A pertinent quote

Why in these days and times we need to be more than just fishermen. The waters and the fish make the experience of fly fishing what it is. Without them, it would be just a bunch of us using expensive gear to chase hatchery drones.

"We have reached a time in the life of the planet,and humanity's demands upon it, when every fisherman will have to be a riverkeeper, a steward of marine shallows, a watchman on the high seas. We are beyond having to put back what we have taken out. We must put back more than we take out.We must make holy war on the enemies of aquatic life as we have upon gillnetters, polluters, and drainers of wetlands. Otherwise, as you have already learned, these creatures will continue to disappear at an accelerating rate. We will lose as much as we have lost already and there will be next to nothing, remnant populations, put-and-take, dim bulbs following the tank truck."

Thomas McGuane

Carpe Carpio

On a whim I explored an area lake in the pursuit of panfish. This lake does not allow motors on boats so it would in theory also reduce the amount of motorheads on the lake fishing, and give me some peace. I caught a few panfish and two largemouth bass, but the water was a little cold yet for the best action. After five hours I ended up at a dark bay at the end of the lake which the wind was blowing into. There were large fish jumping and rolling, but I could not tell if they were largemouth bass on a feeding binge or what. I made repeated long casts into the dark water and finally hooked one. It ran and broke me off quite easily. These were not bass, they were carp. Big carp ready to spawn and on a feeding frenzy. I knew I had found what I always wanted- a carp on the fly. However, since I was going for panfish, I had a 8'6" 5 wt with a Hardy Bougle' reel (click and pawl drag). I was totally under-gunned. After breaking off two more fish, I cut my leader back from 10 feet to around 6 feet, tied on a size twelve crystal hackle soft hackle streamer, and bombed out a cast. Strip...strip...pause...strip...THUD. Boom, fish on. I hoped I wasn't foul hooking these fish, but when I was able to carefully raise the fishes head after about five minutes of screaming reel and careful line management, there was my fly in the corner of its mouth. My first carp on the fly! Around 12 pounds of Midwestern golden bonefish lay on the bank for a quick photo.

I came back the next day to try to repeat the same process, this time with appropriate gear. After an afternoon of finding panfish on the beds, I made my way to the bay, and on the third or fourth cast in, hooked the first fish on a new carp fly I had tied that day. The fish dove, and the fly popped out. Crap. I checked my hook, made another cast, and heard a trolling motor near to my left. Sure as heck, there was a boat heading right into the area I was casting. They anchored directly on the spot I was casting to, and proceeded to cast their bobbers over my line. WTF! I tried to make conversation, but they knew what they were doing, and just were going to fish their spot, regardless if I was casting into it or moving forward into it. The occupants of the boat were the perfect specimens of the Midwest goober-schlub-goons. The guy was about 300 pounds and dressed in camo. Perhaps he thought the fish couldn't see him. The wife looked like a troll and smoked a cigar. While I pondered my chances another boat parked slightly behind the first and hemmed me in even further. As I told my friend Dave D., the experience reinforced my rather misanthropic side.

But at least I had pulled another hat trick, and added another species to the long rod. On a click and pawl reel to boot!

A proper Dunt

I finally found some white wing turkey feathers in matched pairs and put them to good use.
Here is a 3/0 Dunt Dee fly. Should look good stuck in a tree in the Bone Yard run... which is why I don't fish these in our river.

I will be conducting a casting clinic at Greenfield Park in West Allis on Tuesday May 12th @ 5:00 pm for the Milwaukee Lake and Stream Fly Fishers club. Everyone is invited to come and join the club in tuning your fly casting. The more the merrier. You might be in for a treat, and watch me throw tailing loops! ;)

A recipe for disaster

How to destroy a fishery.

1. Cut down trees using clear-cutting techniques. Do no soil stabilization.
2. Place a dam on the river with little or no fish passage opportunities.
3. Build homes and Mc mansions in the riparian habitat.
4. Answer angler's concerns about dwindling supplies of andronomous fish by opening a fish hatchery and dumping pellet heads in to replace the wild fish.
5. Let the hatchery fish spawn with the wild fish, thus diluting millions of years of genetic evolution.

Game over.

This is what California, Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia have been doing for the last hundred years.

Einstein defined insanity as the act of "Doing the same thing again and again, but expecting different results."

If this is accurate then some people in Oregon are insane. After all, in 2009, applying 19th century thinking to our environment can only lead to disaster.
____________________________

From CF Burkheimer Fly Rods comes this little gem.

Proposed Dam on the Siletz River

Posted on April 30, 2009

The Siletz River drains the rainiest part of the Oregon Coast Range, traveling a tortuous path through steep forestlands to the Pacific Ocean. The Siletz isn’t a large or famous destination river, but it is a unique gem, and supports more species of anadromous fish than any other river in the entire state of Oregon. Spring and fall chinook, fall coho, summer and winter steelhead, chum salmon, and sea run cutthroat are all native to the Siletz basin. Lamprey too! Siletz summer steelhead are particularly unique, being the only native summer race of steelhead in the entire Oregon Coast Range, with a few hundred wild fish returning annually to spawning grounds in the upper basin. All of these fish species manage to survive despite intense past and present logging in the basin, continued introductions of hatchery fish, and documented cases of poaching each year. What could make matters worse?

A dam.

Political forces in Polk County are currently evaluating the feasibility of damming the Siletz River. The proposed dam on the South Fork Siletz River would be 100’ tall and create a reservoir 5 miles long and 3 miles wide. A total of 20 usable river miles of mainstem and tributary habitats would be blocked. The best and preferred chinook spawning habitat in the South Fork Siletz would be directly inundated by the dam. The remaining stream reaches in headwater tributaries above the reservoir would become isolated from one another, confounding the seasonal migration of juvenile fish among various tributaries essential for their survival. The lake itself would become a gauntlet of invasive stillwater bass, bullfrogs, and other species that always seem to benefit at the expense of native salmonids. In an unprecedented era of dam removal, why on Earth would Polk County propose now to dam the most diverse anadromous river in Oregon?

Follow the money. The headwaters of the Siletz River lie within Polk County, which in recent years has seen increased development as a bedroom community for the Oregon State Capital. Growth requires water, and continued growth will strain existing Polk County water supplies, jeopardizing further development and cash influx. Polk County borders the mighty Willamette River, which provides an abundant and perfectly usable source of drinking water, with communities both immediately upstream (Corvallis) and downstream (Wilsonville) treating Willamette River water to excellent drinking quality. Polk County has an open option to purchase additional Willamette River water rights from the nearby city of Adair, but hasn’t done much to explore this option. With Willamette water so close and readily available, what makes damming a remote coastal river so appealing?

Follow the money, again. Historically, the creation of large reservoirs in remote areas in Oregon and elsewhere has promoted development and recreational tourism. Landowners along the Siletz River could stand to gain handsomely from a new dam and reservoir. Riverside lands formerly owned by Boise Cascade and now deemed unproductive timberlands were purchased in recent years by Forest Capital Partners, a land holding company with a long history of making lucrative land deals in forestlands. Their clients are wealthy investors, not family loggers in Oregon. Perhaps coincidentally, the Polk County commissioner who has been spearheading the dam evaluation effort has a background in real estate, heavy construction, and construction engineering. That’s one dam coincidence after another.

Contact Commissioner Mike Propes and the other Polk County Commissioners, and let them know what you think of damming the most diverse anadromous salmonid river in Oregon.

Mike Propes: mike.propes@co.polk.or.us & mikepropes50@hotmail.com

Tom Ritchey: Ritchey.Tom@co.polk.or.us

Ron Dodge: Dodge.Ron@co.polk.or.us

A run full of steelhead

On the Dec Hogan spey casting video, he memorably says of a piece of water on British Columbia's Dean river "Well, it looks like we walked into a run full of steelhead."

Once in a long while this can happen. Everything must be correct; water temperature, flow rate, clarity, and of course ... steelhead have to be in the river.

I have taken two fish from a run before, and once hooked three, but never four or more in a single pass through a run... until now.

After the last rain I caught the river at high flow but clear and falling, and had a heck of a half hour. The first fish felt like the bottom. I raised the rod, felt a slight pulsing, and set the hook. The fish tore off down river and buried the fly line and running line in the water as it went into the backing. Then it jumped up river. I always love that when you are momentarily of out of control.

The second fish hit hard on the swing, boiled and thrashed, and the hook pulled out. The very next cast in the same place WHAM! fish on! A different fish. I fumbled around trying to land the fish in the deep boulder-strewn waters, took a quick photo, and released it. Well, it looked like I had walked into a run full of steelhead!

After progressing about 75 feet further down the run, I got hit hard in the swing again. The steelhead gave a couple of quick head shakes telling me it probably was a small hen, and then took off downstream. I raised the rod and just let the hen take out all the line she needed. 150+ feet of backing, 120 feet of running line, and the fly line raced through the water in one long run while the hardy salmon # 2 wailed in protest. Then it was time to follow the fish and endlessly wind back in all the line stretching to the fish.

These fish were not there the day before, they had just moved in. They were not really bright, but feisty in the extreme. One may have been a drop back. The rain definitely moved the fish around a bit.

If you ask me where I caught them, I will say... right in the corner of the mouth!

The Lipscomb memorial hydroelectric boondoggle dam

The hydo-power pink elephant

The latest on the Estabrook dam issue. Milwaukee County Supervisor Lipscomb introduced a proposal to repair the stoplog structure on the spillway section of the dam, which was passed unanimously by the PEE committee and now moves on to the entire county board. The aim is that the stoplog repair will allow the filling of the impoundment behind the dam thus providing the desired water level for boating. The WDNR has stated that the dam needs much more attention and repair than simply replacing the missing stoplog structures. They will likely issue an order to prevent filling of the impoundment unless all ordered repairs are completed.

The supervisors will also vote on whether to put out an RFP for debris removal.

The other amendment attached to the $5,000.00 stoplog repair calls for a study of the potential of the dam being modified or replaced to generate hydroelectric power.

Who can spot the pink elephant?

The Milwaukee River is a spate river defined by a spring flow at its headwaters, and a huge watershed that drains 882 square miles in 6 counties. It is dominated by rainfall and snowmelt runoff. It fluctuates wildly between 100 cfs (cubic feet per second) in low summer flows, to over 9,000 cfs in flood events. Its flow often increases by ten to twenty times after a significant rainfall.

Rivers of this character are poor candidates for hydroelectric generation. The wildly fluctuating flows would leave the generator dry at low flow, and overwhelm it after rainfall. The way man has historically tried to tame rivers of this sort is to build an impoundment behind the dam to build up the supply of water so that more constant flow can be maintained. The impoundments are not small such as the 100 acre Estabrook impoundment, but must be larger and deeper in order to be cost effective. The impoundment would most likely have to be increased in size, possibly necessitating the relocation of those very residents calling for the dam’s preservation.

In addition, a larger deeper impoundment is going backwards in environmental terms. Any hydroelectric generation would have to pass strict federal standards, and undergo environmental impact studies, which it never would.

I think a study is actually a good idea if conducted properly. It would lay to rest any debate concerning feasibility of hydroelectric generation for good.

Mr. Lipscomb is grasping at any straw he can to get his way in this very personal fight for him. His Maternal grandfather operated the dam for a period.

What’s next… painting the dam green in order to pass it off as a boon to the environment?
A fresh coat of paint and a sign stating "Estabrook Eco-dam" should solve all the issues...

Hepped up on goofballs

Something strange happened last week... which is why I have been lax on the writing front. I have been in the river every day chasing phantoms. The normally dour spring steelhead that usually give a short run and a half hearted jump suddenly and without warning were replaced by steelhead from a Lani Waller video. I got a call last Friday when I was not fishing due to shoulder pain ( darn wind) that something was up. Dave P. got into a half dozen fish in a single run that Rob E. and I had fished the evening before and received nary a pull. The fish that Dave hooked were like 'Morice river crazys', and went leaping down the river. One fish jumped seven times!

Saturday morning we convened the full platoon strength of SCUM (steelhead catchers underground militia) and headed to the river for a full 13 hour day. It was like fishing British Columbia. When we arrived at the river in the morning something felt, smelled, and looked different. I told Joe S. that it seemed like I was on the Klickitat. Even the rocks looked different. The entire day Cory T., Joe S. Dave P, Brian K, and I got into fish. The tales are too numerous to tell. Cory got top billing. Joe S. kept pulling bright fish out of the same pool each time through. Every fish was brighter than the last. I got hit by the devil fish; a hen larger than we have seen this spring which ripped out the loop of line, and was instantly airborne and tail walking. She jumped over the largest boulder in the river. I was in total shock. We landed her and pictures were taken which when I receive them will be posted here. In all my years chasing steelhead in the Midwest and PNW this fish was among the hottest. It was completely out of control.

We retired afterwards to Chinese food and sleep. Exhausted from fighting fish that should not exist, we spent several hours the next evening trying to figure out what had happened, for by Sunday, the fish were gone.
Joe S. Dave P. and I figured it out. None of the fish had fin clips, and they fought, behaved, and looked like skamania. They were chrome bright and no where near spawning. Then I hooked and landed and photographed this hen as proof. It had jumped seven times in succession. They were skamania. Running in the spring when the water was the perfect height and temperature, instead of in summer when they are supposed to run, their presence gave us steelhead valhalla for a short time. These fish were hepped up on goofballs. In 2007 the DNR planted smolts and fingerlings that never were fin clipped. The skamania program has now been discontinued. These fish were perhaps the last skamania steelhead this river would ever see. What a way to go out!