Articles

Don't ignore the triggerfish

Expand your flats horizons with a new species

by Chris Hunt - Friday, Oct 8th, 2021

A Christmas Island triggerfish (photo: Earl Harper).

It was hot the last day on the flats. Muggy. Still. Severe clear. We were miserable as we slowly steeped in our own sweat, covered up in light, quick-dry fabric to protect ourselves from the worst of the sunshine.

And the fish seemed to feel the same way. The plentiful bones of the prior day had seemingly failed to crest the lips of the flats this day, choosing instead to stay in deeper, cooler water. As we motored around, prowling for bones and maybe, if we were lucky, a permit, we came to realize that this just wasn’t the day to be out there.

Chile to fully reopen borders on November 1

Both Chile and Argentina will once again welcome international anglers in a few short weeks

by Chad Shmukler - Thursday, Oct 7th, 2021

Trout-filled Elizade Lake in the Aysen region of Chilean Patagonia (photo: Chad Shmukler).

During a press conference yesterday, Chile’s Undersecretary of Public Health, Paul Daza, told reporters that Chile will fully reopen its borders to international travelers beginning November 1, 2021. The announcement brings Chile’s reopening in line with neighboring Argentina, which formally announced last week that it would also be reopening its borders to international travelers effective the first day of November.

"The roughest bunch of preachers I ever saw"

When Morningside Played Notre Dame

by Tom Davis - Monday, Oct 4th, 2021

The 1917 Morningside football team (photo: Public domain).

In my memory it was early fall, the leaves in Sioux City just beginning to turn. I must have been twelve or thirteen. Dad and I were tossing the football in the yard and talking about my grandfather, Les Davis. He’d died in 1966, when I was nine. Thankfully I’d had the chance to fish with him the summer before his death on a trip to Lake of the Woods in Ontario—my first-ever Canadian fishing trip—and to this day I’ve never seen his equal with a bait-casting outfit.

What to look for in a musky rod

Musky anglers face a unique set of challenges which the right tool can help address

by Matthew Reilly - Sunday, Oct 3rd, 2021

Extended grips and fighting butts pull double duty in encouraging a strip set. By choking up on the grip and planting the fighting butt in your armpit, you effectively lock in a downward rod angle, making a strip set more natural (photo: Matt Reilly).

In any pursuit, it pays to have the right tool for the job. In the same way that tying flies on sharp, well-built hooks improves your hookup ratio, having a fly rod that’s designed specifically for your purpose makes your job as an angler infinitely easier, translating into more success. Specifically, in low odds games like musky fishing, where every little advantage skews the probability of success in your favor, having gear that works for you, that can withstand the paces and not fail when it counts most, is huge.

The life and death of a fly rod

Most fly rods are more than just a sum of their parts

by Spencer Durrant - Monday, Sep 27th, 2021

Photo: Spencer Durrant

Fly anglers tend to anthropomorphize the objects of our obsession to such a degree that I often wonder if it’s us or five-year-olds who possess the most active imaginations. Nevertheless, the assertion that fly rods are more than just tools shouldn’t be too hard a claim to swallow. For a group of folks that regularly affirm that trout are capable of elaborate, deductive reasoning, I reckon there’s room for the idea that fly rods are more than the sum of their parts.