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Salmon and mining interests competing over 'new' rivers

As glaciers retreat, salmon and mining companies both seek to lay claim to new habitat

by Chris Hunt - Thursday, Dec 21st, 2023

An abandoned mine on the banks of the Tulsequah River in British Columbia (photo: Chris Miller).

As a changing climate forces glaciers to retreat in northern British Columbia and Southeast Alaska, new stretches of river are appearing, and wild, wandering salmon are finding and using this unveiled habitat, a new study finds. And, researchers say, as climate change continues to shrink glaciers, more of this “new” habitat will be exposed and available to Pacific salmon. But, don’t get too excited. Salmon aren’t the only beneficiaries of these newly exposed and soon-to-be free-flowing watersheds.

Speak up for Alaska's Brooks Range by Friday

Public comment period on Ambler Road mining project closes December 22

by Chris Hunt - Tuesday, Dec 19th, 2023

Photo: Austin Siadak.

Soft-goods manufacturer Patagonia is asking its customer base to engage in a conservation effort in Alaska, where the construction of a 211-mile industrial-grade mining road could lead to the extraction of precious metals from the Ambler Mining District and irreparably damage lands and waters in the remote Brooks Range.

Finding religion on one of Canada's last best Atlantic salmon rivers

Labrador's northernmost scheduled salmon river is also one of its most reliable

by Chris Hunt - Friday, Dec 15th, 2023

Hooked up on Labrador's Flowers River (photo: Camden Spear).

I get it now. For years, I’ve bemoaned the notion that, for some deep-seeded reason known only to those crusty souls who worship at the altar of the Atlantic salmon, their chosen fish sits atop the throne of the fly-fishing monarchy.

Time

Time steals everything except our stories

by Tim Schulz - Thursday, Dec 14th, 2023

The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

—Roger Waters, “Time”

Skwala to donate 20 percent of sales to Save Wild Trout

Gear sales will benefit Montana non-profit working to save the state's imperiled wild fish

by Hatch Magazine - Wednesday, Dec 13th, 2023

Photo: Skwala Fishing.

If you’ve been paying attention to the news over the last couple of years, you already know that southwest Montana’s wild trout are in trouble. Populations in iconic rivers like the Ruby, Big Hole, Beaverhead and Jefferson are in sharp decline and recent data from Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) shows that wild trout populations on the Big Hole have hit the lowest levels since record-keeping began in the 1960s.

New fly fishing gear: December 2023

What's new on and off the water this month

by Hatch Magazine - Monday, Dec 11th, 2023

Patagonia's latest incarnation of its beloved Black Hole line of bags (photo: Tim Davis).

Fly fishing manufacturers aren’t taking the holidays off. Some intriguing items are new in December, including a premium saltwater fly rod from a legacy rod maker, the latest incarnation of a beloved line of do-everything bags and packs, and an interesting riverside coffee-making kit for those cold winter mornings on the river. Check out the new gear that caught our eye this month.

Excessive mercury found in smallmouth bass near Snake River dams

New research highlights another negative environmental impact of dams

by Chris Hunt - Friday, Dec 8th, 2023

Hells Canyon dam on the Snake River (photo: Sam Beebe / cc2.0 modified).

As if Idaho’s Snake River isn’t facing enough environmental challenges, a new study now shows how mercury is accumulating in the river’s prized smallmouth bass fishery thanks to an ecological cocktail exacerbated by warming reservoirs and decaying algae.

Hard-earned

Woodcock are where you find them

by Tom Davis - Thursday, Dec 7th, 2023

Welcome to Wisconsin (photo: Tom Davis).

The ground had glittered with frost when we started hunting; now, the shadows were beginning to lengthen, and not only was my gamebag still empty, my barrels weren’t even dirty. We—meaning my English cocker spaniel, Rumor, and I—had moved exactly one woodcock all day, a bird whose twittering rise I heard distinctly but whose pear-plump form I was unable to “find,” visually, through the gray, thickly massed ranks of popple.