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The Steelhead With A Thousand Faces
Maybe if I take five more steps, throw one more mend, skate one more fly, a hero will appear, armored in chrome, and dance to the music of my singing reel.
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The Birth of A Fishing Town
Calf deep now in the cold river, Trent’s completed his prelude of silky false casts and is ready to start the show in earnest.
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In The End, Style Might Be All We Have
Over the course of 6 trips, in and out, and nearly 40 miles, I question whether or not it’s worth it.
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Banded
Folding neatly the greenhead splashed soundly onto the water. The old lady made quick work of the retrieve.
“Sit.” Math isn’t you strong suit huh? “Stay.” Need to check your watch? “I want to get a picture real quick.” We’re a bird shy of our limit. “No!” And we’ve still got an hour of shooting light left. “SIT!” Take all the pictures you want. I’m going to find more birds. “Alright. Alright., Read More
Each year, as summer comes to a conclusion we become giddy about Fall. Glassing elk high on mountain ridges and schlepping heavy loads if you are lucky. Cooling water temps that lead to aggressive takes. Roosters erupting like fireworks and brought to hand through good dog work. It all adds up to what makes, Read More
Chef’s are underrated. The products of a gifted Chef de Cuisine should, by my estimation, rate right alongside those of lauded musicians, painters, dancers and poets. Maybe they get short shrift because of the transitory nature of their art – it will all eventually, literally, become crap. That seems unfair to me. But maybe, Read More
By Garrett Munson When your primary job each fall is to fill the freezer with wild game meat for your family to eat for the coming year, you know you live a good life – a life many fellow Montanans cherish. My young kids are not too interested in hunting stories – they want results – so the job pressure is, Read More
“I told you so.” “Yeah, but you’re just a puppy. I thought…” “I was sniffing a lot… hard.” “Right, I saw but…” “Chopping with my tail” “I…” “Chop, chop, chop. That’s what I did. I did that.” “Got it, but…” “And tight circles. I did those too. Lots of ‘em. I worked it over,, Read More
Thirty feet below a fish slowly cruised the bank. Quietly stripping line I prepared to cast. The bug landed just around a rock a few feet in front of the fish. Working lazily the fish noticed the fly and casually gulped it from the surface. Earlier, Matt had cracked the code. I had hooked, Read More
Legal shooting light is an hour earlier than it was a week ago. For those keeping score at home, that sets the average elk hunter’s alarm clock somewhere between 3:30 and 4 a.m. Meanwhile an hour of fishable post-work sunlight just got lopped-off your afternoons. Congress has given us plenty of cause for concern in recent, Read More
I had two of my four bags on the platform when the train started to move. The third duffle clipped the closing door as I chucked it. It ended up under the train. Jumping, I faired slightly better myself, decking hard on the concrete station floor with the backpack. I came up rolling, Read More
“Pile of deer, by the big juniper…” whispered Steven from behind his binoculars. “Yep. There’s at least two bedded above them and to the right.” I whispered back, also glassing the opposite slope. After a slow start to the morning, we’d spotted this band of deer from a mile down canyon. Through the spotting, Read More
Churning my legs with my four year old slung over my shoulder and a shotgun in my left hand, I tried to keep pace with the dogs. We were into birds and I aimed to get the jump on them this time. My son had been doing a good job of keeping up, but on the, Read More