Author Archives: KBarton10

Scheherazade is easy. The little black dress is hard.

Miss Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany's I’m not sure that “the little Black dress” is just a girl’s best friend, it’s one of my favorites as well.

I was reminded again Sunday, when older brother and I endured another fruitless expedition; we’d tried everything else and I knotted on a battered black thing hoping it would reverse sagging fortune. One large fish rolled off the bottom to intercept -one brief throb of the rod, and the dance was over.

Why the black fly drew a lethargic fish when all else failed is unknown, but it adds to the notion that Black is somehow different.

Like the Little Black dress, black has a legion of followers. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a naturalist, impressionist, or surrealist – you’ve got a handful of black flies in your flybox, and at least one of them has made your “top 10 list.”

Black is singular lacking gradients or shades, and the flies we make from it use action words, not qualifiers. There’s no ambiguity in absolutes, and while “pale”, “medium”, and “rusty” work for other flies, black flies are syllables bitten off by teeth …

Black Leech. Black Gnat. Black Martinez, AP Black. Black is past seduction, it’s more “date rape”; failing light and you’ve tried those pastel bugs the other fellow mentioned – now you want a fly that makes Momma’s fry pan happy…

Nature sees it the same way, black doesn’t mess around, black hurts; Black Widow, Blackfly, Black eye, Black Belt, Black Death.

Black’s reputation is well deserved, a unique combination of underwater phenomenon and canny anglers whose series flies almost always have a black variant. It’s the universal color, as effective in salt as fresh, fished in conditions of “too bright” or black dark, and is the benefactor of a significant physics advantage versus all other colors.

Light rays (comprising colors of various wavelengths) passing through water penetrate only to certain depths. Water clarity plays a huge role in how far they can be seen, but the warm spectrum; red, orange, and yellow are the first colors to be filtered. Red is removed within the first 10′ of water, orange next, and yellow may persist to 30′, but beyond each boundary that color becomes unlighted and dark. Increasing depth removes all remaining colors in turn, until everything’s black.

Black is most visible against a light background, and considering the fly is often above the fish and sky makes a light backdrop – a black fly offers the best silhouette and can be seen at distance.

‘When it’s clear and bright, tie on a Silver Doctor. When dark and overcast, use a Black Doctor’

Coco Chanel is credited with the Little Black Dress, with unknown  influence from the Black Doctor, her favorite salmon fly immortalized by the above quote.

For the last 80 years – countless fellows have waited impatiently at the curb and been rewarded by her fashions, for the last couple of centuries many more have swung flies and applauded the absence of color.

It’s his last day of vacation, and a toast is in order

Fix half in four years and you've got my vote Please Lord, make this one a good one…

I’m tired of little gimlet eyed, squinch-faced pricks mumbling at me from the Oval Office. I don’t care to entertain more voodoo economic models with clever names like “supply-side” or “Haliburton.”

I don’t care whether he’s a democrat or a republican, what color he is, whether he drinks, kisses guys, fishes, or wears women’s underwear, just give me a bright, industrious president with foresight and patience, whose ethics or interests intersect my own.

In a foxhole there’s little distinction between the parties, and this  fellow is going to need all the help we can muster, just to compensate for the excesses of the last couple of decades.

We’re all guilty, and we’re all going to give something; your kids will get jobs, parents will prolong retirement, and the rest of us will donate cash. The next couple of decades may yield some heroes rather than villains, and Time can choose between someone other than Jeffrey Skilling, Bernie Ebbers, Paris Hilton, or Bernie Madoff for cover art.

I’m not pleased by an 11 trillion dollar legacy foisted on us by the last administration, but as the rest of you voted for him, I’ll do my share.

In the meantime, enjoy watching Barack Obama’s last day of vacation, it’s certain to be a spectacle in the coming months, and though cautious, I’d love to see another great US President rather than read about them in history books.

It’s instinctual to shudder at "feel good" product sites

It's the food of the futureManufacturers love sponsoring a “feel good” web site about product that’s made headlines in a sordid fashion, it’s all the rage. 

Then again, some companies just take their lumps;  no “LickChineseMadeToys.org” or “PeanutButterIsSafeNow.org” – those fellows buckled down and are attempting to fix their house – with us left wondering whether they were successful or not.

Our uneasiness rests with the knowledge that none of those conglomerates truly have our interests at heart, and despite all the warm colors and Mom ladling steaming dishes of yumyum to beaming children, it’s still caveat emptor.

The latest offering is SalmonFacts.org, wherein we’re regaled with the benefits and safety that’s farmed salmon; low in PCB’s, no mercury, and sea lice are yesterday’s news.

Feel the Love:

Gray flesh versus warm Pink meat: Because of its secondary effect of turning flesh colors, some have looked upon astaxanthin as a die or a color additive. It is neither. Rather, it is simply a nutrient that happens to turn ova or flesh pink. No worries.

Escapee’s: When farmed Pacific salmon escape they do not compete well in the wild and do not have a high survival rate therefore reducing the chances of competition for food and habitat. No worries.

Crap buildup and oxygen depletion: The effects of the ocean bottom begin to reverse naturally as soon as the fish are fully harvested from a site. No worries.

Digging a little deeper into the site – past all the smiling kiddies and grandmothers, yields all the really gritty stuff. Their response to “extremist” environmental groups and the NY Times, who had the audacity to spill facts on Chilean farms.

… most of which is generated by CounterPoint Strategies, one of many “pit bull” corporate image cleansers.

That’s why I’m always skeptical, peel back the warm exterior and some fellow is telling me;

Reporters are urged to consult with members of the seafood community to provide a fuller picture of the issues involved.

“Fair and unbiased” – someone that eats sunflower seeds and rock mold holding my left hand – and a Blackwater Security skinhead with a hastily typed corporate name tag, holding my right.

Rod company layoffs continue

More economic upheaval for rod companies First Winston Rod and now Orvis. MidCurrent reports that Orvis has laid off 27 salaried employees from the Manchester office, and an additional 12 positions from the rod shop.

Luxury items are the first to go, and with everyone tightening their belt, this is expected.

Luxury bellweather Tiffany’s reported a 30% drop in US sales, and nine hundred dollar fishing rods have little place given the current economic climate. My expectation is there’ll be a lot more layoffs announced by rod companies this year.

Orvis is especially vulnerable – a combination of high end clothier and rod merchant, with a penchant for undercutting their own margins via “warehouse” sales resold on eBay.

Getting a $600 rod for $49 bucks ensures us newly cost conscious anglers defer to the electronic marketplace.

The “fun” is just getting started, tighten your belts and hang on.

Will Taimen be as compelling if we use the other five senses?

With Odorama!With Hollywood scheduling eight 3-D films this year, will the extremist angling film crowd be swayed by the flames and guts splashing over the audience – and play the same card with an angling feature?

Me? I’d say it’s a “no brainer.”

All them fellows were raised on zombie movies and carnage, and the neo-traditional “grip and grin” pose is yesterday’s news…

Prepare for the Attack of the Giant Chrome Slab of Steelhead Death – thrust into the theater by some fellow dressed like a crazed homeless person, complete with the Slimy Fingerless Gloves of Possible Strangulation.

All them fellows have a maniacal laugh – mostly because they didn’t have to pay for the trip, nor supply the camera crew with Yak Butter Margarita’s of local manufacture.

I’d suggest that AEG Media and it’s followers skip the entire genre. Instead resurface Odorama, and unleash Scratch n’ Sniff hell on a unsuspecting film audience.

A big fish is admirable, but once you’ve seen a couple dozen them 3-D glasses start to itch. The smell of a Mongolian Yurt, with adjoining stable of Yak’s in full rut – is an olfactory pinnacle whose memory lingers forever.

Ditto for every carcass washed up at the high water mark. Thrill to the bouquet of Taimen – caught after a week of direct sunshine …

Some follow fashion, and some set it, certainly there’s a unique opportunity for a film director imbued with real passion.

There’s money in them worms

garnetpin Caddis are becoming a growth industry, first the French rolled them in gold and precious stones, now we’re shamelessly exploiting the poor beasts for all manner of adornment.

Wildscape.com specializes in Caddis cases made from semi-precious stones, reinforced by epoxy, then transformed into pendants, bracelets, and necklaces.

The prices are a little easier to swallow, easier than the “brick” the Trout has to eat.

 Owe your life to a Carp? If there’s justice you will. Researchers discover how carp can survive in oxygen depleted water, and the same process could be used to minimize the oxygen depravation damage incurred by stroke victims.

It’s poetic justice, after a lifetime of tossing coarse fish up onto the bank to expire, it’s you lying on the bank gasping for breath while clutching your chest, and the Carp swims close and gives you the extended pectoral fin…

Names have been changed to protect the guilty

No, I'm the only loud fisherman in the room Row upon row of long faces trudge into the meeting room knowing the outcome is pre-ordained. The economic devastation wrought by the Wall Street mavens coupled with the cavalier treatment of debt by us consumers has finally rocked our little pond…

Management is just as solemn, there’s downcast gazes coupled with minute amounts of lint removed from sleeves, toes scuffing on carpets, and tacit admiration of ceiling tiles.

The Big Cheese clears his throat, ” … well the Governor has decreed we’re taking a 10% cut of your paychecks across the board…unless it’s an emergency – in which case you’ll work for free …”

Groans and teeth gnashing follow…

” The way it plays out, each of you will have the first and third Friday of the month off and will receive no pay.”

… and to the astonishment of the crowd, some portly, middle aged idiot in the back of the room exclaims, “Sweet!” – just a wee bit too loud, and as absolutely everyone swivels in their seat to stare holes through the offending SOB, he manages one last weak bleat, “Oh, I guess I’m the only fisherman in the room…”

The golfers were just as happy, only a “golf clap” makes less noise.

In your face and worse, in your lifetime

calendar We’ve seen a couple of decades of spittle and vitriol over the Right to Bear Arms, and many hunters are fishermen, can we assume we’ll offer as good a fight with legislators as the NRA?

We’ve mentioned the depletion of commercial fishing stocks in the ocean, how scientists predict the demise of almost all commercial fisheries by 2040 (based on our current consumption) – and a logical crisis “first step” will be to limit what everyone can catch.

The journal Science published a study by Felicia Coleman of Florida State University showing that anglers are the largest human threat for many species off America.

My question is, after all the posturing and rhetoric – after the Hollywood celebrities swear publicly they’re lifelong anglers, after lobbyists for Trout Unlimited, CalTrout, and other angling organizations wine and dine senators, and it’s all for naught, how are you going to spend your quota?

Joe Borg, European commissioner for maritime affairs and fisheries, said: “Control and enforcement of catch limits should be the cornerstone of the common fisheries policy. The future of sustainable fisheries requires us to replace a system which is inefficient, with one which can really produce results.” Under Borg’s plan, each EU state would be given a quota for each protected species. Governments would then divide this quota between commercial fishermen and anglers. Anglers would be banned from marketing their catches.

In the US we’re already prevented from marketing our catch, but the trend is plain. If the 2040 date is accepted as fact, most governments will ignore the issue until it’s too late, then clamp some Draconian legislation in place at the last moment. If you figure they’ll finally wise up about 20 years before the fish are gone, then the issue comes to a head in 2020.

Eleven years from now.

Now all those marine V-8’s and pleasure barges are hunting a freshwater venue – as they’ve used their allotment of salt water quarry by March, and if we give them a decade to start the same spiral in freshwater, it’s opening day of 2031, and you’re allotted 6 trout for the season.

Catch and Release may no longer be an option, because a 25% mortality rate is unacceptable.

We fought that legislation too – only we chose an aging Tom Cruise as spokesman – and he got Congress sidetracked on the whole Scientology thing and we lost. The decline in size of freshwater fish over the same 20 years, rendered those big stonefly nymphs illegal, and now anything over a #12 triples the mortality rate for trophy fish (11″ and longer).

So you’ve got 6 trout per season; do you go for the big dollar Montana trip – the cedar lodge, the grizzled guide, and use your entire quota in a single outing, or do you husband your quota until October – when the streams are deserted, and everyone else is working on their allotment of Pikeminnow and Suckers?

Take your time, you’ve got at least a decade to decide…

Add durable to a long list of stellar qualities

A beginner tears hell out of everything – it’s his nature; the unfeeling, uneducated, flailing of amateurish casting is the best way to determine whether a material warrants more study or whether its got both durability and looks.

…that and you can see whether the dyes cause wounds to fester, as only the novice can imbed a really big hook where it’s least desired.

I had an awful lot of casualties this week; fanciful flies with intricate parts, simple flies with new replacing old materials, and simple patterns that merely allowed something to flop around in mid-air.

The winner was the Polyamide double eyelash yarn, it’s completely bulletproof and possessed of qualities unlike any other synthetic I’ve seen in recent years.

 Opaque when dry

The bad news is that every source I’ve identified has ceased production, and while finding multiple sources of manufacture, I assume its the “look” of the finished garment that’s no longer in fashion.

 Translucent when wet

The dry version of the fly looks nice, but the soaked material has a marabou-jelly quality that simply defies description. The dry version is opaque, the wet version is translucent, and the damp fly resembles jelly.

Add to the mix the crystalline sheen of seal fur, and a fiber size about half the width of a human hair – where the slightest movement in water current or line causes the head to pulse and tails to flop wildly – and you’ve really got something special.

 Gelatinous when damp

I managed to get four skeins of the Gedifra “Costa Rica” flavor, and have seen similar yarn marketed under the Feza “Karbele” label. Six skeins of the autumn colors are available on eBay but that’s all I’ve seen in recent memory.

There’s a special hell for fly tiers … we finally get a couple synthetics to slow our killing of real critters, only to find the man-made stuff is closer to extinction than the beasts we’re saving…