ARTERIES OF THE EARTH
A good friend recently told me that river rambling is a worthy pursuit. It was a validation of my last 20 years. Not that I needed validation, but somehow it helped qualify my desire, twenty years into the love affair. Perfect. Clear. Concise.
Passionate endeavors can be misconstrued. I love my work. Is that bad or good? Most would say that is awesome. If you think it isn’t ‘a good thing’ to love your work, well then… It is what it is.
Watersheds are so dynamic, powerful and fragile in the same sentence. The entire earth depends on water; Flora, fauna, drinking water, spawning beds, rainforests, shrub steppe, transportation, photosynthesis. It might be a bit overwhelming to list all factors that watersheds affect especially when sometimes all I want to do is double spey a fly out into a broad riffle/run. How selfish is that?
Tailwaters are wonderful fisheries, but deep in my heart the freestone river is incredibly special. An unencumbered watershed is more romantic. Simply navigating the river is inspirational. Now let’s cast a fly into likely waters, surmise the insects of the day and release a wild and possibly indigenous fish back into the flow. How cool is that?
Cool stuff at times doesn’t come easy and is not without a price. It is easy to point fingers and accuse everyone else be it the big companies, special user groups, small companies, and the like for the decline in fish our waterways face. The problems we face require a joint effort from all user groups and we cannot continue to point fingers. We all have to cast our tackle where it counts – jm
