DaveJensen

I saw this back in the summer but had no time to comment. In discussing carrying capacity & limiting factors - be it growth potential of a population or size of an individual - what factors are present in an environment? Spawning, juvenile rearing, feeding, resting, wintering, etc... I truly believe that in the case of the N & S Ram and possibly/likely in the remote bits of the Castle or lower Blackstone system the limitation to the population is wintering habitat. The pools on the N & S Ram have finite carrying capacity during winter. In the case of the N Ram, there might be 3 or 4 km of summer trout forced to winter together. Ergo, how many fry/juveniles will make it through the winter sharing a pool with a 20" male? How many nymphs float through to support those fish? How much anchor/frazil ice rips at the fish? If the pool loses 20% of its wintered fish once winter, stress of spawn, and run-off all have a turn at starved winter trout, you're left with even fewer. Sure, they move out during the summer season, but the limiting factor is winter. I say it's the same as having 6 sections of farm land. In the summer you might run 500 head of cattle. But, come winter, if those cows all have to share 1/2 of one quarter, there is going to be mortailty and only the strongest will survive - the limiting factor of winter suggests that only the strongest will survive. And the few trout that are the strongest will be afforded essentially unlimited feed during summer months when the few survivers have free reign of the hatches. If you look at the low population reaches of the S Ram and the N Ram in general, they are spotty numbers of fish but some of the larger you will find. Once you get into the more productive reaches of the canyon or the lower N Ram there is a more traditional/classic population pyramid. And when you think of it this way, realize what's going on, and see why there are a few big fish but not many, you begin to question why you need to catch them - why fish streamers, for example? If you know that mortality is higher using spoons or streamers, is catching a 'big' (relative to cutts) cutty using those methods worth it, just to do it to prove you did it, when you know you have a 2 - 3 times likelihood killing one of a few dozen larger fish in the entire N Ram? Having caught the same fish from the same pools many years in a row, you notice these things. There is a FINITE pie. Having caught Big Mama 11 straight years and seeing her go from a 15" robust fish to a 22-1/2" bold and beautiful to a slimmer one at the end. It's interesting. We're talking specific fish here. And there are only so many - exactly what can be supported through winter.

Actually, you can learn a lot about delayed gratification from dry fly fishing lake whites. Sight-fishing those particular whites in that particular spot teaches you something about the difference in takes, turns, etc between hatches and fish spp. The delay in hook set on those pods there are the same delays required for large, methodical browns. And I bet you might care for those. Cheers

Ah, depends on which way you focus. You could conceivably over-develop one set of muscles while neglecting the opposing muscles, creating an imbalance and some pain. Other things can happen too - like walking perpetually side slope - where you strain / overwork something in there. I know when I spent every day in the canyon I used to get out knee pains.

Let me guess - north bank, upstream of the launch along the gravel deflections? A few pods of lake whites right there.

Since SJW let the cat out of the bag who owns this site, and considering that this issue is an ongoing one, what a great opportunity for a FFC project that would cost a few $ but provide a great service to the FF community in Calgary and show that the magazine involved cares about its home community. Why don't you guys get together and put up BIG ettiquette signs at the boat launches? You'll need 3 signs total that tell folks the stuff being discussed here. About $3K worth of design time and production/installation. A HUGE PR opportunity for the board, to get more folks interested, to be more visible in the community/on the water. Partner with TUC as a community stewardship program. Since Streamwatch is dead, here's a perfect opportunity for the forum to fundraise. Maybe the owner of the forum's business could match raised $? So too TUC? - for a community stewardship/involvement plan that educates, includes, and invites people to get involved in this community. Pretty solid PR exposure. Literally everyone wins.

In reading the comments here, I'm beginning to see/wonder about the avg leader length. I almost never fish under 14 feet and almost never over 18 feet (on flowing waters). I suspect leader turn over speed impact, line control, mending, etc are quite likely major issues for people with shorter leaders, especially, say, if you are using a 9 foot leader on a 6+ wt rod. If you have high line speed with that set up, it is going to land pretty hard. Just something to consider prior to worrying about tippet shyness. I ran into a nice fellow on a brown trout stream earlier in the year who had trespassed to access the stream and he had cut off Amelia & I. Not our favorite as it ended our day, but what can you do? He had been working one riser for an hour and had tried 'every fly in the box'. I asked what he'd been using and everything was tiny this, tiny that, emerging this or that, all on 5x. He recognized me and asked me what to do. "Try a #10 ___, and for goodness sakes beef it up to 2X," I told him. "2X??!!! No way!". But he did tie on the bigger fly. Sure enough, he hooked the fish straight away. And then broke the bloody tippet not 2 seconds later.

Two things: 1 - It's the Bow. It is expected. Our reaction to such situations is ours to own. If you submit yourself to a scenario that you are fully aware of the possibilites, and then react negatively when those possibilities arise... is it on the outside influence/perpetrator or on you? My vote is that it is on ourselves when we choose when, where, etc we fish. Why is it that with our limited time to fish and with our excitement to fish that we expect things to go our way - esp when so many factors are out of our control we expect to control others rather than own our positions? 2. Is running a drift boat down a narrow, skinny side channel good etiquette, especially for a guide? Great that the second example's oarsman could row hard to avoid, but should that boat have been in that skinny side channel when he/she knows full well these are prime wade angler locations? (and before the specific person reacts, this is simply a bigger picture question). It's easy to simply say life's too short too worry about this stuff, but at what point do we take ownership that we are going to cause direct conflict with our actions, esp knowing wade anglers target that specific water. Funny that, of course, the above points require us to own our forethought into scenarios, and own our actions, and reactions in honoring ourselves and others. Cheers

Drake - the walleye population is doing extremely well. So much so that there is likely to be an opening of some form on the river after the FMP is done. Yes, the whites are down from the peak just prior flood '05, but when the flood hits a population and at the same time a top predator in the system has its #s improve so dramatically, suppression happens, which is why the whitefish regs reflect that. Pike pops come and go but they are almost as hard to get a good handle on #s as the browns in the RDR - look for more protection of pike in the future. That said, we've caught a lot of pike in recent years in key spots. You are right about the sculpins but when you look at suckers, etc, they are still there in good #s. Then there is the goldeye pop. And the browns - honestly - they are what they are. If you were on the river this spring, you know what's there - the best spring since the flood, hands down, for us. But, really, in looking through photos lately and remembering the moments and fishing for browns in the RDR the past 15 years... it has and always will be*** a poor trout river with world class moments with browns lest we nuke the other top level predators (and I am not advocating that). But, for what it is from a brown trout/fly fisher's perspective, it is an amazing resource close at hand. You simply have to have the flexibility to time it well... and the browns in the RDR are generally not hard to catch. The habitat issues - absolutely. But what are you (collectively) going to do about that? We can't change that over night. There are growing watershed groups' movements that are making some headway. Like all things, we have to bottom out before things improve. I suspect that worm has turned. But, if it takes 100 years of farming to create a situation, it'll take a few years to come around - and it won't ever be as good as when the Palliser Expeditions came through. Not a chance given the intensity of use. The reality is that in Alberta, when you look at the bigger picture, we have excellent fishing regs (as a whole). Sure, we could use some tweaking in site specific locations. Our issues are not regulations related so much as habitat and sheer volume of users and user conflicts (which will lead future regulations response). *** I had to come back to this to edit - 'has and always be' refers to post dam river. We all know the influence of a dam. We all know that the river used to be bulls/whites. Using time stamp of the dam as reference, since it is what it is and will be for a long time.

Really looks like a tiger. Neat shot - for what it is. To pick up on a thought - brookies the biggest threat for the moment - to you. In the Bow drainage, is the brookie the worst thing that happened? Maybe to the bulls but the rb and browns certainly took a sledge hammer to anything else. Rainbows in the OMR vs brookies in the OMR - which is worse... For you, obviously, got it - brookies in your back yard. But on a larger scale, what a lot of folks consider prime fishing is like playing with an acreage full of dandelions to someone else. Not arguing anything in your post, just sayin' for sayin' sake. Hope fishing remains good down there. Cheers

I don't think I've ever floated the RDR and not caught a fish. Fish being the operative word. Green Drake - would it be best if we had the historically present bull trout or the non native browns? Would it be best if we had more native walleye and no browns? Andis there a difference in catching a bunch of goldeye vs 2 - 10 browns? To whom? Hence why I've pushed 10+ yrs for the RDR Fisheries Mgt Plan to be revisited. And, this year, finally - we will be doing just that. One note about the petition: it does not line up with the guiding principles, foundations, etc of Alberta Fisheries Management. To try to super-impose a new regime on one river without first changing those guiding principles is not going to fly. The two are a separate set of procedures. One arm must patiently wait for the other to catch up. Hence, the petition is ahead of itself. Proceduraly, the group should be first changing the foundation (which would go through the FRT mtgs, bios, politicians, etc on a provincial scale). That takes abouto 10 years. After that has occurred, then follow up with a site specific regulation that falls within the new foundations. To attempt to usurp process will not work. But they've been told that by essentially everyone, from techs, bios, MLAs, etc. Nobody is saying that their plan does not work. Nobody is saying they are wrong to want more. Nobody is saying not to try. Everyone is saying process - respect it and go through it and work within it. That is the only way gov works. And sure, I'm sure this will evoke the same kind of response I've received before but all I am saying is follow procedure within the foundation of our system. There are some (not all) very positive ideas in their literature that will never see the light of day until they follow process. I've never been against everything in their plan, just the methodology.

Ditto on that set up. Apparently AJ says we did 77 of 89 days in NZ camping in the unit this year. Never done so much camping in my life. Every situation is different. PS - and yeah, you could say the wee spring creek behind us is worth fishing.

That would be on the investor side of a time share - if you think that way. Otherwise, yes, what flavor are your noodles? Something like I'm talking is for ff, but if you want property and to set something up it does take $. Not for everyone though. But it could be done quite well and very reasonably and serve a lot of people & their friends/families who then wouldn't be on the investor side of things but contribute to the maintaining of the investment. I'd put MB in the fall against anywhere for scenery - on a crisp, calm evening (of which there are 6 or 7 each year)

It's an interesting concept for sure. The idea is sound if done with a plan and a group of investors that 'get it'. Lots of options for fly fishers. the only downfall is that you don't want to be the one stuck with a week in early Aug when it's +35C and the fishing sucks. It'd have to be done on a spring fall schedule. Maybe a 16 week season. 8 investors = 2 weeks each? $30 - 40K start up investment for property/present house + whatever the plan is for infrastructure (boats, motors, guest cabins, etc). I got an email out of the blue from a fellow last summer - Turner something or another - who was going to start a ff lodge/guest cabin with boat rentals but it hasn't panned out as yet I guess. But there is something that could easily be set up with a group of folks that simply want to fly fish and have it open to their group of friends. A week in the spring and a week in the fall is really what you'd want - all set up so all you have to do is drive there and the boats, gear, etc is ready. Keep it to the group and their friends with a useage fee that's reasonable. It could work very, very well. Not that I've thought about it much.

I'm surprised that nobody has opted to do a group timeshare on a property or two in the Manitoba Parklands. 10 hr drive. Lots for sale in the area and WAAAAAY cheaper than AB. Just sayin'.

I know what you meant by that - but to give an idea of scale of proportions on warranties 'in season' - we just sent 3 rods back en mass and the repair # on the first to the last was separated by 20. The fellow on the other end told us "that's how busy we get during the season". It was a 15 minute call. The scale is important to understand. The quality of rods these days is amazing, but they do break and when they do, we have to consider how many fly fishers there are on the planet when dealing with these comapnies. Amazing stuff.

The original FFOAA (FF Outfitters Ass Ab) had a group permit (Park Use Permit) to cover this. It was within part of the mandate to have this permit to cover members. Of course, it also had a group insurance policy for its ff guide members (the only issue with that policy was that it didn't cover on the water activities which kind of became the hub of the whole unwinding). Most guides across Ab wouldn't have this PUP today. Yes, technically/legally, you need it to operate (read, even to park in a Provincial Rec Area like parking at Ram Falls, Highwood, Livingstone Campgrounds to access the river while guiding/teaching/seminar you'd need a Park Use Permit). Nobody has ever enforced this. It would now teeter on officially enduced error given the #s of guides using Fish Cr to launch through the years with no hint of enforcement. The gov certainly couldn't simply start writing tickets based on the ostrich performance on the issue to date - they'd have to do a feathered in education/warning program much like what is done with traffic laws. But yes, if anyone were to begin complaining about the lack of enforcement on the PUP, it's quite simple. Call. And maybe, just maybe, officers doing the check points at Fish Cr Park could then ask guides for their business insurance, PUP registration, proof of vehicle business insurance, FA, CPR. But, and this is always the question - how do you prove that the boat is, in fact, a guide boat or not a guide boat in the eyes of a provincial court judge? I know my father in law couldn't do it, so why would we expect any other judge to? Just how far can you take an investigation that is clearly going to wind up unable to track a cash transaction that likely isn't going into any bank account? And that is the obvious end result of any real/perceived illegal guiding, which is why so much time & energy has gone into enforcing such rules (sarcasm).

Keep checking the papers to see if you hear of anything for the rest of the summer that isn't just a one off or a road side check point, then follow up in the fall to see if officers have fuel to drive the trucks before hunting season's enforcement budgets open up. The PR is good but reality is what it is.

One thing to consider is what you are trying to accomplish with the lens. Are you spotting? If so, using a tinted color will detract from your experience. Male brown trout heads are green, the sides of browns can be yellow, the pec fins glow yellow-green; rainbows backs glow green; male goldens glow red; brookies and bulls have distinct fin markings... etc. Color in trout spotting can be severely diminished by using tinted glass. And that's just fish - there are many other facets in spotting that coloration is very important. The amount of light filtered is a strong consideration as well. Me? Maui Jim HT lenses. Not to say anyone else is wrong - they work wonders for me and have received RAVE reviews from everyone I've let try them in tough conditions in NZ. Hope that helps someone. Happy fishing.

Just a note to say an ongoing thanks to the crew @ FFC for continuing to host this forum. It's not an easy thing, especially in winter or during times like now when the waters are high and muddy - people can get a wee testy! My favorite aspect of the forum is genuine discussion and seeing the sharing and positive, helpful posts that enhance each other. It's not always an easy thing, hosting forums (I'm sensitive to that), so every once in a while it helps when you get some positive feedback about what you are doing. For as often as I can stop in, thanks! Dave

No offense, I'm simply using this space to reiterate - a better poll would be to ask what people are willing to do/be involved with to effect a positive change that honors/respects all realms of recreational users. To only look at powered boats is to stick your head in the sand to ignore the fact the river is seen as the main water recreation/environmental backdrop for 1-1/4 million people and a futuristic vision needs to start evolving. Cheers

I don't expect everyone to agree with my perspectives, more just typing this for discussion. Nor are these absolutes, carte blanche points. I posted the video to show that a stream with 150 trout/km can still produce within 5 minutes of a jet boat. The trout aren’t as impacted as you’d think when something happens repetitively. Conditioning does that, frankly. Honestly, fish adapt to their environment and have been doing so for years on the Bow (note: cumulative intrusions between anglers, jet boats, canoes, floaters, predators, etc). They will always do so. And if a stream with 150 trout / km can produce under 5 minutes after a jet goes flying past, I’m fairly certain the Bow can produce a fish or two as well – with its 2400 trout/km. You might not get all of them sipping caddis on top, however. The key thing about that stream in my video – essentially a giant spring creek – is that the jets have been there forever and if you want peace – you choose not to fish it. When we fish it, we simply accept that is the way it is. Why get all uptight and ruin your experience? When you know certain things are going to happen – you have a choice: go and decide to have a good time or stay home/go elsewhere. Why on earth would you submit yourself to a situation where you know the outcome already and you know you are going to fight it in your head? Why would anyone do that to themselves? I also posted the video to show that it isn’t just a local issue. If you care enough about your local river, do some research and find out what other areas are doing to make it a workable situation. And I’m not talking about just here in Canada – be a leader and find what others in other countries have done to make it workable without necessarily being combative. The issue is not going to go away, it is not going to get better. I am very surprised that nobody from this forum has done any co-ordinated, collaborative video recording of the jets. Show that there is an issue. Streamwatch made good progress with a lot of data collected to show impact and user reach, why does this forum not get together to do something and show leadership – to make sure its feature river and its users are playing nice? This is FlyFishCalgary, right? Obviously there are yahoos on the water – document it, report it. Anyone that has taken the boater exam knows the rules of the river but if nobody is documenting the infractions and showing proof to authorities, you won’t get anywhere. You need to show sustained infractions and the safety hazard that is occurring. Document, report, follow up. Repeat. You may find it is actually a group of 4 – 6 jets that everyone is actually complaining about. Set up a Sub-Forum for the FFC site and have a “Spottings” thread so you can document it. I suspect it would be the same core of jetters everyone is complaining about. Guess what? The boats have call letters and descriptions – now you have data to take to authorities. And by ‘not combative’ – invite these guys to the FFC sub forum about jets so they can see how others perceive them but also so you can get to know them and tie into their circle of friends / co-jetters. Heck, create a Bow R Rec Society that has a framework of how all users can interact. There is an issue with too many people on the Bow, and every user can admit that. Even when it comes to fishing there is an issue pre-runoff as there simply isn’t enough water to accommodate wade and boat anglers on those gorgeous early season days - as the wade anglers simply can go to the guts of the river and then they expect all boats to accommodate them. The trouble is that in many runs on the river, pre-runoff, there simply isn’t room for a boat to float between the bobbers being tossed to the guts of the river from either side. But, the issue really is this: Fishermen won’t ever be happy because of the inherent “I want it my way” attitude predominates. Whatever happened to honoring the other person by simply being courteous? This might mean that wade anglers don't wade to their nipples just to conquer the river, and drift boaters just don't drift the city to Policeman's early in the year. About the only time there perhaps might not be an issue of too little water to accommodate all users is the peak of runoff to typical early summer flows, but that accounts for 2-3 months of the year. There is not a lot of room for 400 vessels to co-exits over 60km of water that happens many summer days. As the availability of play zones between users is limited, there may be need for seasonal restrictions. Honestly, it is extremely difficult for a motorized craft not to impact other users during lower flow periods on the Bow. But it will be 5 years min from today that you change the restrictions - based on starting today. The system simply takes that kind of time (at least) and if you don’t stop giving it lip service and start to take action / document things – you might find that the jet boat association has quite a few Bow R users in Calgary 5 years from now that have a stronger lobby than you. And then it’s really over. The Bow is starting to come to a cross roads. It’s being used by a society that simply wants to use it, by a population that has as much $ as any in the world, and those people have high expectations that things will stay the same as it was ‘back in the day’ – and is based on our Canadian outdoors heritage (and that covers a lot of cross sections of a changing society and its interests) . That’s a really, really tough juggling act. And the worst part about it is - if/when regulation comes to the Bow, the users will simply shift to another water and the entire process will start over again - on that water. Sadly, I'm not so sure that the Bow is the worst case situation in Alberta for river recreational conflicts (try the RDR system), but it is likely the one location to get public support for changing it. Someone in Calgary is going to have to show some leadership on the recreational use issue, and not based upon their interest. It will have to be based on the greater common good beyond fishing. Resource management isn't based upon the birds, bees, and trees. It's based on managing us and our inherent inability to agree on how we should use it or how much of it we should use. The birds, bees, and trees would do very well without us.It's tough for most of us to admit that our Canadian outdoor heritage is simply based on using a resource to fulfil our own selfishness, simply because that's how it has always been. But it's when we step outside of that perspective, that's when we can affect change. PS - the hummer in question? This shot was from 2006. Had there been a group organized to deal with this kind of conflict this user wouldn't still be getting his Hummer stuck out in the middle of the river.

I'll throw this video out there. (edit: sorry, I removed the video because it was taking on a life of its own on Youtube)

As above - but one thing we do get here is a period after low elevation run off where the water can warm and hatches occur, followed by an odd warm spell that, while lower elevation run off has finished, the mid to upper elevation reaches snow melt sees in stream temperatures cool off considerably downstream, even though visibility may not fall off too severely. That time frame can see hatches slow down and fish get a little sluggish, feeding windows narrow. I've seen lower reaches of rivers that were in the high 40s come way back down to the high 30s or low 40s even though it's considerably warmer outside. The present weather patter ins similar to this, though it has affected visibility on most of our trout streams. Hope that helps

It's actually a passive aggressive look that appears to be smiling but is saying get the hell away from my fish. I just had to buy one.

The L400 and L300 are completely different beasts. And the L300 is the beast. The L400 pulls extremely well on hills. When I drove the Coquihalla it maintained 110kmh, but that was peak with AJ & I and a bit of luggage. The L300 is the one that not only barely pulls 70kmh, but it does it with chugging diesel effect. The L400 handles very well. The passing power is actually, surprisingly quite good. For what we do, $10 - 12 K for a used 4x4 diesel van, it's a great vehicle. There's a Delica Canada forum for anyone wanting to check it out more - and lots of positive members that can put you in the right direction when buying or looking for parts if/when that pops up as all vehicles tend to. As per driving RHD, the only issue I have is at an intersection where I am turning left. I simpy wait for good sight lines if there is a truck turning left in the opposite direction. One single lane hwys, sight lines are seldom an issue as the buffer to pass gives quite good sight lines. It's a minor adjustment. A queen mattress fits in there too, and we camperized the NZ machine easily. But, it has to make sense for what you want it to do.