bcubed

depends on the weather. Typically i'm only wearing waders if its spring or late fall here, so cold water, or steelheading. The simms exstreams are the best socks i've tried for cold weather (november in northern BC cold..). I like the patagonia socks, however i tend to shrink them as i suck at laundry..

I'm confused how this will keep perspective for us "southern folk". The Red Deer is exclusive to poor dam management? I think not....

once that spirit is there..it'll never come out.. reason #131 for never buying used waders...

definitely socks, preferably wicking ones so they can move moisture up to the breathable areas. Putting talc in there will get gross quickly, too much moisture

I would say that they're good boats, but i'd recommend using someone like Nick at Troutwaters, or waiting for the show so you can deal with the guy that was there...

The guy that was at the show was awesome. However, I had a seat (i assume the back bars broke on yours wayne) and sidebag issue in October, and called and emailed (fully ignored on email) multiple times before it was late January and they were at the show to get it dealt with. They also over charged my CC, which instead of just reversing the charge, he took about 3 months and about 10 phone calls to send me a cheque. Lots of 'cheque is in the mail', when obviously it was not. Guess after working in retail, so I'm particularly not impressed. Guess it speaks to the boat once you finally get one....

Dave is good when you're giving him a credit card number, past that......for one example, it took them over a year to get me a receipt...good boats, awful service. I'd recommend getting an Assault, however do any and all accessories yourself. Deal with Nick at Troutwaters if you want good service.

Or the cringe inducing habit of a experienced guide keeping a fish out of water for another glory shot...

Pretty typical BC response. I had a guide call me regarding a lesser known steelhead river that he saw me rafting, and lit into me for over an hour about illegally guiding on it (even though i was not rowing...), and how any time I was in the area, he expected me to call him and tell him before hand...

blue green algae is everywhere (can pretty well thank them for the existence of life.). Blame eutrophication for the blooms, not the algae. I'd suspect a lot of it is extra nutrients after the flooding pushing a lot of fertilizers into these reservoirs.

Nice holier-than-thou mindset there...have you been to hidden creek yet? have you contacted anyone regarding it? While I have not been to Hidden Crk, i have emailed numerous government agencies and NGOs and yet, I'm still up for the barbless debate. Plus i work full time. Since you posted at approximately noon today, i can assume that you were not guiding.... Did you go to Hidden? Let me rephrase this for you in a way that is not hard-assed, and gets your point across a little better. Look, same point, without pointing accusing fingers at people that think differently then you, and blaming them for inaction. If the barbless debate initiates someones thoughts/fury/annoyance enough to get them to write a letter to the government (to something that may actually have a chance of getting changed), they're going to be a heck of a lot more likely to write about something like Hidden Creek.

I'm reposting this from Chris's post, as it deserves a watch... http://landusekn.ca/resource/video-hidden-creek-case-study-headwaters-management

also confused why the photos (and blog they were hosted on) was deleted....

Pass it along to the Herald, may be interested after they did this (yes, i've linked it like 4 times) http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/alberta/Disastrous+logging+effects+spark+fears+environmental+crisis/8517538/story.html

This was prior to the area receiving all that rain... http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/alberta/Disastrous+logging+effects+spark+fears+environmental+crisis/8517538/story.html

I'm more concerned about 're contouring creeks' (as is happening in High River..how do you RE-contour something that is naturally contoured is beyond me) then rip-rapping banks. Rip-rap provides more habitat then a straight dirt cut, same can't be said about a dredged river.

If you can get an appropriate anchor mount, the pully system is very easy to do. I just put a u-bolt off my anchor mount on my clacka, tied the rope to that point and added a pulley. was a 5 minute job.

How is your anchor set up now?

While you can't blame logging for the weather event, you can still point a finger a little bit.. When the cataract has almost no trees in its headwaters to hold anything back, it's not going to go well when it dumps that much rain. Sure glad they felt like logging Hidden Creek one last time...

Id say, and enough flow to keep people off the island for at least part of the summer

I've been wearing Simms for 10 years from the guides to now wearing g4s. Personally, I think the G3 convertibles aren't as good as the regular g3. You lose some of the nicer features that Simms has (fleece handpockets, tippet mender internal pocket) just so you can zip down the top into the bottom. I'd personally just get the regular G3s, and when it's warm out just roll down the top, and use the shoulder straps as a waist belt to hold them all down (which in my mind makes the g3 convertible quickly replaced)

Kris, i agree, i'm glad they bumped fees. However, the non-resident non-canadians could have had a $10 bump without anyone complaining. I agree with you about their main focus, should probably spend a bit more time on riparian areas after the flooding this year, then adding more stocked lakes. Should also watch the non-resident non-canadians getting a cheaper deal then fellow Canadians if they fish for 5 days or less, when non-alberta residents are forced to buy annual.

They're asking for feedback, so please add it, doesn't take much time: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/8GVVD5R Would also love the money go towards licensing guiding operations. But again, can change all the rules under the sun, but unless theres someone out there enforcing them, it doesnt matter.

ACA is proposing (finally) to increase the angling fees in the province. http://www.ab-conservation.com/go/default/index.cfm/aca/proposed-angling-levy-increase/background/ Personally, i think they could have bumped up the fees more for residents, as well as non-residents. Hope that they put the funds towards more enforcement, rather then just blindly stocking more lakes. Can stock and aerate all you want, but without consequential regulations and effective enforcement, we'll never get anywhere with our lakes..

Pretty surprised by the amount of deepening the river has had. It's promising for the future, and hopefully it will provide some new wintering holes and fill in some old ones. Make us work a little more to go find fish when they stack up again. Looks like the plug at the Mallard Point Back Channel (Poplar Island) was washed out, and enough of the bank was chewed out so that the river is not going into the channel at 90 degrees anymore. This *should* keep a good amount of flow running down that channel, which will be awesome for fish spawning and rearing(now only need protection for the spawners in that channel....that's another topic). Hopefully it will continue to flow. Downstream of policemens, it's very evident what happens to a river when the riparian zones have been wiped out. Anywhere that a cottonwood was on the bank held its ground considerably better then those without. Time to start pushing land owners for more responsible riparian zone management, as well as getting out and wrapping the cottonwoods to keep the beavers off. We should have a lot of cottonwoods this year, just need to protect them (seems like a good project for TU to get on)... Word on the "street" is that carseland will likely be out of the game for boat launches until late august or september (if at all) this year. Need to push TU to work on their leased land at Legacy Island to get that launch open. Time to put some of those fundraising dollars and large volunteer call-outs to work. Craziest change IMO - the new channel about 1.5 km downstream of policemens on the north bank, the one that comes out upstream from the gravel highbank. That thing is insane!