RIVERS I WON'T WRITE

I hate calling fly shops. It takes a remarkable quantity of suppression to overcome my do-it-yourselfing nature and query a local expert for directions to success on foreign water that they’ve come about the hard way. And yes I know that’s what they’re there for.

Photo by Matt Reilly.

    The bulk of it is that my transient identity as a writer makes the dilemma all that much worse. I regularly set people straight on my life’s priorities—I’m an outdoor writer, which means I’m an outdoorsman first, a writer second. I’ve expended a substantial number of days--relative to my age--putting boots on the ground; finding the out-of-the-way, hidden spots that fish all the better for it; putting people on fish; and going out of my way to make sure those special places remain little more than carefully-crafted vignettes reserved for close conversation. What this more or less boils down to is that I have a darn-near medical aversion to shedding light on secrets, on pieces of this beautiful Earth somehow not already run over by human meddling, and to stepping on the feet of those locals who appreciate those spots on a regular basis or make their living revealing them to others in confidence.

    But, until I make the professional leap into the pool of the latter type of individual, who I have profound respect for, I resort to making money off of words and photographs of waters. A little ironic, isn’t it?

    I have a formula.

    This summer, the destinations I’ve chosen to write about are the furthest things from secrets I could find without writing the article another writer wrote for last month’s edition. The prime locations require a good deal of footwork to access, with the hopes that those willing to invest sweat are the kind to respect and protect the resource. However, though there may be plenty of existing information, I’m almost as allergic to writing about places I haven’t experienced thoroughly as I am giving away secrets. So, I spend my working days on the water taking photographs, flipping over rocks, fishing, and taking notes on said water, and my after/off hours fishing the places nearby that don’t have established fishing pressure and that I won’t tell you about.

    So yesterday I called the fly shop. With more than ten miles of water, not including tributaries, to check out in four days, I needed a logical place I could start with some kind of confidence. I talked to the young guy on the other end of the line like I knew him, because, at least as a fly shop worker, I did.

    “Don’t tell me any secrets, but do you have any suggestions as to good water on the…?”

    The question’s prefix is a formality. Having worked in a fly shop, I can say with confidence that you don’t give away any kind of true secret to a customer unless you’re on a first-name basis with their entire living family and attended some of their late relatives’ funerals. But you have your good information that a customer can tank to the bank and finish the day with fish-slimy hands. The young guy responded in such a way.

    The positive thing about out-of-town and first-time-on-this-piece fishing pressurers is that they live the tourist effect. You know the kind. Like how Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello may be the most popular spot in all of Charlottesville, but as locals, we have our own favorite haunts. What’s more, tourists sometimes randomly happen upon local gems that even some locals didn’t know about. It’s a real grab-bag, and there’s notable room for varying first impressions that either will, or won’t draw them back.

    And so it is with rivers and fishing them for the first time, and reporting on them, as I do. One day spent on a piece of water hardly serves as an accurate representation of a fishery. In the absence of streamflow gauges, you can’t precisely discern normal flow, water clarity, or temperature, and you surely don’t know where the best fish are, but you’ll go to Monticello until you realize you can get more Charlottesville elsewhere.

    So I invest as many days as I can to get a picture of the fishery for myself (however accurate it may be), and use that picture to qualify the opinions of local experts, guides, fly shop workers. There is no room for dishonesty in journalism.

    Thus, in fishing, I resort to cherry-picking, running-and-gunning, and pausing to put my time in where I think I should. That is, for now, and you may read about those rivers. But this time tomorrow I’ll be getting off an unnamed creek I spied on my way back to camp yesterday, with a head full of stories from rivers I won’t write.□

*Originally published in the Rural Virginian

FAMILIAR FACES IN STRANGE PLACES

I left home on a Tuesday. Little Blue didn’t seem as full as perhaps she should be with the intent of spending a month on the road in New England on a tight budget. But I wasn’t lacking in flies, food, or camera gear. So what more do I need? The jury is still out on that ever-standing question, though it’s only Day 1.

    When I found Cape Cod for the first time in two years, she was covered in darkness. Traffic held me up in the bold points of Megalopolis, and I didn’t make camp before sunset, as was the intention. Oh well. It’s all part of it.

    I regrouped in the morning. Day 1, officially, and pointed Little Blue towards Buttermilk Bay of Buzzards Bay, on the eastern edge of the Cape.

    Buttermilk is an uncelebrated fishery, itself, but it drains the 4.5-mile spring creek, Red Brook, which flows south from White Island Pond through classic Massachusetts pine barrens. Every year, around the middle of May and early June, Red Brook is the seasonal host of alewives and blueback herring, both herring species that run up the river to spawn, and the water is thick with them.

    But herring is not why people come to Red Brook. Hidden beneath undercut banks, and nestled up tight to woody cover and watercress edges, fin the speckled beneficiaries of a great conservation success story.

Photo by Matt Reilly.

    I connected with one on the end of a delicate, tricky cast that floated through a tangle of trees and landed on the upstream edge of a watercress patch. In a flash of gold he darted out from cover and ate my Edison Tiger, fashioned in a vise weeks prior.

    A familiar face in a strange place, the small brook trout that came to quiver in my hand looked no different than any I had tricked from their mountain lairs back home. However, this fish’s life story is a bit different.

    He started his life as an egg in the slow, meandering Red Brook, but his childhood years were spent along the weedy banks of buttermilk bay, filtering saltwater, and feeding on small fish and crustaceans. In the creek, as a grown individual, he sits in wait for the chance to snack on a herring fry, as they, like their spawning parents, are thick in the river.

    Indeed, until recently, the “salters,” as they are called, of Red Brook were one of the last known populations of sea-run brook trout remaining, and like their Appalachian cousins, they too face adversity.

    Near the headwaters of Red Brook and White Island Pond is the town of Cranberry, aptly named, as the hub of a great deal of historical (and ongoing) cranberry farming. As a tool perceived to be ecologically harmless, Red Brook was dammed to flood acres of cranberry bogs.

    The dam spelled low and warming water on the downstream side, which made it impossible for coldwater species to thrive where they once had unhindered. Once the plight of the salters was discovered, a collaborative effort between Trout Unlimited, the Massachusetts Division of Fish and Wildlife, and the Trustees of Reservations got the dam removed, woody cover added to the streambed, and a regular stream monitoring protocol instated.

    Today, that stretch of river is managed under special regulations, and enjoyed by fishermen, birdwatchers, hikers, and photographers.

    There are other rivers like Red Brook, and all have fishable populations of salters that love to chew on streamers. If for some reason you needed to find me sometime in the next few days, you can be sure it’s somewhere under the branches, and within 40 feet of a watercress patch sliding flies to familiar faces.□

*Originally published in the Rural Virginian

VOWA SEEKING ENTRIES FOR HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGIATE OUTDOOR WRITING AND PHOTOGRAPHY CONTESTS

For the 22^nd year, the Virginia Outdoor Writer’s Association (VOWA), along with its contest sponsors, Bass Pro Shops, Dominion, VirginiaCooperative Magazine, and Hunt’s Photo & Video is holding two writing contests, one for high school-aged students and one for undergraduate college students.

High School Contest

    The high school contest,sponsored by Bass Pro Shops, is open to any public, private, or home-schooled student in grades 9-12.  Essays should be written about a memorable outdoor experience, with possible subjects including hunting, fishing, camping, boating, hiking, birding, or another outdoor activity.  Accounts of athletic events are specifically excluded.

    Three winners will be selected and invited the annual VOWA membership meeting in Charlottesville on March 21 to present their essays.  The deadline for the contest will be February 16. 

    Prizes provided by Bass Pro Shops will be $150, $100, and $50 gift cards for first, second, and third place winners, respectively.

    For more information on the high school contest, visit www.vowa.org.

Collegiate Contest

    In cooperation with Dominion, Cooperative Living Magazine, and Hunt’s Photo & Video, VOWA is once again offering a collegiate levelwriting and photography contest to any student at any Virginia university or college, including community colleges, two-year schools, and private institutions.  Virginia residents enrolled at out-of-state schools are also eligible.  The topic for the writing contest will be a memorable outdoor experience or special interest. 

    Entrants in the “Best Outdoor Photo” contest, sponsored by Hunt’s Photo & Video, are encouraged to enter up to three of their best outdoor photos in JPEG format, accompanied by a 50-75-word description. 

    Winners will be selected by a judging panel and invited to the annual VOWA membership meeting in Charlottesville on March 21.  The deadline for all contests will be February 16. 

    Each entrant of the contests will be given an annual student membership to VOWA.  The winner selected for the best overall essay will be awarded a $250 cash prize by VOWA-Dominion.  Cooperative Living Magazine will select one winner for the best essay related to outdoors in Virginia and award a $100 cash prize and publish the essay in the magazine.  “Best Outdoor Photo”, as decided by Hunt’s Photo & Video, will be awarded a $50 gift card to Hunt’s.

    I often am faced with the question, “How does one become an outdoor writer?”  The answer is complicated and dependent on a host of factors.  However, one factor is common across the board—credentials.  Before any editor or publisher will be willing to give you a shot, generally, one must prove ability and/or knowledge.  This is at least difficult to youth or young adults without any prior experience in professional writing; and so the best options for earning a first gig, without first organically wearing down a market with hundreds of rejected query letters, are to 1) get to know someone in an editing, publishing, or writing position, and 2) make your name known in the outdoor writing field.

    If you can’t tell where I am leading by now, I’ll make it easy for you.  This contest, should you win at any level, provides both of these opportunities.  Winning will make your name known to those in the local outdoor writing community, and you can forever introduce yourself to an editor as an “award-winning outdoor writer.”  Moreover, you will be invited to attend a meeting in a room full of outdoor writing professionals, all of which are full of knowledge and the mission of recruiting young communicators.  So, if you are interested in outdoor writing in the slightest, this contest is for you.

    Still, should you enter and not win, and you are serious, come to the meeting.  Shake as many hands as you possibly can.  Collect business cards.  Take members up on their offers, suggestions, and invitations.  You will not leave empty-handed.  VOWA is a resource.

    Thus I conclude my annual plug for the writing association that started it all for me.  I do it out of gratitude to the men and women that comprise VOWA, and to everyone that has supported me; but more importantly, I do it out of a desire to see more youth members involved.  The younger generation cannot expect outdoor writing to remain strong, advocating for the continuation of the treasured passions and traditions we all enjoy without recruitment of strong voices.  I suppose that is why VOWA established, and continues to sponsor, this contest.  I hope to see everyone interested in March.□

Originally published in the Rural Virginian