BBBrownie

Having said that, I have had great success at dusk later in the season swinging traditional style muddlers.

Hey, I resent that! Edmonton is a great city, I would say much superior to Calgary...too bad about the trout fishing though! I am a transplanted Edmontonian, as much as I liked it there, the fishing here makes up for a lot. Aside from the numerous stocked potholes surrounding nearby etown, you realistically have a two hour drive to most fly water, south or west, or I suppose north (grayling) in the open water season. You could head south west to stauffer creek it is open, I am not sure whether the red deer river is open (I believe it is?) but it has big browns and is a tailwater, much like the bow is, so you will find open water. Good luck!

I wasn't a big fan. Definately a renter. I didn't even think it lived up to the hype (whether negative or positive). Half the film - Road trip, poor us, no fish, bad weather (welcome to steelheading! It wouldn't be any other way!) then second half was bent rod, then cock grippin big steelhead. Then abrupt ending. There you go. No more, no less to it. No morals, lessons, reflections, techniques to it, just tittin then fishin. Thats how I stacked it anyhow...

easy! head to the bow this weekend- if that is possible for you. It is fishing well right now.

The shot where you are dragging the boat in the fog is a great shot.

blarg.

Michelle and Armande of Bow River Shuttles organize it. Their website with contact info is http://www.telusplanet.net/public/shuttles/contact.html

Gone to vegas for a week, sorry for delayed response! Yes, this is indeed Kinsey. No, it wasn't my first steel, just one of those days where nothing seems to work, rainey, cool morning, then last couple hours the sun broke out, so did the steel. I supose I just really enjoyed fishing Kinsey on that particular day. I think it was also due to having some time with a hen player just before the buck. She plucked 4 flies, but wouldn't take solid to anything. First hit a steelblue and black bugger, then a silver hilton, then a prawn pattern, then a purple peril, then finally I tied back on the original bugger and she smashed it and took me for a ride. Oh, and Bedhead, I am not going to argue semantics with you. This is a photo post not a pissing contest, or a moral judgement. I treat every fish I catch and release with the utmost respect and never target stale fish. Nice fish by the way.

After a very slow day, I was fortunate enough to find this guy and his girl in the above piece of water. One of those days that ends perfectly, a couple fish, the way the light was reflecting off the water through a thin fog at times, grizzly tracks in the sand, pleasurable wading, alone on the run, heaven as far as I could tell...

a very special place, on a special day for me...

kispiox chrome...

some more bc fish...

Burbot primarily use barbels for feeding. Barbels are sensory organs that look like tentacles or whiskers below the maxillary. They have something similar to taste buds on the end of the barbels, swim near the bottom feeling around with the barbels for food, this is why they often take bait off the bottom. Similar setup to catfish. Interestingly, burbot are most active in the winter during the day, and in the summer and at night. As far as I know they are the only fish species in Alberta that actually gains more mass in the winter than in the summer. This is why you generally will see more burbot in the winter icefishing than in the summer. They are trying to gain weight for spawning, which occurs late in the winter.

Agreed.

Probably my favorite bow - rainbow of the year, my first spey caught fish, I saw him rising consistantly to caddis, so I tied on a goddard and skated it right into his jaw. He fought hard enough to get the 7 weight multi flexin.

well, perhaps I will add a couple more. I have some gorgeous cutt pics from this summer kicking around that I can't seem to find, I'll keep looking! Anyhow here are a few various pics. Juvenile bully with beautiful markings made for a nice shot, a snakey bow that absolutely smashed a hopper in a very shallow riffle and had only one eye, and my favorite landed fish of the year, a nice big steelhead buck that kicked my ass, then posed for a picture.

That was a nice little personal jab! Just so you know I never stated which side of the "climate change" debate I am on, only that I support minimizing emissions, pollutants. I also do not think that harvesting game is in any way "on the other side of the fence>" You are linking carbon emissions to harvesting game as being in any way related(Other than the fuel my truck burns on the way to the forest)? I harvest sustainable animals as I am a conservationist, not a preservationist, there is a huge difference that you can look up if you are not aware of this. We do indeed influence our environment in many ways, some of which greatly benefit certain species, native or not. White tail deer have expanded their range with the advent of agriculture. They are not native to the calgary area, only naturalized. In the same way that I have no qualms with harvesting (albeit rarely) non-native fish species, or even native fish species(if it is a necessary management tool in modified or desturbed ecosystems), I have no issues with sustainable harvest of game species. I really don't care whether you are utilitarian, dominionistic, transcendental or what, I jsut observed from your list of values for the earth that they were all anthropocentric. Again, not looking for personal attacks here, this is how you become ostracized, your point will be moot. So, good on you for preaching your beliefs, but in the end neither of us is a climatologist (well, I am not anyhow) or an expert studying in this field, so all we have is opinions and my opinion is that garbage is bad, and climate change needs transparent research. BTW, I have taken many dumps on dual flush toilets, perhaps mine are well shaped or something, but they flush just fine thank you (although that may have to do with my being a vegetarian for the year due to not having time to harvest an animal this fall).

Just so you know, all the bad science surrounding the climate change issue, IPCC, really burns me up as well. Even though I believe in sustainabilty, reducing consumption, etc, I really think this issue has a big black eye at the moment. I say shame on those who use science as selfish vehicle. The big problem here is that it is often very difficult tp get the public on side with a movement, to gain public trust to affect political will. When bad science is used in the manner that some abusers have in this issue, the public really loses faith. This hurts good, pure and applied science in the end. A shame is that regardless of the true processes occuring in the climate change arena, the issue may remain muddy for a long time to come as it will be very difficult to win public support back for true research and real science.

This all looks like a monologue/personal crusade to me. Is there something you feel guilty about (dirty job, drive a hummer, support feedlots, dump oil down the catchbasin, etc) and perhaps need to try and absolve yourself? I realize that the jury is still out, but bottom line, the more garbage we produce, the worse off we are. I don't care whether you believe in climate change or not, if you produce emissions, they will accumulate, there will at some point be an effect, just like if we were to all piss straight into the river (untreated), at some point it would accumulate and there would be an effect. I am never on the side of polluting and I will always seek to minimize consumption as as the more *hit we pile up, the worse off we will be. A problem I see with your list (on an admittedly quick read through) is that you don't figure in any sort of ecological arguement. It appears to me that you have a fairly utilitarian view toward nature, which is common in Alberta. You see it as only for our use, not much value beyond what we need. See, I will disagree and say that I don't feel that we have a right to continually plunder natural systems, I don't see you or me as being superior to any other living thing, don't have the right to continually take. We MUST seek ways of becoming sustainable, reducing our consumption to producing our items - food, fuel, clothing, etc from lands already dusturbed. Of course I realize that at this time it is a pipe dream, but I feel that we have the responsibility to try. Just because we are smarter than than any other organism and have opposable thumbs does not mean that we have the right to exploit everything that we are able to dominate. I am as bad as most, I drive, I have a yard, I have a dog, I probably eat more than I should some times, but I do try and reduce my footprint through the many little things I can...reduce my water usage (don't water lawn, keep rain barrels for plants, 4 short showers per week, saving for dual flush toilets), only eat meat if it is sustainable game, recycle anything we can, focus purchases on items with minimal packaging, and many other things. Bottom line, you must at least try. Defeatist attitudes will make the world a worse place for my kids, your kids, their kids, and all the living things that currently exist here.

Alright, perhaps a couple of cutts as well...

Great shot everyone! Some hogs, and some beauties there for sure! Here are a couple pics I have handy on my computer right now that I can post...Ahhh...missin fishin right now!

Those are nice ties. The big rabbit would be good for bulls in more natural colors.

I am a complete window licker for steelhead patterns, so my only purpose these days is tying steelhead patterns, although I definately throw in the odd bugger/leech/intruder, occasional nymph (not big on nymphing when I can get around it) for the bow. I just find that I am spinning up steel flies every chance I have to tie, so I really just buy most of my trout dries - aside from caddis or other deer/elk hair dries. My other purpose most nights is to kill a scotch or two. I find scotch and big flies compliment each other...