I’ll be logging here until I become sick of the exercise, or the editor kicks me to the curb, which has happened before.

Once he got used to casting the line and not some ball of lead, the fish began moving on the fly. Some slashed, some rolled, some simply drew the fly down, but we got to eyeball them, which is the point.

Since I can't cast to these pools, I just tie a fly to the tippet and dangle it down through the deadfall on a stiff willow branch.

Paiting: Aengus's Stream, Greg Keeler

Male, 73 cm, two visible tags behind the dorsal, clipped already. The data is entered. We drive the holding tanks upstream about a mile above the work area, then carry them to the stream and gently release a couple more.

Photo: Jay Humphrey

A sometimes guide on the Methow, as well as on the Olympic Penninsula and elsewhere, Matt sent us this lyrical gem on the nuances of getting your ass kicked in Spokanistan, WA.

He spent twelve months evading Himalayan storms, honing his photography skills, learning how to live out of a pick up, and fine tuning the art of making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

If you expectafish it happens, if you dont it doesn't. My dentist, Doc Covello, who got the BASS bug several years ago, was good enough to fill a giant whole in one of my teeth. He's been using his dental tools to make BASS jigs, and we  were talking about coming up with some kind of a buzz-bait you could huck with a fly rod.