Yet another fly-fishing friend has died—Jim Greenlee. It’s likely that not many readers will recognize Jim’s name, but I know that some of you still wade in the boots that he shepherded into being—along with my father—many years ago. Jim was in charge of Weinbrenner when he and my father got together and made the [...]

Since I’m going to soon be heading back to my old column in “Fly Fish America,” I thought that I’d post what is perhaps my favorite column from the “old days.” I suspect that parts of this story will show up again in another guise in a future column (and I can pretty much guarantee [...]

Another sad week for the fly-fishing community with the passing of Charlie Meyers (so close to the passing of Rusty Gates). Much more about Charlie from his close friends and colleagues here and here than I can write on FF&W. My mother has a funny remembrance about Charlie, though, involving a particularly rough plane ride across [...]

We started 2010 with fly drawings, so why not tie one on? Kel leaned over my shoulder and took this shot one day as we were fishing an old spring creek haunt. No real set-up, no real intent, just literally a quick snap-shot using dead-stock camera settings. Art? No. But it still means a lot [...]

Got an email from FF&W reader, Dan Knox, and thought it would make for an interesting blog post. Dan wrote: Is there any stream that you have always wanted to fish, but have never done so? In the USA? In the rest of the world? Might you still get to go there? Where do I [...]

Feelin’ lazy reflective today. Gonna go cast my MPR, work on the book series, and perhaps watch a few minutes of “Once in Blue Moon” (while simultaneously lamenting the fact that I do not currently have two tickets to the South Island sitting on my kitchen table). And while I do all of that, here [...]

A quick sketch of a Loop-Wing Sulphur, with thoughts of Rusty Gates and the spring hatches on the Au Sable.

I just heard that long-time family friend, Rusty Gates—of the famed Gates Au Sable Lodge and fly shop in Michigan—has died. Our family has had a connection to Rusty, his family, and the lodge for decades, and I grew up fishing the river almost every spring for about as long as I can remember. I [...]

As some FF&W readers likely already know, Jack Gartside died last night. Jack was a long-time friend of our family, and was someone who I always looked forward to seeing at shows and so forth. If you aren’t familiar with Jack, just check out his Web site for a taste of his legendarily entertaining and [...]

Montana’s Gallatin River holds so much history for me that I sometimes feel like I’m wading into a fly-fishing time-warp as I rig up on its banks. From my first trout to my first shadow cast, the Gallatin has been a part of my angling life literally longer than I can remember. It is such [...]

Spent an hour today casting and assessing three prototype finished rods and build kits. Need to tweak the last few inches of the tips (a little soft, I think), as well as the power low down in the butt sections (they’re strong, but they also cast an SA ED Sharkskin like a shot). Also need [...]

I’m slowly getting my act together on the grasshopper tying piece, but in the meantime here’s another pic from the archives. This is one my personal favorite fishing “snapshots” from Kel last year, taken on Oregon’s North Umpqua (I was working on a project at Steamboat for a couple of days—squint hard and you can [...]