Dustin Chromers
Legend
The food is actually improving things. All the needles and shit get washed away.
Fly Fishing Elitism?
- Thread starter kmudgn
- Start date
Dustin Chromers
Legend
First off it's fisherMAN.
Second, get a grip. There are levels and ranks is the world for good reason. I don't wish to share the same Pallmall stained air as the bait maggots breath. They stink.
Your comparison to racism is pure comedy. They chose to be lesser than by fishing in the simpletons manner. One cannot choose their skin color. Unless you're suggesting that reincarnation into this realm is somehow linked to sins of a past life. Perhaps the roe fisherMEN are somehow doing time as the animals they are for abuse of a past life.
At any rate get real. The average bait angler has no interest in conservation other than conserving more freezer space for their horrific concoctions.
a man who was the apex of morality, compassion and kindness
When THE MOVIE came out, it was like a gold rush of Orvis outfitted newbies showing up at the rivers I was currently fishing. And a couple of years later, there were some great scores to be had at local garage sales...lol
Last edited:
A River Runs Through It is wonderful writing and a great film. Part of the reason it resonates with most remains we all love people we may not ever understand.
I just finished a biography of MacLean and he was a fierce critic of even those close to him. I suspect writing really well puts you in a constant mindset of satisfying a brutal internal (self) critic and then accept the criticism of an elite reader (editor).To write well is a constant battle of hierarchical thinking- good v better v best. Plus perhaps a kind of weird relationship to readers, specifically what is the motive of wanting a population to buy and or read about your loves? He spent a very long time writing that book and really wanted it in press. He was both elite and, yes, an elitist.
The movie was really well done, character aspirations and expectations to become not just good but outstanding....it is both elite and elitist. The setting was stunning- frontier- with all the metaphors of potential and change. ARRTI remains an amazing American work, better than Gatsby, less selfish than Hemingway, less depressing than Twain or Atwood....
This was a Redford voiceover in the movie....elite and elitist....
"And there could be no better place to learn than the Montana of my youth. It was a world with dew still on it... ...more touched by wonder and possibility than any I have since known."
Last edited:
Flymph
Life of the Party
Appreciate you proving my point.
Dustin Chromers
Legend
Anytime. You can find this type of content and more discerning thoughts about how every person doesn't deserve a participation trophy or tolerance on my Myspace page and my area in The Museum of Tolerance.
Bait fisherman in general, and particularly their more slovenly kin known colloquially as 'plunkers' really should be studied more closely.
Watching their interactions with each other, the social rituals they engage in, and their ability to fashion crude but effective meth pipes from common, everyday objects is fascinating.
Now I know how Jane Goodall felt watching chimpanzees.
Watching their interactions with each other, the social rituals they engage in, and their ability to fashion crude but effective meth pipes from common, everyday objects is fascinating.
Now I know how Jane Goodall felt watching chimpanzees.
charles sullivan
Life of the Party
The true elitists of Washimgton State are the boat bound salmon anglers. Many of their boats cost more than I paid for my home. Their political power is unrivalled. Other PS anglers are left to only hope that there are scraps of impacts left for their fisheries.
Dustin Chromers
Legend
Fascinating behavior! And look there, that one of fashioning a rod holder out of an old leaf spring, a beer can and some copper wire! This will likely cause a dispute with the skinny one over the wire.
I honestly give plunkers a pass. They are generally older less mobile fellas occupying a single piece of real estate in high water not bothering anyone. In my area it's the same half dozen guys in one of 4 spots chatting hoping for a fish. They are also of a generation that will speak up if a rig is getting cased by a tweaker. If I were king plunkers of a particular age would be the only anglers allowed to use bait in mixed fisheries.
"Early in the morning, while all things are crisp with frost, men come with fishing reels and slender lunch, and let down their fine lines through the snowy field to take pickerel and perch; wild men, who instinctively follow other fashions and trust other authorities than their townsmen…. They sit and eat their luncheon… on the shore, as wise in natural lore as the citizen is in artificial….Here is one fishing for pickerel with grown perch for bait…His life itself passes deeper in Nature than the studies of the naturalist penetrate; himself a subject for the naturalist…. Such a man has some right to fish, and I love to see Nature carried out in him."[1]
[1] Henry David Thoreau, Walden, The Pond in Winter (1854), reprinted in The Portable Thoreau (Carl Bode, ed., The Viking Press 1964) (1947) at 525-26. See also Henry David Thoreau, Journal (1858) reprinted in The Portable Thoreau (Carl Bode, ed., The Viking Press 1964) (1947) at 575 (“I am encouraged by the sight of men fishing in Fair Haven Pond, for it reminds me that they have animal spirits for such adventures. I am glad to be reminded that any go a-fishing.”).
Got to thinking about "fly fishing only" again. I don't know about Maine, but when fly fishing only (FFO) regulations came to WA state in 1940 and 41, the only known alternative regulation at that time was standard bait fishing with barbed hooks and 15 fish trout catch limits. The proponents of those FFO regulations (and by coincidence I happened to know and be acquainted with a few of them) really believed FFO served the interests of fish conservation in that fewer fish would be caught and harvested. Concepts like barbless hooks and selective rule regulations were not popularly known at that time. Not to mention "catch and release." Lee Wulff made a hard sell of that concept nearly a hundred years ago, but it didn't really catch on until the 1970s and wild trout management in Montana actually became a fishery management concept.
Built into the philosophy associated with fly fishing is the concept of restraint. "By choosing to fly fish, I limit myself to a less effective method of fishing." I understand and accept the truth to that in most fishing that I know about, except trout fishing. Certainly in early season, as rivers are coming down from spring runoff and as lakes are just beginning to warm, bait fishing is more effective. But once streams drop into shape and hatches regularly occur, and lakes warm up to where insect hatches become prolific, fly fishing seems more effective than anything short of blasting caps and gillnets. At least in my experience.
I was fishing Lake Chopaka in 1973 when I met a local man from Loomis. He was an L.A. transplant who moved to take a teaching job there. He said at first he wanted to teach all his newfound acquaintances to fly fish. He soon realized that would be a terrible mistake. The locals idea of a fishing creel was a gunnysack, and it was meant to be filled. Restraint just wasn't a part of most people's fish and wildlife philosophy. Creating a population of murderous anglers wasn't something he wanted on his conscience, so he stopped teaching the gospel of fly fishing. That makes perfect sense to me.
Catch and release fishing only came to me as a concept after I started fly fishing seriously. I was a casual fisherman who caught only a few trout because that was usually the best I could do. So it was natural to catch a brace of trout - as many as I would eat - and then stop for the day. As I began to get the hang of fly fishing, my catching increased exponentially. I remembered reading one of the Lee Wulff articles about a trout being to valuable to be caught only once. I had 2 or 3 dead trout in my creel, and I didn't want to stop fishing. So duh! Releasing fish suddenly became the most sensible thing to do after first catching them.
Fly fishing may be associated with the elitist nature of practicing restraint when fishing, but it is no longer as necessary to fish conservation objectives. Decades of experience has demonstrated that "selective rules" the prohibit bait and allow only artificial lures and flies, and single, barbless hooks serve conservation objectives quite well. Where FFO has the edge is in providing a higher quality fishery for the reason, I think, that a lot of anglers simply choose not to participate. Consequently, the fishing pressure tends to be lower on FFO waters, making for a higher quality fishing experience for those who do choose to participate. This is seen as a good outcome for those among us who think fish management should provide a range of experiences to the public. But it is seen as unjust and a bad outcome for those who would have everything reduced to the least common denominator. This leads to the sorta' political comment: All hail diversity and inclusion, but fvck equity.
Built into the philosophy associated with fly fishing is the concept of restraint. "By choosing to fly fish, I limit myself to a less effective method of fishing." I understand and accept the truth to that in most fishing that I know about, except trout fishing. Certainly in early season, as rivers are coming down from spring runoff and as lakes are just beginning to warm, bait fishing is more effective. But once streams drop into shape and hatches regularly occur, and lakes warm up to where insect hatches become prolific, fly fishing seems more effective than anything short of blasting caps and gillnets. At least in my experience.
I was fishing Lake Chopaka in 1973 when I met a local man from Loomis. He was an L.A. transplant who moved to take a teaching job there. He said at first he wanted to teach all his newfound acquaintances to fly fish. He soon realized that would be a terrible mistake. The locals idea of a fishing creel was a gunnysack, and it was meant to be filled. Restraint just wasn't a part of most people's fish and wildlife philosophy. Creating a population of murderous anglers wasn't something he wanted on his conscience, so he stopped teaching the gospel of fly fishing. That makes perfect sense to me.
Catch and release fishing only came to me as a concept after I started fly fishing seriously. I was a casual fisherman who caught only a few trout because that was usually the best I could do. So it was natural to catch a brace of trout - as many as I would eat - and then stop for the day. As I began to get the hang of fly fishing, my catching increased exponentially. I remembered reading one of the Lee Wulff articles about a trout being to valuable to be caught only once. I had 2 or 3 dead trout in my creel, and I didn't want to stop fishing. So duh! Releasing fish suddenly became the most sensible thing to do after first catching them.
Fly fishing may be associated with the elitist nature of practicing restraint when fishing, but it is no longer as necessary to fish conservation objectives. Decades of experience has demonstrated that "selective rules" the prohibit bait and allow only artificial lures and flies, and single, barbless hooks serve conservation objectives quite well. Where FFO has the edge is in providing a higher quality fishery for the reason, I think, that a lot of anglers simply choose not to participate. Consequently, the fishing pressure tends to be lower on FFO waters, making for a higher quality fishing experience for those who do choose to participate. This is seen as a good outcome for those among us who think fish management should provide a range of experiences to the public. But it is seen as unjust and a bad outcome for those who would have everything reduced to the least common denominator. This leads to the sorta' political comment: All hail diversity and inclusion, but fvck equity.
Dustin Chromers
Legend
.
I'm just honestly completely sick of praising or accepting mediocrity as equal to excellence in life and fishing. This whole diversity and all things are equally valid thing is bullshit. Some people are better than others, it's a fact. If you want to be better work at it. Participation trophies and all this crap is wrecking society. If a guy is a piece of shit he's a piece of shit, case closed. He is not equal to that of a man of merit. No we don't all start at the same place, tough shit. Take what you got and become the best you can. We are raising losers and whiners, not winners anymore and telling them they get to share the podium. That's complete crap. We need to get back to celebrating excellence and deriding poor execution. That doesn't mean we can't encourage people to do better at life or fishing but with no heirarchy there's no aspiration. This is why we are breeding more underachievers than ever before. I mean we are on the verge of a union for coffee pourers at Starbucks and the bait guys think they should get to fish wherever the actual sporting people fish. Lots of people need a serious reality check. It's unequal results for unequal effort in this world not equity for less than equitable effort. Oh yeah and we don't grade on effort we grade on results so try harder.
Therein lies the problem...being less mobile, they act as a prey species for the agile in the pack, allowing them easy access to both gear and tackle, but also cheap liquor. Much like the Buffalo, removing the sources of sustenance for bait fisherman is an important part of fisheries management.
Last edited:
There's a ton of people who were 'born on third base and think they hit a triple.' I'm all for programs that work to level the playing field. I'm also all for competition and rising on one's own merit. I don't think everyone is or should be equal. But I think it's good to strive for equal opportunity.
One of my friends guided in Montana. He looked forward to those 'well-heeled' East coasters flying in, buying all that equipment, guiding them, and when they went back home, leaving it all behind. It helped him survive the winters as he sold it off.
Last edited:
Who's the judge? Do we hold up placards with a number on them? All of the 11 placards are reserved for WW.
