didn’t point to it with a lilt of joy in my voice.

Then again, maybe joy is the old way of doing things at Southern Culture on the Fly. For years, jam bands have been the soundtrack of choice. I once told Dave Grossman about a long-haired cat doing mouse patrol at the farm. His reply: “Fucking hippie cats.” That’s about right.

And look, I’m no musicologist—leave that to the Merchant of Waverly, Scott Stevenson. I’m just a cultured observer of people. But at the 2025 Cohuttasponsored Bassapalooza, the musical split was on full display, and I think it says something about the direction SCOF is headed—somewhere between Slayer and shoal bass. For a magazine steeped in Grateful Dead DNA, Slayer isn’t just a playlist change—it’s a cultural swerve.

SCOF has always taken pride in its countercultural roots—flipping the bird at the country club establishment. But Bassapalooza? It didn’t just flirt with punk ethos, it leaned full tilt into Slayer territory.

Any good Southern field party merges musical tastes on the Turtlebox—hip-hop, bluegrass, arena rock—but when fishing

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is the unifier, you get wildly different tribes sharing the same river.

And this tournament brought them all: absolute angling studs, river divas, and the freshest mullet in the game sported by Austin Macdonald, side by side with his long-haired big brother Drew Friedrich, owner and operator of Cohutta Fishing Company. The whole Cohutta crew made a hell of an impression. This might’ve been the best tournament venue I’ve ever seen: RVs that rivaled Talladega race weekend, a pavilion grilling wagyu burgers to order, and a party vibe that never quit—so long as you were sober enough to remember your name.

Friday night’s music came courtesy of a few original members of Atlantabased jam band Jupiter Coyote. Bluesy Americana with folksy licks and a jammedout heart. They absolutely crushed it. I was too timid (or maybe too tipsy) to thank everyone rocking their SCOF Mikey hats, but the vibe was strong. At one point, we nearly started group noodling on the pavilion floor, led by Cohutta Travel’s own Andy Bowen.

I hadn’t come to compete. No jet boat, no partner, no plan. I just wanted to chill and fish with Austin and Drew. Sam, a friend of Atlanta fishing-scene fixture Eric Thrice, and co-owner of a dive bar called Elmyr, had recently launched an Instagram fishing club by the same name. Their club hat was styled like a Slayer shirt, and that was enough for us to hit it off. We ended up wade fishing a bridge together for stripers and redeyes.

That night, I found a blown-up air mattress under the tin-roofed pavilion— pure serendipity. A light rain fell while I slept

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a few hours off. The next morning, Sam and I made it to the shoals, armed with four rods and too little sleep. We fished hard for three hours, testing depths and swinging flies through 3-foot riffles. The fog burned off, the sun came out, and so did the fatigue. Sam dodged a copperhead before collapsing into a hammock in the woods. I joined Drew and Austin for Mexican food.

Steak torta on Drew’s dime, since he felt a little guilty for taking my entry fee when wading technically wasn’t allowed. Team Too Little Too Late—or maybe Too Big to Fail—was tapping out.

Back on the gravel bar, the banjos kicked in as the kayak crowd rolled up—sunburned, half-naked, and wholly unbothered by taste or tact. More than a few questionable bikini choices made their appearance. I managed two bites on the far bank, but couldn’t get the hook set in that titty-deep, refreshing Etowah water.

The fishing was done for me, but the party was just heating up.

Then came the storm. A real Metallica kind of thunder. Forty-mile-an-hour winds.

Fork lightning. Dirty deeds done dirt cheap. The serious anglers got rocked.

Taking cover under a metal canopy in a lightning storm has a way of making you holler skyward like Slayer’s Tom Araya.

And somehow, the food got even better.

JR from Banana Good Luck and his partner Geoffrey “Woody” Higgins cooked up hand-shucked oysters with herb butter and Paul Prudhomme seasoning. JR had already boated and photographed a 29inch striper that day, and now he was showing off on the grill. He diced onions, seasoned a flank steak with gunpowder spice, grilled it to a perfect medium rare,

and sliced it against the grain like a true champion. Meanwhile, Parker Bolt’s wife kept talking up the duck eggs they’d brought, though I never got my hands on one. Then came Eric—yes, that Eric, bassist from an influential punk band called H20, and his badass DJ wife Ashley.

They cooked an absolute spread: steaks, squash, mushrooms, potatoes. It was legendary. Colt Whelchel sealed the night with backstrap wrapped in bacon, served up hot to whoever had the good sense to ask.

Yeah, fishing brought us together.

But did I mention the libations? By night two, it was the best of times, and the thirst of times. I capped the evening by projectile vomiting water, the kind of holy purge that only a proper Southern gathering can provoke.

I’m not sure what made this year’s Bassapalooza so special. Maybe it was the chaos. The lightning. The Slayer. The mullet. Maybe it was the shared decision to say “fuck it” and enjoy ourselves. To eat well, fish hard, party harder. To live a little metal in the middle of the woods. Whatever it was, it felt like a shift—not just a playlist swap, but a full-tilt riff into something wilder. Somewhere between Slayer and shoal bass, a new SCOF rhythm emerged: less noodle, more snarl.

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The Premier Fly Shop in Blue Ridge, GA S.C.O.F MAGAZINE

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Going in Blind: A French Polynesian Gamble photos and words by kirk marks

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Going in Blind: A French Polynesian Gamble

By Kirk Marks

There’s a nearly universal seductiveness among anglers in being the first to fish a new location. It feels like one of the last frontiers of modern pioneering—but those opportunities are becoming fewer and farther between.

It’s the kind of thing that can leave you wishing you’d been born a few decades earlier. Even so, a recent trip taught me that if you’re willing to look, the globe still offers the occasional surprise.

Last March, I took an exploratory trip to a small atoll in the South Pacific that sees very few visitors. Full disclosure: we weren’t the first to fish it—not even close. Spearfishing, hand-lining, and, more recently, conventional tackle had already been woven into the fabric of this small island community. That said, there was still one method that hadn’t yet been tried: fly fishing. You can never know for certain, but chances are we were the first to wade the flats and drift the reefs with fly rods in hand. It’s a small footnote in the island’s long fishing history, but one that feels noteworthy nonetheless.

Our host—the village fisherman who’s spent a lifetime working these waters— had never laid eyes on a fly rod until our arrival. Through broken French, hand gestures, and shared laughs, he made it clear he didn’t think our gear was up to the task. By the end of the trip, he wasn’t fully convinced, but he was warming up to the idea. I’d bet another week or two would’ve sealed the deal.

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I like to think I make the most of my local fisheries. As a Marylander, I have access to a smorgasbord of species—striped bass, cobia, red drum, speckled trout, northern snakehead, and muskellunge, just to name a few.

I’ve tangled with fish that have serious attitude problems and have rarely seen gear fail. But all of those species, in terms of strength, hit a somewhat predictable ceiling. Fish in the South Pacific, however, operate on a different spectrum—they fight like they’ve never lost and don’t plan to start anytime soon.

Prior to this trip, I hadn’t fished anywhere with the chance of hooking something like a giant trevally, dogtooth tuna, or coral trout—and those were just the tip of the iceberg. That kind of bigfish potential called for more than just a gear check. It required a few serious upgrades.

I realized the best way to approach this trip was with a two-rod setup. One would cover the smaller—though still substantial—targets like bonefish and triggerfish. The other would be reserved for the heavy hitters: giant trevally, bluefin trevally, coral trout, and so on.

My quiver included a 10-weight and a 12-weight, plus a couple of backups in case something went awry. The Douglas fly rods I already owned were up for the job, but the reels I’d been using in the Chesapeake suddenly felt undergunned.

Anglers are often quick to find excuses to buy the newest, fanciest gear—hoping it’ll help them land more fish and look cooler doing it. I’m not saying I haven’t fallen victim to that urge, but in this case, it was less of a want and more of a need. If I wanted to stand a chance in these waters, I needed reels that were S.C.O.F MAGAZINE

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bulletproof. After some considerable research, 3-Tand seemed like the obvious choice. I went with the T-100 on the 10-weight and the T-130 on the 12. Fully sealed with reliable drag systems and deep backing capacity—they felt like the right tools for the job. And in the end, that feeling turned out to be right.

This trip consisted of two main types of fishing: 1) wading flats and 2) drifting reefs. When wading, I usually had my 10-weight in hand and my 12-weight tucked under the strap of my waterproof backpack—within reach for when the time came. When drifting in the boat, it was easy to switch between rods—and between spare spools, which I had for each reel: one with a floating line, the other with a heavy sinking line. I was a foreigner in a totally new environment; I felt as prepared as someone in my shoes could.

Most of the species were new to me.

To keep track, I jotted down a running list in the Notes app on my iPhone. As I write this, there are nineteen entries—though I’m sure I’ve missed a few along the way.

That’s easy to do when some are labeled “unidentified wrasse #1,” “unidentified wrasse #2,” and “unidentified parrotfish.”

Still, one fish in particular made a lasting impression that I didn’t expect: a beautiful and powerful member of the grouper family.

Coral trout are built like tanks, with colors that put a bag of Skittles to shame. Fly fishing for them isn’t delicate or graceful—it’s more of a barroom brawl.

We drifted over miles of living coral, lobbing baitfish patterns on 500-grain sinking lines with 100-pound leader.

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the line around your hand, lock down the drag, and pull like you’re trying to rip a stump out of the ground. Give an inch, and they’re gone—buried in the reef.

Trust me, I speak from experience.

I brought five good ones to hand and lost three that felt even bigger. One of those losses came from a snapped welded loop on my fly line. I’ve heard the horror stories, as I’m sure many of you have, but welded loops had always held up fine against the mild tempered species I chase in the Chesapeake. I should have known, coral trout don’t play by those rules. Moral of the story: if you’re pulling as hard as you can to keep big fish out of structure, that’s a good time to break out the nail knot. Loops can’t be trusted.

While drifting over the reef, we picked up a handful of other species too—bluefin trevally, black trevally, camouflage grouper, longnose emperor, and spangled emperor among them.

Bluefin trevally were the most common and, pound for pound, put up a fight that rivals their GT cousins. There was some overlap between reef and flat habitats, especially with trevally species, which seemed comfortable in both. That said, a few species never made an appearance while drifting the reef and only showed themselves on the flats.

Sight fishing bonefish doesn’t get old. They’ve got a reputation as an honest fish—make the right cast, lead them well, and more often than not, they’ll eat. But landing them is a different story, especially when you’re waist-deep on a South Pacific flat peppered with razorsharp coral heads—locally referred to as balmies. The fish we spotted were 48

exemplary—hands-down the biggest bonefish I’ve ever laid eyes on. A few looked to be upwards of fifteen pounds.

We didn’t manage to bring one of those true giants to hand, but we did land a handful of solid fish in the five- to tenpound range.

Prior to this trip, my only other bonefish experiences had been in Ascension Bay, where they’re more abundant but generally smaller. I know we’re talking about two different species between the South Pacific and the Caribbean, but still—the size difference was striking. I walked away with a new level of respect for them. Big bones are a force to be reckoned with.

Some other species we encountered on the flats included Picasso triggerfish, redtoothed triggerfish (which provided the crew with all the frustration you could ask for), goatfish, various types of unidentified wrasse and parrotfish, remora, Pacific lizardfish, a small omnipresent grouper the locals refer to as cod (frustrating in their own right), barred trevally, yellowspotted trevally, and—last but not least— giant trevally. Of that list, the two most memorable from a fishing standpoint were the redtoothed triggers and the giant trevally—both of which left me with some unfinished business.

Redtoothed triggers, in particular, were maddening. They’d track your fly with laser focus—hovering inches above it, clearly interested, but never quite ready to commit. You could strip slowly, give it a twitch, even dead drift it. None of it seemed to matter. Sometimes they’d spook before you even got a cast off. Other times, they’d follow cast after cast—only to bail after they had followed the fly all

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the way to your feet. The worst, though, was when one finally looked ready to eat… and a cod rocketed in from nowhere and grabbed the fly. That happened more than you’d think.

Earlier I mentioned my two-rod setup while wading—10wt in hand, 12wt strapped to my backpack, ready to deploy when the time came. As it turns out, it wasn’t quite as ready as I’d thought. I was standing in knee-deep water on a bonefish flat, with a white sand island about 50 yards off to my right and a drop-off into the lagoon roughly 30 yards to my left.

I had just clipped off a fly and was in the middle of tying on a new pattern when I looked up and caught movement—two deep-blue shapes cruising fast along the sand edge, just inside the drop-off. It only took a second to realize what they were: truly giant trevally. Probably pushing triple digits. I took a breath and cinched my knot.

There wasn’t time to switch to the 12-weight. It was either take the shot and hope for a miracle or watch them disappear. I made two quick false casts and landed the small shrimp pattern ten feet ahead of them, right in their line. To my surprise, they both jolted forward, and one of them inhaled the fly. I stripset once—no reaction—then again. On the second set, the fish realized what was going on, turned hard, and took off across the flat, drag screaming. Within seconds, I was deep into my backing, watching the fish beeline toward the lagoon and its maze of coral. I knew my chances of landing this fish were slim, but I applied some pressure, hoping to steer it back toward the flat. Just as I did, the rod went limp, the line went slack, and I reeled in a Gamakatsu SL12 opened wide.

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That fly, with its straightened hook, now sits inside an oyster shell on my cabinet at home, alongside the one that caught my first redfish and the one that fooled my first permit. The story behind it is a little more melancholy, but meaningful in its own right. I was the only one on the trip to lay eyes on a GT of that size. A few smaller fish in the 5- to 10-pound range were brought to hand, and I would’ve been glad to join that club—but truthfully, I wouldn’t trade the experience I had.

They’re called giant trevally for a reason, and I got a front-row seat as to why.

Looking back, I didn’t come home with a grip-and-grin of a hundred-pound GT— but as I get older and do more exploring, I’ve started to realize that’s not always the point. We went in blind, took a gamble, and came out with good stories, new species under our belts, and some hard-earned knowledge. We fished hard in a place few have, with gear that raised eyebrows and a method that hasn’t yet earned its place. That feels like a win to me.

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F LY

RODS

www.waltersflyrods.com

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LYDIA IS COOL. LYDIA WEARS SCOF MERCH. BE LIKE LYDIA.

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photo by alan broyhill57

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Forty Miles at Night

By Cola Austin McDonald drove us toward the Ozarks like a man on retainer. I called him my attorney for the trip—the one I trusted to cover my ass as we chased a midnight dream. For years he’d told me I needed to do it right: brown trout, after dark, with nothing but a mouse pattern and nerve. Now here we were, bound for an unnamed river outpost where the Cohutta Fishing Co. crew would row 17 miles a night, testing themselves against the current and whatever swam in it.

The plan was simple, stubborn in practice: skate a rodent across the seams and let the river decide. A mouse doesn’t linger—it bolts for dry ground. Strip too slow and the fly dies ignored; strip fast and the night erupts with a brown’s violent kerplunk.

Memphis pavement rattled the truck like a bad snare drum, every crack and seam announcing itself. An amber alert glowed on my iPhone alongside a boilwater warning, signs of a society unraveling at the edges. My attorney cranked Project Pat, and we barreled west with bravado, a cooler of beer, and nothing but trout on our minds.

Eventually we hit a desert of beer before Austin, and pulled into a gas station.

He cracked a can, sighed, and said, “I feel like a vampire that craves beer.”

That line carried us into the week. We were about to trade daylight for darkness, waking for the hunt only when others slept.

Our hosts, Kevin and his wife, June, lived streamside and welcomed us with a plain grace that made their place feel less like a waypoint and more like a hearth.

The rest of the Cohutta crew rolled

in: Matt Morrison, the youngest in years but the oldest vampire by instinct, his trout tattoo a badge of devotion; Hunter, the Marine with a German VW who hated Ozark dirt roads; and Kyle, who carried a wild humor he kept sheathed until the danger passed. We split into boats: Austin, Kevin, and me in one; Hunter, Matt, and Kyle in the other.

The first night was for breaking in.

Kyle stuck a 17-incher and spared us the shame of a skunk. The rest of us settled into rhythm: listening for the river’s hidden cues, skating mice across seams, learning patience in the pitch dark.

Daylight was for recovery, or the illusion of it. We talked water levels, gear quirks, and the rituals men invent when their waking lives take place in the wrong half of the clock. By the second night, we were no longer visitors—we were apprentices in the nocturnal school.

I landed a trout just under 20 inches, the strike exploding in a way that jolted me upright. Another followed on the same 17-mile drift. By the third night I’d been turned fully—one of the vampires now, sunglasses at dawn, hiding the crazed look in my eyes.

The escalation was merciless. A 24-incher hit like a train, running under the boat and doubling my rod. It took everything to horse him up for Hunter’s net. For a moment I held the record—until Matt bested us with a 28, hook-jawed and brutal, a fish that felt like the river’s own signature.

We came back to Kevin’s place halfbroken and grinning, bloodshot but alive.

Austin bragged about his trailer-backing skills, Kyle needled us with jokes, and Hunter, steady Marine to the core, recited his creed:

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“Death before dishonor.”

The fish were only part of it. What stayed with me wasn’t the tape measure or the tally, but the way the nights reshaped us. Each mile stripped away something unnecessary until all that was left was water, moonlight, and the pull of a fish we’d never truly own.

By the end, I wore my sunglasses not just against the dawn, but against the sense that something in me had shifted for good. We hadn’t conquered the Ozarks.

We’d listened to them, rowed through them, stolen a few moments of truth before morning burned them away.

The photos proved the fish. But the night had given us something harder to measure: the honor of thieves who stole from the dark—and lived to tell it.

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Catfish Blues – a reverence for summer suffering.

By C.H. Daniels

“Every year, August lashes out in volcanic fury, rising with the din of morning traffic, its great metallic wings smashing against the ground, heating the air with everincreasing intensity.”

Henry Rollins nailed it. He must have spent a few summers in the deep South watching paint bubble on the porch rail.

The Southeast in August is a sauna with toads. The morning sun creeps over the pines, not warming so much as boiling everything in its path. The air hangs so thick and the sun so relentless that my 62

shadow is trying to crawl back inside. Even rain feels like a hazing ritual: the sky bursts open, the temperature still goes up a few notches, the humidity ticks up further, like a culinary technique for preparing human gumbo.

Fishing options dwindle with each rising degree. Trout? Only up in the high elevations. The tiny specs know the story and keep to the icy rivulets, guarded by Joro spiders who string their webs like Halloween decor gone feral. I’ve never seen so much tick activity—every twig and dead branch seems to be a launching pad for the blood suckers, not to mention the legions of microscopic vampires buzzing in the undergrowth. Hiking for trout is supposed to be noble, even elegant, but

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in August it’s more like jungle warfare against arachnids and arthropods.

Striped bass and largemouth sulk down deep, like kids avoiding chores. Their appetites are as shallow as the puddle leftover from last week’s thunderstorm.

August in Georgia delivers a graduate course in aquatic ennui: the “Dog Days” doldrums when only the truly desperate fish because the fish just don’t care.

That’s where my friend Rene comes in. Rene may love to fish even more than me and most importantly he also has access to some unnamed local lakes. He is also a Certified Casting Instructor for Fly Fishers International. This means on your best day casting you feel like a little kid breaking up dirt clods with a willow stick when you are fishing with Rene. I can forgive him for that if he puts me on fish. I can forgive a surprising number of things for the people who put me on fish.

Rene suggested lake fishing. Catfish.

I raised an eyebrow. “They’ll eat a fly,” he said.

“It is inhumanly miserable outside,” I complained.

“I bet you never caught a catfish on a fly.”

Kryptonite. Can I be that shallow and obvious? He was becoming less likeable by the minute. I accepted, of course.

The forecast called for a brisk 89 degrees. The walk down to the lake where the little boat and a canoe were tied up was pretty enough. A cathedral of pines, sunlight dappling the leaf litter, all deceiving me into misplaced hope. But the minute we hit the water’s edge, the heat returned—center stage, spotlight, no understudy.

The lake shimmered like black

tea with cream—dark, cloudy, and fullbodied. No breeze stirred the bugs from their hiding spots; the air was perfectly still except for the occasional buzz of cicadas, nature’s tinnitus. “Nice that there is no wind to mess up the casting,” Rene intoned.

“Yeah. Wouldn’t want to be comfortable or anything like that.”

My cell phone chimed. It was a friend from Florissant, Colorado texting me complaining that it was going to be 78 degrees there. I decided I don’t like him either.

Sunfish swooned over Rene’s perfectly placed casts. He snuck casts around obstacles and rolled tight loops up under the overhanging cover to deliver the fly gently in the water next to the shore.

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I took the less artful approach, slapping brush with reckless abandon to see if I could shake out any bait to chum for him.

Rene’s accuracy bordered on obscene— his fly teased, flirted, seduced panfish from dark corners while I gained a lot of practice retying a loop knot.

“Put your cast between the two bushes with the lighted leaves. A couple short strips and then you need to let it sink deeper here. But not too deep, watch the underwater tree,” Rene cautioned.

“Between the bushes, don’t let it sink too deep,” I muttered, sweat rolling down my back, dripping off my left ear. I was melting. The cast unfurled on target for once, allowing the fly to settle into the tea. A few strips, nothing. I let it sink deeper. Strip—resistance. I executed a strip set that would have made a tarpon guide proud. Was it another log? Damn.

Snagged. A sunken limb full of soggy leaves. The pull felt heavy and sluggish, like dragging a sack of sand.

“Come on man, stop moving the boat!” I barked, convinced I was hung up again. Rene grinned.

“We’re not moving, your line is.

That’s a fish.”

My line was swimming away. I hauled on the line. The line pulled back.

For a while, it was just mass and inertia, then the fish seemed to surrender, and I asked Rene if he was ready with the net.

Then catfish stubborn kicked in. The fly reel clattered, handle working my knuckles over like a boxer at a speed bag. “Huh, I didn’t know you had a click and pawl reel.

Love the clicking sound of that drag.”

Rene’s mocking laughter echoed round the lake.

I wrestled the fish back under control 64

and worked it back to the boat. Finally, it came to the surface, and I leaned over to admire it before slipping it into the net.

Dark as an oil stain on asphalt, fading into pewter along its belly. No spots. No gold. No color. Just the minimalist design of a bottom feeder with the fighting spirit of an offensive lineman and a face only a mother could love. Even then, maybe only reluctantly. “That may be the ugliest fish I have ever caught on a fly rod. I want a picture of that.” So, we took our best photos of Mr. Homely while August, summer’s last messenger of misery, continued to lash out at us, and then we released him back to his murky kingdom.

Which was cooler and less humid than the boat we were sitting in.

That was it. We caught plenty more panfish, and Rene later convinced a large bass to stop pouting and to eat. An even larger catfish followed one of the struggling sunfish to the boat but refused to commit.

Even the catfish don’t like August.

On the deck later, holding a beer with my right hand, nursing the tender knuckles on the other, the southeast heat mellowed to background noise. Now it was merely offensive, or so it seemed. The beer was very cold. I had another. That seemed to make everything better.

Prompted by the cool persuasion of barley and hops, I offered, “You know, that was a good-looking fish.”

“Mmm,” Rene replied, the syllable rich with approval. “You saw the one that chased the sunfish, right?”

“Heat ain’t so bad. You fishing next week?”

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summer fluffer by alan broyhill 66

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Tarpon on the Line, Tortilla in My Pocket

by Gecko

This one takes the cake. The closest I’ve ever come to disgracing my family. It trumps my almost bankruptcy of 2021, when I narrowly avoided finding my ancient liveaboard Hatteras on the bottom of Lake Pontchartrain after Hurricane Ida. I remember my search history, “Bankruptcy lawyer New Orleans,” “Do co-signers go bankrupt,” “Can you bankrupt your family,” “Is the boot open?” That was bad, but due to some stroke of luck, and a bunch of old heads with nothing better to do, we kept the boat afloat, sold it, and lived to fight another day. Today was that other day. I would die. And, I would die disgraced.

It was February of 2025. I was leading a photo shoot for a large sunglass brand on the west coast of Puerto Rico. I believed I was a local expert, having gone there a handful of times with a bad posse to DIY tarpon fish and disrespect the locals. All those songs Bad Bunny wrote about colonialism and gringos taking over PR were likely directed at my former crew of hooligans (and me). Anyhow, I pitched the shoot to the brand I was working for and got 20K in cash, and the green light to run it.

It went fine, but towards the end of our trip, I was exhausted. As the sherpa of eight influencers, by day five I was beat, hangry, and ready to catch a goddamn fish. Days of watching missed sets, bad casts, and fumbled feeds had me pissed off, in a bit of a fit, really. One 68

might say “manic.”

I set out on my own to do something dishonorable. I wanted to catch a tarpon, and I knew where they were. I knew they’d eat, and knew what to feed them. Behind the taco shack I went, where tortillas fly, french fries die, and tarpon aren’t leader-shy. I tied on my Mustad 5/0, the big dog. And from my pocket, I grabbed a 12-inch, all flour, slow sink, 100 gram, tortilla.

I fixed it to the hook and prepared to cast—roll cast, that is. The tarpon were eyeing me, but due to their brain size, it's unlikely they were able to distinguish me from the bus boy. I planned to take advantage of this.

As I dropped the fly (tortilla) from my hand, I heard shouting followed by two small shadows. Abueltia and her Tia in seconds were over my shoulder.

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Assuming I couldn’t fish there, I was prepared to walk away. But, they weren't there to protect the tarpon, they were there to save the world. “El tsunami,” they recited, “EL TSUNAMI!” I didn’t know what they were talking about. They seemed convinced I was about to die, or at least I was minutes away from dying.

It was then I looked around and realized, everyone was gone. Bus boy, his boss, hell I couldn’t even hear any Benito (what the locals call Bad Bunny).

It was a ghost town. The water began to recede at my feet, and at that very same moment, my tortilla must have weaseled out of my small pincers. I had a tarpon on, and of course a few tortillas hanging from my pocket. He violently worked to throw the hook, but it was a J hook, and the tortilla whole wheat.

The only thing I could think about during this unethical battle was my family. What if there was CCTV footage of me feeding Taco Shack tarpon tortillas on a 10-weight fly rod? What if that was the last video of me? The reason for my death, my dead body found miles inland, bloated, and smelly, with waterproof pockets full of tortillas.

I’d (not really) rather get caught trying to meet up with a 13-year-old boy at Firehouse Subs on a Friday night. There would be nothing more disgraceful than this. Unfortunately, I lived to tell the tale, but I remain anonymous writing this to protect my kin, and my pride.

A pocket full of tortillas and a tarpon on the line.

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Chased By Everything

By Gavin Griffin

I don’t think I’ve ever been more pissed off at how scared I was than the day I had to army crawl through the grass and grab Doak’s tail, legitimately dragging his ass backwards away from a bull moose he’d cornered along Idaho’s Big Wood River. We were fishing, and that moose came barreling upstream. One second Doak was beside me, and the next, gone.

A blur into the trees. Not uncommon. I found him by his sound, barking like mad, squaring off with the horned beast, defiant as ever. I yelled, begged. He wouldn’t budge. Primal. Locked in. I truly thought we weren’t walking away without a hole stomped through us.

Or the time the trail collapsed beneath us hiking into trout country along the Colorado. We tumbled down a canyon wall, smacked the river and went deep, swept into separate parts. I was laid up in an eddy rather quickly. I figured he was gone. I clawed myself out, dumped water from my waders, and there he came— dripping, eyes lit up like it was just another run through the woods. Fucking dog.

Then there was the fight up in the Sawtooths on Fourth of July Creek.

We’d parked, fished all day, caught a monster bull trout, but ran into the meanest bastard I’ve ever met: the American badger.

Three hours of hissing, lunging, clawswiping chaos. The fucker parked itself under my rig, claimed it for himself. I tried yelling, throwing rocks, even tried to run it off, only to be run up an easement fence post. I remember thinking, “Can this thing climb?” The talons on them are insane.

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Freaks of nature, highly aggressive.

Finally, I gave Doak the green light.

What else was I supposed to do? He was ready, I was out of options. He dropped his chest into the dirt, slid under the car, locked eyes with it, nose to nose. Then he lunged, snatched it face first by the muzzle, drug it out, and flung it into the brush like a rag doll. The only predator a badger has is a bear or an eagle, so good for Doak, but that demon reversed into the shadows like a horror movie.

Doak was some sort of wolf hybrid mutt mixed with a heeler. Red and white, tail like a husky, long-legged, intense orange eyes—a pure athlete. Back then I was always fishing deep in predator country. Something about him lit up the wild. I felt we were always chased by everything. He didn’t just exist out there, he disrupted it. Moose, elk, lions, badgers, they came to us like they sensed a rival.

He was interesting like that.

I never saw him face a wolf, but I used to picture it. I’m sure he had some contact at some point. We’d go fishing and he’d disappear for the day, eight hours at a time, then meet me back at the car. He always came back. I imagined him running off to join a pack. Becoming what he almost was.

He wasn’t a pet. He was my dog, but not domesticated. He was wild, he just followed me around. Loyal, eventually.

Protective. Affectionate in his own alpha way. But he wasn’t a dog you patted or cuddled. Hell, I barely did. It felt like a special occasion when he let me get close.

Our bond was… survival-based. Mutual trust.

We made some miles together.

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But one night early on stands out.

I’d just gotten him. Full-grown already, didn’t even know his name. The same week, I got a call from my dad, and heavy stuff was said. I took off for a few months, fishing my way through the West, trying to clear my head.

A few weeks in, we ended up in northern Yellowstone, past Gardiner,

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grizzly and wolf country all around. We fished the Yellowstone that morning and ended up at a BLM site past Jardine called “Bear Creek Campground.” After three hours of dirt road, I was productively lost but had a sense I’d found where we’d sleep. Nobody around, just warning signs about bears and wolves. I figured as much based on the territory, but after an hour,

the thoughts disappeared.

That night I woke to a sound I’d never heard before. Not a growl, but a low, haunting hum. My eyes opened to Doak— rigid, head pressed into the tent wall, making a sound that vibrated through the nylon. That was his thing, I’d learn later.

He didn’t bark at apex predators. Moose, elk, deer, cows, the mailman? He barked.

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But when something real was out there, something that could get him, too, he’d hum, rumble. Like an ancient instinct rising up.

Outside, pots softly clanged.

Something was testing the line I’d set— metal bits hanging, cut pine carpet to prick paws, some trick I’d seen on Discovery Channel. The age-old question reared up as I sat in the dark with a dog I barely knew, miles from anyone: Do I unzip the tent, or not?

I did. Hit the headlamp. Lit up three grizzlies just beyond the line, the biggest with her chest tightening my lifeline.

Probably a mom and two soon-to-bekicked-out cubs, none of them small.

I grabbed Doak’s muzzle. He wanted to go, but I didn’t want him to make a sound. Locals had told me I was nuts for bringing a dog out here. In that moment, I understood.

I crawled out, tried to spray the bears. A soft wind hit back, and I took the overspray straight into my eyes and chest.

Choked, blinded, I haphazardly retreated to the car, dragging Doak by the collar. We sat and watched the bears tear through camp for the next few hours while I honked the horn, helpless.

We slept in the car. Me questioning decisions, Doak guarding. Both alive in the wild. He was something wild, something dangerous. Something I never fully understood. Even in five years, because I never got to know old Doak.

A week after I moved to North Carolina from Idaho, I found him dead beneath a waterfall in Pisgah. Eyes white, tongue swollen, body stiff. He was wedged into a rock, hidden by the froth of the falls.

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He’d chased a rabbit into the thicket last I saw. Three days later, I realized he’d gone over the edge after he never came back to me. He always came back.

That was Doak’s way—headfirst into the unknown. No hesitation. No regrets. It was a hell of a way for that dog to go.

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The Most Imperfect Streamside Dog Chases the American Dream

By Cola

When I was 30, I decided I needed to prepare for the inevitability of family life. I was dating a woman named Tessa, an artist and Nietzsche scholar. Despite her atheism, she loved dogs—something I never quite understood. How could someone who didn’t believe in a divine creator not find some mystery in the unconditional love of a 84

dog? If God ever showed His face plainly in this world, I’ve always thought it was through them.

Tessa, in a gesture of strange grace, adopted a four-year-old Australian Shepherd from a trailer park in Denver. His name was Julian, after the character from Trailer Park Boys. I renamed him Hopper, after the terrestrial fly that Western trout devour in late summer, when the grass is thick and the rivers run gold.

From the start, Hopper was a challenge. A strong-willed, workhorse cattle dog with separation anxiety so

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Nighthawks Edward Hopper (1882–1967), 1942; consigned to Frank Rehn Galleries, 1942; sold to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1942.

intense he’d bark himself hoarse if I left the room. I tried locking him in a shop behind the house one night and his barking kept the neighbors up until sunrise. When I tried to cut the grass that same week, he bit my seven-year-old nephew in the face, just to be near me. McKee has a permanent twitch now. I should’ve given Hopper up then. I didn’t.

I wouldn’t give up on a child, how could I give up on this adopted son?

Like the artist Edward Hopper, who painted Nighthawks, he was a lonesome American soul with a violent past and a

need to witness the world from the outside.

For a year, we lived on Tessa’s brother’s bison ranch. Hopper would stare through the fence, aching to herd the tatankas, not knowing he’d be gored to death in seconds.

One day a badger slipped under the fence, and Hopper wrestled it by the throat— blood, spit, dust, chaos—until the badger crawled away through a hole. He stood panting and proud, a wild-eyed sentinel.

When we traveled, he rode in the back of my stinking Tacoma. Trucks, somehow, were the only things he trusted to return him home. The bed of that truck was his chapel.

Destination: Laramie, the North Platte, wherever the trout whispered. Sometimes he’d herd me mid-wade, circling like I was a sheep gone rogue. He’d tangle himself in my hopper-dropper rig, yelp, and nip at my fingers as I performed streamside surgery.

A loving bite. A reminder: don’t hurt me.

The day my mother flew to Colorado to help me drive back to Alabama, she met Hopper for the first time. He’d been sprayed by a skunk the night before, and the stench clung to everything—our bags, our hair, our lungs. And yet, she loved him.

Everyone did, eventually.

I tried integrating him into my father’s chaotic pack of Southern dogs. It was a disaster. Hopper was too aggressive for Happy, a blind chow, and Me Too, a Sand Mountain fighting mutt. My sister’s pug, Huey, would sometimes initiate melees by lovingly licking a labrador’s testicles. It didn’t take much. A chicken snake in the yard, a sudden movement and Hopper would launch into combat like a berserker.

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The lab would nearly kill him. He never flinched. He always came back for more.

But nothing incensed Hopper like herons. Those prehistoric bastards fishing the shoreline would tempt him to madness.

They waited until the last second to lift off, just enough to convince Hopper he might catch one next time. When he tired of birds, he turned to waves. He hated water, but at Lake Guntersville he would crash down the banks, barking at each incoming ripple like it had insulted his mother. I called this “chasing the American Dream.” All I had to do was say, “Hopper, go get the American Dream,” and he’d bust through the screen door, eyes wild, sprinting toward the lake, ready to bite surf and sky. It was all I could do for him. He never learned obedience beyond “sit” and “lie down.” But purpose?

He had it in spades.

Years later, after I married and my wife became pregnant, things changed.

That Christmas Eve, a Roomba arrived. Her aging Jack Russell stared at it like a dog seeing its robotic replacement. Hopper, perhaps sensing the same thing, snapped.

He grabbed the terrier by the scruff and shook him like a rag doll. When my wife pried them apart, Hopper’s jaws closed on her finger. That was the last Christmas I spent with him.

My mother took him in for the duration of the pregnancy, but it wasn’t a long-term solution. Eventually, she found him a home with a NASA scientist in Huntsville named Colton, a man who’d grown up with Aussies.

Hopper lived another six years there. He was safe, fed, loved. But there was always a sadness in the pictures. Maybe he had climbed the social ladder—from Denver trailer park to a rocket scientist’s backyard— but something had short-circuited between us. Maybe between us both.

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I never had to bury Hopper. But I did have to let him go. I did it for my son, to give Trey a safe life, free from Hopper’s mood swings and unpredictable violence. But some nights when I think of Guntersville, I wish I could stand on that porch one more time and say it again: “Hopper, go get the American Dream.”

And he would. God, how he would.

And maybe, just maybe, he already had.

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O R ' L I L T SWEE

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photo by thomas weatherington

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OD

a new column!

TFO Moment 9’ 4pc (7 Weight)

By Scott Stevenson

Is this a ‘Sweet Lil Rod™’? Yea it is.

Let’s start with the looks. Reminds me of the Scott Tidal or another Scott I am not putting my finger on at the Moment. It’s a nice gray blank with blue wraps that is unsanded too.

Ok, that is why I am thinking Scott. I love the little snubbed, mushroom cap fighting butt on this seven weight. Nice little blue lines in the uplockers on the reel seat. It is a classy looking rod from TFO, who usually does a more in your face color scheme on their offerings.

TFO describes it as fast action. That is an accurate description. It has a stiffer tip than the rods I have been casting lately and usually prefer if I am being honest. The flex is very consistent and predictable and that all occurs in the middle of the rod. I usually like throwing poppers or anything topwater with a tip casting rod, however I was able to (very) easily hit the bank consistently over and over. I think this rod allows for that because of its steady power. My loops were a little more open than I would have liked but that may be due to my poor/lazy casting stroke. This rod really shines water hauling streamers or bigger saltwater flies. I looked it up and this particular model checks in at 3.5 oz, which is light. I feel that the swing weight

is a bit heavier than some of its competition but I don’t have the data to back that up.

The power generated by this rod more than compensates for that heavier swing weight. I totally see myself never leaving this rod home when fishing for reds on the Gulf Coast. I would probably reach for something else if targeting bones where a rod that flexes more in the tip would be preferred. And I would think the nine and ten weights would make for dynamite striper sticks.

Now for the price which clocks in at $645. If money were no object would I choose this over some of the American made flagships from the other guys? Probably not.

But I just spent $8 on a tube of toothpaste and shits expensive. I would definitely head down to your local shop and try them out.

I think you would be impressed. I certainly was.

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Shootin’ the Bull With the Owners of Tulsa’s Newest Fly Shop – Green Country Fly Co.

T

By JD Miller

-Town. The Birthplace of Route 66. The Oil Capital of the World.

The origin of JJ Cale and Leon Russell – the source of a sound that changed music. The buckle of the bible belt. A city of undeniable art and culture with a complicated past. The hometown of Bill Hader. Hey, he’s funny.

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We’ll take him. Tulsa, Oklahoma, is a lot of things to a lot of people. To me and my brethren, Tulsa and the surrounding northeast Oklahoma and Ozarks region is a warmwater fly fisherman’s paradise, and a town with an outdoor sporting tradition as rich as the oil that made it famous.

With that said, it’s a bit of a head scratcher as to why T-Town – with its passionate outdoor community including

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a strong underground fly fishing sector – has not had a dedicated fly shop in over 20 years. You read that right. Tulsa has not had a shop solely devoted to fly fishing in more than two decades.

The city has been home to some outdoor retail spots that have earned legit cred with Tulsa’s outdoor enthusiasts.

Stores like OkieBug and D&B Outfitters, the latter being the last true fly shop to serve the Tulsa area, left behind a legacy that persisted among their customer base years after shutting their doors. Of course, we’ve got the big box stores, but the fly community in Tulsa deserves more than what places like Bass Pro Shops and Scheels can offer – a place to call home.

A place to share stories, tips and tricks, fish pics, fly recipes, comradery, third rate

spots, and maybe a lie or two here and there. A place to pause the hustle and bustle of the daily grind, enjoy a beverage and shoot the bull about the only thing any of us ever really want to shoot the bull about: fishing. Chance Maxville and Nick Williams, local fly fishing guides embedded in the Tulsa fly community, thought the same thing. And we thank the mighty fly fisher in the sky that they did. I sat down with Chance and Nick to learn a little more about them, and a lot more about Tulsa’s newest shop, Green Country Fly Co.

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Q: Ok, let’s get right to the important shit.

Let’s talk about how bass are superior to trout in every way imaginable. Nick, you go first…No, no, that’s a joke, but bass and warmwater species are the DNA of this new shop. Let’s kick this off talking about the choice to make warmwater the cornerstone of Green Country Fly Co.

Nick: Yeah, you know, Oklahoma is not a fly fishing destination. It's not something that you point to on the map and want to go see like Yellowstone or the Catskills or the Smokies. Trout are not our cornerstone.

It's not what the fly fishing community here is about. It's not what our culture is around.

We have a lot of fish that are accessible on the fly – from our native smallmouth to our non-native stripers to all the ponds full of largemouth. There's a lot more water, a lot more opportunity for warmwater fish, and the journey to catch those. So, trout can be cool, but not here.

Chance: For us, it’s about building community.

I think people miss out that we have some truly special fisheries here for smallmouth and striper. I mean true trophy fisheries. We also want to take in the conservation part of that and protect those places, too, start working with people and going through that whole scheme. The trout in the Ozarks are super cool. We have some great places, but the Ozarks to me is warmwater, and we want to build a community around that.

Q: I want to hear the quick backstories.

When did you fall in love with fishing?

When did you turn to the dark side (fly fishing)? Where did you cut your teeth with the buggy whip? Who were the important people in that journey?

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Chance: For me, fishing has always just kind of been a way of life. I mean, there's pictures of my grandparents fishing, my dad's a huge bass tournament guy, my mom fished, that was just part of life growing up. At some point, fly fishing poked its way in through Roaring River State Park in Missouri. I got my first fly rod when I was nine or ten, and that all started from going there and seeing guys fly fishing on the river. Tim Homesley of Tim's Fly Shop was a big mentor. He'd get off work at the fly shop, and he'd come down to the same area that we were fishing, and I

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was in his back pocket. And he was gracious enough – even though he was a grumpy old fart – to take me in, let me hang out in the shop, taught me to cast, helped me while I was learning how to tie. He showed me a lot.

Nick: I grew up fishing the farm ponds, doing the whole spinning rod, bass scene. I loved the old Bassin magazines as a kid. I'd bug my dad to get up early on a Saturday morning, and we'd go hit farm ponds and just hop around and fish. It wasn't until my college years when I bought my first fly rod.

I was actually on the Lower Illinois River for a church event, and I was watching an older gentleman catch fish after fish after fish with a fly rod. After talking to him and seeing what he was using, I walked up to the local store on the river there that sold tackle, and I bought an old Martin combo. And man, it spiraled from there. And a few years later, I got into tying. That eventually led to me starting Oklahoma Fly Company. It’s just a spiral. It's a deep, dark rabbit hole of a spiral that never stops.

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Q: You’re both guides here in the region.

How did the transition to guiding happen?

Chance: My dad and I took some guided trips when I was growing up – Mexico, Colorado, Lake Fork – I thought, You can do this for a living? I was always just enamored with that. When I got out of college and got back to fishing more, I was more or less guiding my buddies. I mean, I made them row, but I was basically running around doing mini hosted trips for like 12 to 15 years. I put my program together and didn't even know it. I started running a few trips in 2019, and then in 2020, Covid happened. I took a pay cut at my day job and was trying to figure out a way to make some extra money. And kudos to my wife, she pretty much pushed me into it. She's like, you’ve always wanted to try it, it's what you've been doing already, now just take strangers. So, I bailed off in it and find it highly rewarding.

Q: You both seem like you genuinely love guiding. What makes you love it?

Nick: I had another young guy just a few weeks ago, he caught his first 20 and he's like, shaking. Literally shaking. That's a core memory. You don't forget that. And last year we had a couple guys out and they wanted to get their first striper, and they got their first striper…and then they got their next 20 or 30 stripers the same day. You don't take it for granted. It costs money and people's time.

You get to know somebody pretty quick so there's an element of community to it. When you have return clientele who have been on your boat multiple times, there's a legitimate relationship there. It's not just fishing now.

It’s doing life with people you otherwise would never have met.

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Nick: Kind of like Chance, I found myself taking people fishing. I was a youth pastor for years, and I would take students fishing who didn't get to experience much in the outdoors. There’s a teaching side to it, and you're so involved in the process, and they're getting to see things and be outside. It might be something as simple as seeing a bald eagle flying downriver. There’s just something cool about seeing that and it has nothing to do with the fishing – it's outside, it's quiet, the phone's not out, no distractions. It got to a point we were fishing and floating so much that people started asking about trips. It was a natural progression.

Chance: I've always loved teaching. And honestly, part of that was getting a drift boat and finding joy in just rowing people down the river and being a part of their experience – if they catch a fish, you're a part of that.

When you put somebody on a fish, big or small, and they're absolutely elated, and you were a part of that, it’s absolutely crazy and so fulfilling. I had a dad and a son out there a few weeks back, and the boy was a stick. He caught a 20-inch smallmouth on topwater. That moment when it hit the net, he ran over and hugged me. He was jacked.

I was jacked. Those are the moments that you get to share with people. Life’s all about moments. You just need to recognize when they happen and appreciate them. I get to have those moments with people all the time. It's pretty great.

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Q: Talk to me about the backstory of the shop. Talk me through the conception.

What sparked the idea? What made y’all want to open a fly shop?

Nick: I actually started writing the business plan for this four or five years ago. I had a few job changes and things, and I sat down with my wife and was like, this is the time. The door, the window, the opportunity is here. I'd been bugging Chance for four or five years, literally, and I told him last year, like, we're to a point now that this is going to happen.

Like, you are either going to get on board and join me and be a part of it, or not.

Chance: Crap or get off the pot.

Nick: Yes. And so last year we really got to the point, and we started really letting that ball roll downhill and it gained a lot of momentum very quickly. We have a great network through tying, guiding, fishing, photography, and social media across the U.S. We started calling other fly shop owners, and we were asking questions like, how do we do this right? How do we make sure we go through the right process?

What are we missing? What do we need to consider? All of those questions. And it was probably October, November of last year when it started to get real. And in April of this year, we signed the lease here. Then you're official. You're committed.

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Q: What was the biggest question mark in that process?

Nick: The biggest question initially was, can Tulsa do it? Can we do it in Oklahoma? We are not a fly fishing state; we're not a fly fishing destination. You can kind of separate fly shops into destination fly shops – those that are located where you’ve already traveled to fish – versus the fly shop at home. There’s a distinct difference between those two. So, the biggest question initially was, can we make it in Tulsa, Oklahoma? And we have been very, very pleasantly surprised by the community here.

Q: The shop is located in Owasso, which is a community of the Tulsa metro. Why here?

Chance: Everybody kept saying “You need to be in Tulsa. You need to be in Tulsa.”

And we tried, but there were logistical and financial barriers to that. Picking this location was a little bit of a logistical thing and of course had a financial side to it. We love it.

It’s a cool space, a big open area.

Nick: And it’s brand new. We were looking at old buildings in Tulsa that needed major renovations, and they had their price and they weren't going to come off it.

Chance: I was very hesitant about Owasso considering the gap from downtown Tulsa, but Tom Adams and Steve Ruiz of JD Adams and Co. put us at ease. They talked about how they're in Northern Oklahoma City, and they get people who drive to the shop from all over. So, that gave some relief. There is no bar to entry if you treat people right and give them a solid experience when they walk through that door. If they like you, they will come back.

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Q: The Tulsa area has had outdoor retail shops in the past that have carried fly gear but hasn’t had one solely dedicated to fly fishing in over 20 years. Why do you think it’s important for this community to have a dedicated fly shop?

Chance: Growth in both our local community and the sport. There's been some massive growth. I think we're seeing that in the shop just by the response we've had since opening on May 31st. The community needs a center.

We have a great community but there's no hub. I mean, we have to sell rods, fly lines... we have to make a living, it's a business, but we want to be the community hub and mean more to people than just a place to buy stuff.

Nick: Connection. Community. It's what it all comes back to. It's about being the hub, being the center, and bringing everybody together. That is our goal.

Q: Did you ever have the chance to go to OkieBug or D&B Outfitters? What do you remember about those shops?

Chance: I remember OkieBug vividly. It was Bass Pro before Bass Pro. You’d walk in there and they had an aquarium, they had everything, and it was just mindblowing, especially when you're a little boy going in there with your dad. The legend is that the idea for B.A.S.S. (Bass Anglers Sportsman Society) was hatched in that building. That place is storied. It was the same experience as walking into your local fly shop, but they built it for that conventional bass community back then. It was a community hub – it tied everybody together. I didn't come to D&B’s till later in life, honestly on the tail end of it, but it was super cool to be able to walk in and see that fly fishing presence here in Tulsa.

Q: Why the name Green Country Fly Co.?

Chance: That was such a challenge. And it’s kind of silly to think about now, but like, you really want to hit the nail on the head with the name and have it represent you and the community. But Green Country is where we are. It's what this part of Oklahoma is called.

I think that really helps identify who we are and where we're at.

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Q: Let’s talk gear. What will the shop be carrying?

Chance: As far as brands go, I mean, flagship brands: Sage, Scott, TFO, Echo, Lamson, Ross, Redington, Hairline, Simms, Grundéns, Scientific Anglers, Rio Products.

Cornerstone brands of the industry.

Nick: The whole back of the store is tying stuff and terminal tackle, and it's based around warmwater stuff. We carry a lot of streamer stuff, and part of the goal is to carry products that you're not going to find anywhere else in the Ozarks. We will have it here. We have some products that are relatively new around the U.S. – banger products. We've got the big game pliers, big saltwater hooks, you know, for our striper stuff. We've got the trout stuff, sure, you can't not…but we're heavy on the warmwater side.

Chance: We have just as many streamer rods on the rack – 6, 7, 8 and 10wts – as we do the trout rods – the 3, 4, and 5wts.

We have the rod rack that holds 60 fly rods, and it's packed full. And if you look down through there, if you know remotely anything about fly fishing, you'll look and think, wow, these guys really like to throw streamers.

And streamers are generally oriented to warmwater. Reels’ the same way. We have just as many large arbor reels as we do trout reels. That's what we're hanging our hat on, one hundred percent.

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Q: Are there any other local vendors that the shop will be carrying?

Nick: One of our goals really is to also highlight the local stuff. I have my flies on the counter, and we have patterns from the Fly Armory up in the Springfield, Missouri area.

We've talked to some guys in Arkansas, a guy in Oklahoma City, some guys in Texas.

They’re local to here in the sense that they spend time in the Ozarks, they fish what they tie, and they're fishing for the same things we're fishing for. We really want to highlight those guys. You will probably never see their flies available online. You've got to contact them directly to get them. But we will have them in the store, and we will have them on our website available for sale as well. We want to highlight that local side of it, that community side of it.

Q: Over the last few weeks, you’ve hosted fly tying nights and tactics classes. What else can we expect in addition to your retail offerings?

Chance: We’ll have presentations, from smallmouth all the way to your White River trout – we'll cover the whole gamut. We also have great anglers and local tyers who we’ll tap into. We're just slowly starting to plug that in. Casting lessons, guide trips through me and Nick, that is all available through the shop. We’ll have some destination travel options in the future as well. We keep trying to build up to full service. That is who we will be – a full service fly shop.

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Q: Has there been any inspiration from other fly shops, or even other conventional tackle or outdoor shops, that y’all have drawn on as the model for what you want this to become?

Chance: Schultz Outfitters and Muskie Fool.

Those guys hang their hats on warmwater, and you want to talk about two shops just doing it right all the way around. They’ve kind of laid a blueprint, and we're picking and choosing and drawing inspiration from some of that.

Nick: There were several shops we spoke with, picking their brains as we got this thing up and going. Spawn Flyfish, Fly South in Nashville, we had lengthy conversations with them. Diamond State Fly Company – the new one over on the White River – and JD Adams and Co. in Oklahoma City. They were all very helpful to us.

Chance: But as far as some heavy influence, Schultz Outfitters and Musky Fool for sure.

Their presence is just wild. They knock it out of the park.

Nick: We're gonna grow our hair out like Mike Schultz and start playing hockey. Well, I guess I'll grow my hair. Chance is going bald.

Chance: It's getting a little rough up here. I'll grow my beard out.

Q: What separates Green Country Fly Co.?

Why should someone spend their dollar and their time here and not over there or online?

Nick: Local knowledge. Somebody walks in here like, “Hey, I want to go fish this weekend.

We've got four inches of rain that fell here.

Where can we go?” We know where to send you. It’s easy to get you pointed in the right direction.

Chance: I think it's that you and me, the connection, the relationships that you build with people. The online thing is what it is, but I think people are looking for a hub and a center. They want that personal connection when they come in. You know, guys come in and we know their first name. They want this small, intimate environment where they don't feel like they've walked into Walmart.

It should feel like they’ve walked into their bud’s place. That's what places like OkieBug and D&B Outfitters did so well.

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Q: Let’s talk two of the flagship species around here, Striped Bass and Smallmouth Bass.

Nick: We'll talk about striper first. Stripers are in the Arkansas River system. So any river or tailwater connected to the Arkansas can have striper. We do most of our chasing below Keystone Dam and below Tenkiller Lake. The Lower Illinois River is below Tenkiller, and that is ironically one of the rivers that offers year-round trout fishing. We joke a lot that the trout are just in there as bait for those stripers. We’re talking massive fish, like state records. And it's interesting, none of those options here in Oklahoma are really on the map nationwide. They should be. We will often fish 8wts and 10wts for those fish.

We're fishing shad patterns. We may fish a trout pattern here and there. But more often than not, we're fishing big deceiver-style flies, big changer-style flies on sinking lines.

When it is good and it's on and the water's right, nothing beats it.

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Chance: As far as smallmouth goes, there are some great options in lakes and rivers around the state, but we have a fantastic fishery in the Upper Illinois River, and some of the little creeks around it. Those creeks provide little intimate moments for smallmouth, but the main stem of Upper Illinois from the headwaters in Arkansas all the way to Tenkiller Lake is a fantastic fishery.

Nick: And that's 60, 70, 80 miles of the river, too. Most people don't realize how much water is there.

Chance: There’s great fishing the entire length of it. It's all super accessible by foot, by boat, it doesn't matter. The fishing is fantastic, and you can do a little bit of everything you want there. That's what's great about that place. You can attack those fish a bunch of different ways and adjust tactics depending on your skill level. That place can be wild and can spoil you. The Arkansas drainage, the Upper Illinois, and the Lower Illinois – that's our three big rivers.

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Q: Let’s talk about the fishing around the house. What’s available in T-Town or within a short drive?

Chance: The Arkansas River. Right here in Tulsa. You never know what will happen when you go down there. If you’re throwing a four-inch baitfish pattern on an 8wt fly rod, you may catch a 30-pound striper, or you may catch a 30-pound flathead, or a 20-inch skip jack. You never know what you're going to tie into there, and it's fantastic for people who want to make that next jump from the nine-foot 5wt trout stuff to learning warmwater, and there's tons of accessibility here in town. And those fish are fantastic on the fly. Catfish on the fly are great. Drum, gar, buffalo, carp, sand bass (Okie for white bass) – there's tons of them in there. There’s hybrids, walleye, saugeye, sauger. It’s endless with that river and we want to promote that fishery, build on it, and ultimately conserve it. That is our local river.

It's probably not the prettiest thing to lay your eyes on, but there's a lot of opportunity there. The amount of fishing a guy could do in Oklahoma with a 7 or an 8wt and a couple of lines and some flies…you could chase and catch about anything.

Nick: People don't realize how much water is available if you just want to get out for an hour on a Tuesday evening or whatever it is – there are ponds everywhere. It doesn't have to be moving water; it doesn't have to be a big lake or a city lake. You can go walk around a pond in an hour, spend some time throwing a popper around with 5wt, 6wt, some grasshopper flies, whatever it is, and have a fantastic evening. You're driving 10 minutes, and you're fishing. And if you're fortunate enough to have some sort of watercraft, our state offers so many levels of accessibility for that. You can do so much in a canoe or a kayak. That opens up a whole new world for people.

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PHOTO ESSAY - WESLEY'S BUOY TRAP Forgotten Coast Fly Company's Tarpon Retreat - July 20-26 2025 by wes frazer

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photos by wes frazer

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DURABILITY STABILITY NAVIGABILITY

ZERO MAINTENANCE

BLUE RIDGE BOATWORKS tel: 828-208-3428 124

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Are the Trout Watching Too?

by Frank Draper illo by hank "Feeling guilty, feeling scared, hidden cameras everywhere."

Destroyer by The Kinks

T

he road’s sudden closure had evaporated the din of rushing cars weaving through the curves leaving only the lullaby of a gentle gurgle from the mountain stream. The walk from the vacant parking lot to find fishing solitude will be peaceful and quiet. While pulling on odorous waders barely dry from my last excursion, a gentle white-tailed deer approaches me. Seemingly seeking an offering, I ignore the doe, and I puzzle over which fly boxes to carry.

Walking away from the parking lot, I scout the creek, admiring the snowcovered banks protected from the sun’s melting laser beams. Seeing no trout stirring in the crystal clear water, I return to the road to walk a mile or more for peace.

Lost in the struggle to erase the worldly tasks of work and family obligations from my mind’s whiteboard, I consider my fly options as I hike. As I search for entomological life forms in the air, a mild humming registers in my ear. Seeing nothing, my gaze turns downward. Has the sun encouraged ants to emerge from their tunnels in the roadside earth? Nothing.

But the hum persists. Or is it a hiss?

Ignoring the noise, I continue the uphill walk. I feel a presence. Something is scanning me. Am I being followed? I stop and turn. Fifty yards behind me stands a deer on the road. The doe pauses her stroll. She turns her head. I only see one

eye. She looks away avoiding my stare. I walk a few steps more, then turn. Nothing is there.

Seeing a pool at the base of a small waterfall, I leave the silent road. Stealthily, I trek down into the ravine trying not to be seen by the trout hopefully waiting for my feathered fly soon to be cast. Halfway to the creek, I hear the crunching of snow.

Too early in the year for black bears to have emerged from their dens, I mindlessly stroll downward. Turning, I see a deer following my path down to the creek. The hooves crushing the ground vibrate sound waves, penetrating my ears. Rubbing my eyes to clear the hallucination, the deer is still. It stops as I stop. It walks as I walk.

The pulverizing sounds continue.

I sit on a rock dried by the sun pondering my reality, and pluck a size 14 Renegade as an attractor fly for the creek’s pool. Tied on a fine long dry fly hook using black thread, with extra fine gold tinsel wrapped as a tag, the aft brown feather hackle is separated from the larger cream hackle by a rope of peacock feather hurl.

As I thread the tippet through the hook’s eye, a brown blur enters my peripheral vision from the right. Startled, I turn to see a deer standing beside me. Again, the doe’s head is turned so I only see one eye, she is close enough to touch should I dare. Hands shaking, I struggle to find the hook’s eye with the tippet. She stands motionless, not even a flick of her tail, but I hear a click. Staring at the one big eye turned my way, I focus on the protruding sphere. The pupil is fixed. Then it moves, contracts, and again a faint click.

My legs cramp and temples throb.

I stand, the doe moves two steps away, then stares directly at me and unleashes

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a torrent of fluid to the ground. But the stream of urine does not steam. Shaking, I search for my phone to take a picture, but it falls into the snow. Click, click, click. The eye’s pupil contracts and expands with each click. Where is the other eye?

Frozen, I wait for the deer’s next move, as she watches me intently. I try not to look directly into the eye and pull the brim of my hat lower shielding my irises. A white streak of fur on her right flank seems misplaced as she saunters away.

Should I flee? I have wandered off the path and ponder my plight. Time folds.

The sun has moved. The siren of the water plunging into the pool draws me back.

Realizing my fly is now tied to the tippet, I false cast. Into a brier.

Retrieving the fly, I hope I have not spooked the fish and move below the dark basin to cast once more, noting the briers before lifting my elbow. The Renegade dry fly lands gently at the tail of the pool, and floats into a drift that takes it into the current dragging. A second cast lands further up the tail of the pool, and quickly a trout rises to inhale the fly. I put the line on the reel and the rod bends, but the fish does not move. Seemingly it has dropped an anchor, more likely it has wedged behind a submerged branch previously unseen. I splash up the creek reeling as I go. The trout makes a sudden erratic surge into the black depth of the pool.

Leveraging the rod, this feels like a 20-inch trout, a monster on this small creek. The fish comes into view, no more than seven inches long. A brook trout with a protrusion on its spine two inches from the tail flops in the net. On the left lateral side is a white dot and it is matched on the right lateral by two more. It moves in a mechanical way, its contortions 126

predictable. The hairs on the back of my neck rise. I quickly release the trout which has thrown the hook. Having scattered what fish may still be lurking in the pool, I hike further into the woods following the creek as it twists through boulders warm from the sun.

Grabbing my water bottle from my belt, I again hear a hum. Has tinnitus begun its early onset? I gulp a second swig from the metal bottle before returning it to the clip on my belt.

The unidentified sound grows louder and mimics a twirling rattle. Suddenly jetting into my view is a large dragonfly with a small black head striped with yellow. It lands on my shoulder. I glance down to examine it without moving my head. Two bright green eyes protrude. The body is adorned with black and yellow markings, with two thick, yellow stripes on the sides of the thorax. The legs are black, with short, heavy spines on the lower section. The posterior end of the abdomen is enlarged, looking like a club.

The wings are coarse and slightly tinted, with blackish veins coursing through the cellophane membranes.

The hoverer looks like an adult dragonhunter (Hagenius brevistylus) with a length of at least three inches. Unlike the dragonhunters I had seen before, the dorsal surface of the last two abdominal segments are also marked black and yellow. I have seen many flying insects streamside over the years, and dragonflies are a frequent companion. But all the dragonhunters I had spied at river’s edge had the final two abdominal sections completely black and devoid of yellow. No palpal lobes lined with hooks, spines, and teeth were visible on the end of the labium.

A local genetic mutation?

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As the dragonhunter launches from my jacket, the air at the tail appears distorted and blurred like exhaust from a jet engine. The agile aviator hovers closely, at iris level. Then another dragonfly arrives with similar markings. I rub my eyes then pull down my hat’s brim again. As quickly as they appeared, I see them no more. A faint gaseous smell lingers. Am I having a stroke?

A pressing urge to relieve myself scrambles me deeper into the forest as I search for a rocky outcrop where I can find privacy from unintended eyes. Dropping my gear as the urge becomes imminent, my wader straps tangle with thorns from a green brier, and I find myself engulfed.

My biological task pressing, I wrestle with the growing thorns to avoid flooding my waders.

Mission accomplished; I search for the road wondering if more mechanical deer will greet me. The sun sets behind the tree topped hills, and my way is confused.

I feel more eyes upon me. Green briers appear everywhere. An enclosure appears on the hill ahead, and I climb to it looking for a path out. Surrounded by a barrier with no discernible entrance, I press my hands to the wire mesh fence to see what is inside when I feel a pulse through my fingers. The electricity straightens my arm hairs, the pain quickly intensifies, and I rip my fingers away before the current fuses flesh to metal.

Dazed, the moon lights a path previously unseen, and I journey toward the unknown as my heart pounds, my ears throb, and my eyes struggle to see.

Following the path for an hour, or was it ten minutes, I find the road and head downhill toward where I hope my dented truck awaits. A click of the key fob sounds 128

the horn, and my heart slows. Not pausing to change, I throw my rod in the bed of the truck and see a deer standing on the passenger side blinking. Click. The whitetail glows red in my taillights as I white knuckle the steering wheel and drive away.

Click.

I turn on the radio and “Paranoid”

by Black Sabbath is blaring. Ozzy sings, “People think I’m insane. Because I am frowning all the time.”

Once home, I search the internet for more details of the dragonhunter. Searching, an algorithm offers an “Insectothopter.” A click on the link directs me to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) webpage:

Developed by the CIA’s Office of Research and Development in the 1970s, this micro unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was the first flight of an insect-sized vehicle (insectothopter). It was intended to prove the concept of such miniaturized platforms for intelligence collection.

Insectothopter had a miniature engine to move the wings up and down. A small amount of gas was used to drive the engine, and the excess was vented out the rear for extra thrust. The flight tests were impressive...

Chat bubbles invade the screen, “How was the trout fishing?” I turn off the computer and unplug it from the wall.

Looking out my window, six moonlit deer stare back at me from the yard.

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DAVIS IS COOL. DAVIS WEARS 130

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Vicarious Fly Fishing: a starved addict's saving grace

By JD Miller

I love my family, I really do. As a father to two children, I even consider myself to be an average, if not slightly above average parental figure. Being a dad is a role that I truly cherish (most of the time – parents, you know what I mean), and I’m blessed to have it.

Ok, now that that’s been said (an obviously true statement that feels oddly obligatory and unnecessary, but in the unlikely happenstance that my wife stumbles upon this writing, I’d prefer to have it in here) I must admit, I am an addict.

A desperate, hopeless junkie. For the past ten years, fly fishing has had a hold on me tighter than the grip the white pony had on one of the Two and a Half Men. It has provided me with an identity, a connection to the natural world. It’s reshaped some priorities, vetted my friend group, warped my fashion sense, inflated my ego, deflated it back again, accounted for a lot of money (well?) spent, affected career moves, created sub-hobbies, influenced life choices, encouraged occasional debauchery, promoted potential and actual dog/baby names, and hijacked more than one “family” vacation. And even when fly fishing has frustrated me beyond imagination – left me cursing its existence, criticizing its arduous nature. Or the times I’ve left it, led astray by giant swimbaits, glitter boats and high-gear ratios, it has always welcomed me back with arms wide open.1 At the time of this writing, I’m closing in on seven years of marriage to my wonderful wife, and together we’re 134

raising two boys: three years old and six months new. I’m “in the thick of it,” so I’ve been told. Time to fish seems to grow smaller and smaller as the number of years I spend on (and human beings I help add to) this planet grows larger and larger. If you’ve been diagnosed with the piscatorial obsession like I have, and have a young family as well, then I’m under the confident assumption that you know exactly what I’m talking about. It’s not that we don’t love our families any less, it’s just that we are dealing with what I’m sure is most likely, probably, definitely a serious mental health affliction. An affliction/ addiction that’s only treatable/fed by time spent on bodies of water casting feathers at subaquatic creatures. It’s an addiction that demands time, the most precious of all commodities.

And now we’ve reached our first conundrum: time. I don’t have enough of it. Not enough to chase down my fly fishing dreams and be a decently reputable husband. Not enough to travel the world checking epic fish off my angling bucket list and be a half-respectable father. Hell, I struggle to find a minute to dunk a fly in the neighborhood pond, and often those local excursions include a snackhappy miniature me dead set on turning a fishing session into a Barnum and Bailey production. And you know what? That’s all okay, because most of my fly fishing aspirations are more pipe dreams than viable opportunities anyhow.

Now we’ve arrived at the second major roadblock of a life well-fished: money.

You see, I didn’t inherit the generational wealth or professional drive to climb the corporate ladder in search of the financial freedom that those destination-type trips require. Maybe someday I’ll make

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friends with a billionaire who just wants to take me fly fishing around the world, expecting nothing from me in return. (He says he’d just enjoy my company, albeit with an unsettling smile.) Or maybe the email I got was real and I am the last living descendant of a Saudi prince and the rightful heir to a petroleum empire. The law of averages says one of these emails has to be legit eventually, right? Either way, if those adventures ever happen, it won’t be anytime soon.

Dry your crocodile tears. I think I’ve found a solution: living vicariously. Hear me out. With social media platforms and podcasts of every shape, size, and flavor being as popular as they’ve ever been with no signs of degression, it has never been easier to live through the experiences of others. There are a plethora of influencers/ ambassadors/content creators or guides/ filmmakers/photographers/professional industry people out there right now living your fishing dreams. Peacocks in Brazil? Yep. Taimen in Mongolia? Check.

Rainbows in Patagonia? Done. Roosters in Baja? You bet. Geets in the Seychelles?

Of course. Christmas Island bones? Sure thing. Marbles in Slovenia? No problem.

Striped Marlin in Mag Bay? Si, amigos.

Trust the algorithm, it will provide. Can I enjoy an ice-cold Kalik on a Bahamian flat after releasing a 10-pound bonefish? No. But I can watch @flyflinger836 do it while I enjoy a fridge-cold Keystone Light with my ass on the couch – after the kids are down of course – and I won’t have one single grain of sand in the recesses of my butt crack either. We are experiencing the golden age of vicarious fly fishing.

Christiaan Pretorius, Oliver White, Cullan Ashby, Rodrigo Salles, Jako Lucas, Jay Johnson – freaking fly fishing Avengers

1. If the last four words of that sentence didn’t fill your head with the angelic vocals of Creed frontman Scott Sapp singing the band’s gorgeous, chart-topping power ballad of the same name, well, just reread it now, under the sunlight.

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– out there delivering the world from the evils of mundanity, saving our souls from the perils of monotony. In a shocking twist of fate, it seems that death scrolling on social media actually provides life.

It’s nothing to be ashamed of. I read somewhere on the interwebs that the first known written appearance of the word “vicarious” was in the 1630s, no doubt penned by a fisherman who lacked time and funds. It’s not a new phenomenon, but maybe this fresh perspective could be. Just pay attention to the possible side effects. One such, undoubtedly, is vicarious trauma, which the American Counseling Association refers to as “the emotional residue of exposure to traumatic stories and experiences of others.” It’s real, and it hurts. I, myself, after countless hours of this vicarious fishing, have, more than once, viewed the loss of a large or critical fish and felt the sudden panic, the sharp chest pain, the dizziness, the upset stomach, then the heaviness of heart and onset of depression that always accompany these unfortunate circumstances. I’ve felt it as if the opportunity had slipped through my own fingers. I’ve felt it as if the failure was my own traumatizing experience.

On the flip side, it’s not inconceivable that one could become overly excited watching dramatic feats of fly fishing for alluring species in exotic locations – if it lasts longer than four hours, seek immediate medical attention. Secondhand hazards, I suppose. You must take the good with the bad in the uncharted waters of vicariousness. As the renowned philosopher Thomas Rosenbauer probably once said, “It’s better to have fly fished vicariously, than never to have fly fished at all.”

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BENCH PRESS Ass kicker SCOF winter fluffer

by Nick Williams

WHAT U NEED

Rear Hook - Ahrex TP610 - Size 1 • Thread - Veevus GSP 100D • Blood Quill Marabou • 1/8 strip of 3mm foam • UV Polar Chenille • Barred Marabou (wing accent color) • Sili-legs • Articulation Wire • Beads Front Hook - Kona Big Game Carnivore - Size 1/0 • Double Pupil Lead Eyes • UV Polar Chenille • Barred marabou (palmered) • Sili-legs • Rabbit Strip (dubbing loop) • 1/2” strip of 3mm foam 138

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step by step Step 1: Insert rear hook (this is an articulated pattern) into vise and start thread on hook shank.

Step 2: Tie in blood quill marabou by the tip and palmer marabou to create the tail. Wrap back over the palmered marabou to secure and protect the marabou wraps.

Step 3: Tie in UV Polar Chenille and 1/8” strip of 3mm foam and advance thread to hook eye.

Step 4: Wrap the foam strip around hook shank while slightly stretching the foam to keep it tight, secure foam behind hook eye.

Step 5: Palmer UV Polar Chenille over foam in touching wraps up to hook eye and secure. Wrap back over Polar Chenille to create room to palmer marabou.

Step 6: Tie in blood quill marabou by the tip.

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Step 7: Palmer marabou in touching wraps, and secure behind the eye.

Step 8: Tie in top wing of barred marabou that extends roughly just beyond the hook bend.

Step 9: Tie in two Sili-legs, one on each side of the hook shank.

Whip finish to complete the rear hook.

Step 10: Insert front hook into vise, start thread on shank, and tie in lead dumbbell eyes on the underside of the hook shank.

For added stability, use Dave Whitlock’s monofilament foundation technique for the lead eyes (see @the_fly_armory demonstrate this technique on Instagram).

Step 11: Attach rear hook with articulation wire and beads for spacing. Secure wire with tight wraps to lock everything in.

Step 12: Tie in UV Polar Chenille.

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Step 13: Palmer UV Polar Chenille forward to behind the dumbbell eyes and secure. Leave space (similar to rear hook) to palmer more marabou.

Step 14: Tie in one barred marabou feather by the tip, and palmer with touching wraps. All the marabou should stay behind the dumbbell eyes. Secure and wrap back over slightly to protect the marabou wraps.

Step 15: Tie in two Sili-legs, one on each side of the hook shank.

Step 16: With a scrap piece of lead wire, wrap down the marabou and Sili-legs to keep them out of the way for the next step Step 17: Create a dubbing loop and lock it in. Select a strip of rabbit and using a dubbing loop tool (I use an old chip clip), trim the fur off the leather, and insert the fur into the dubbing loop.

Try to the keep the fibers even in the dubbing loop.

Step 18: Spin up the dubbing loop to create a Rabbit brush. For simplicity, you can also use one of the premade rabbit brushes available on the market, such as the Montana Fly Company one.

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Step 19: Begin wrapping the rabbit brush around the shank BEHIND the dumbbell eyes before advancing them in front of the eyes for the last few wraps. Use tight wraps to keep everything secure! Secure with thread in front of dumbbell eyes and wrap back over to make room for the foam strip. (It may help to pick out the rabbit fur with a bodkin or brush, just be gentle.)

Step 20: Poke a hole through a 1/2” strip of 3mm foam. The hole should be centered on the foam, but leave a 70/30 taper on the foam, i.e. less foam is needed below the hook eye than above the hook eye.

Step 21: Fold foam back over eyes and secure foam with thread. Use gentle, even pressure or the GSP will slice right through the foam. Once happy with the foam and thread wraps, secure and finish with a whip finish. Coat the visible foam with thin UV resin and cure.

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Step 22: Trim foam to fit the size of the fly. For proper keeling and balance, keep more foam above the hook than below the hook (see picture). Pull back both the top and bottom pieces of foam and add a drop of gel super glue to secure foam (essentially, you’re glueing the foam into the rabbit brush and lead eyes) from spinning around the shank.

Step 23: Admire completed fly. Go cast it into some logs where Smallmouth should be, break it off, and start over at step 1.

Rinse and repeat.Step 15: Tie in two Sili-legs, one on each side of the hook shank.

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The Back Page SCOTT STEVENSON I’ve always wanted a fishing dog. A real proper fishing buddy. I’ve had several dogs and every one of them had promise, but none of them ever panned out. My first dog as a young adult was a lab named Jeb and was supposed to be a hunting dog as well as fishing buddy. I hunted ducks over both of his parents and both were fine retrievers. I was honored to get the pick of the litter and they cut me a deal being a broke college student. Three hundred fifty dollars later I picked a yellow( almost white) butterball who was already thirteen pounds at six weeks old. I read Water Dog over and over, watched as many VHS tapes I could get my hands on training them and chatted with every duck hunter I knew.

We practiced. I mean we practiced. I had frozen a few birds, and we hit the ponds a lot that spring and summer. First hunt that next season we were up in Guntersville.

We had a beautiful greenhead fly towards our blind. My buddy and I dropped him just out beyond the decoys and Jeb took off on command. He got to the bird in no time.

He was a beast of a dog at 110 pounds, mostly muscle. A true jock. He wouldn’t put the bird in his mouth. Just pushed it futilely with his snout. I ended up wading out to get it. We never hunted together again. He was a great companion though.

At the time I had college roommates and they were good to him except they made him a little neurotic. You could pet the deer mount in the den and he would just go nuts. They nicknamed him “Paint Chip”.

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One time I took him out on the leash in the front yard. It was early morning and we hit the canopy under the magnolia tree beside the driveway. I looked down to see a turd with something white in it. I immediately thought it was worms. A little probing with the stick revealed a rubber.

My roommate never locked the door to his room due to the doorknob missing and Jeb must have found his way to his trashcan.

I threatened to kick his ass and made his girlfriend all kinds of embarrassed.

They just celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary. I recently threw away an old pair of Redwing boots that Jeb had taken a bite out when he was a puppy. I had replaced them a long time ago but hung on to them for sentimental reasons. I lost a fiancé in a boat accident the summer I graduated from college and Jeb helped me through all that. He taught me everything about the greatness of dogs. Jeb would die very young at the age of eight we think of a snake bite or stroke.

I didn’t wait long after Jeb’s passing to get another dog. Sam Bailey found a puppy listed on a duck hunting message board basically for free (shot money) in Rainsville, AL. He was the exact opposite of Jeb being the runt of his litter. He was a black lab and would grow to be half the size of Jeb. Some guys on the Drake message board (early early days) helped me name him. “Hatch”. I didn’t even attempt to hunt Hatch but I did try, and try,

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and try to take him fishing. He would last twenty or thirty minutes till he just couldn’t stand it and start ruining every good run in the creek or river. I was determined to make him a fishing buddy. We did this for a few years till he became just a buddy. He once swallowed a pack of dry fly hooks.

They were balled up out of the package.

I remember them being size 14. Patridge brand I think. I fed him cotton balls soaked in some grease or fat I had in the kitchen.

He never showed any signs of distress.

I have a picture of him jumping around right after that event. Hatch was my best friend. I was a single man for most of his life and we survived the ups and downs of life together. I got married in 2020. Hatch had started to really slow down that year.

He was sixteen, ancient for a labrador retriever. Every time I thought he wasn’t going to see another week or month he

would bounce back. They say they will let you know when it is time. Well I woke up one morning and he let me know. I made plans with the vet that following day. I cooked him a steak that day and got him a frosty at Wendy’s. We went on one last ride on some dirt roads that afternoon. I think about him almost daily and fully believe he stayed with me till I married Melanie.

We have two ankle biters now. One had come with my wife. He’s a rescue.

The other I got for her the fall after Hatch’s passing. She was going through cancer treatment, and I wanted to get her another dog. I plan on trying again on the fishing dog thing next year. Been trying to decide on what breed I should get. I fully don’t expect that dog to work out as a fishing buddy either and that’s perfectly good with me.

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S.C.O.F Magazine | issue no. 56 | SUMMER 2025 | GOOD BOY