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3. The Michigan Big Ugly...

I don't want to start any trouble here on this web site. Since I've stumbled on to it a while back I have enjoyed the banter and everyone has been very helpful with sharing their info etc. I came to this site like most of us probably due to Jason's wonderful photos of bugs.

But I have a question that's bothering me a bit lately. We all talk about the different styles of fly fishing and we have all heard the arguments between die-hard dry fly guys like myself and the nymph fishermen etc. That is not where I'm headed here believe me...I've seen it...Done it!

My question is this...Here in Michigan our version of the DNR is in the process of totally redoing our fishing regs. They are doing it, they say, in the cause of simplifying them. We can all dig that! How about a little more enforcement while we are at it?

I have noticed over the last couple decades that different types of streamers have become more and more popular, bead-heads, and weight used on more and more flies. It has become almost the norm for a "new" angler to wade down the middle of the stream tossing their weighted offering against structure and just moving on.

It seems to me sometimes that our sport has changed a bit and it's all about catching fish and less about the other things we experience when we are lucky enough to be in the woods. I know that I have limited myself abit when I say that I prefer dry fly fishing, but I have spent a great deal of time, sometimes, over a particular fish trying to fool it. This process itself has interested me and if I was lucky enough to figure it out and caught that fish all the better. God knows, I haven't won every battle!

My question...I titled this "The Michigan Big Ugly" because of a old version of the Wooly Bugger we have had around here for at least 20+ years if not longer. Imagine a large Wooly Bugger with lead bar-bell eyes and an underbody that has lead wire wrapped along the hook shank. This is a "fly" that if we were being honest around beers one night we would call a jig...

Over the years we here in Michigan have put in place areas we call "Quality Fishing", "Flies Only", "Catch & Release", etc. During this debate over our new regs I'm afraid we don't truelly know where "fly fishing" begins or if we can distinguish fishing with hardware (lures/bait) from what was originally meant by fly fishing.

The question is...Have we blurred the lines so much that we can't really justify any longer restricting tackle? I am afraid that one day down the road I may be wading down the storied Au Sable only to find some "bait-boys" hogging a favorite hole, knocking back beers, and tossing their empties in to the woods! I over do it here I know to make a point.

I remember an old-timer that we use to run in to from time to time years ago. He would pretend to be deaf when it suited him. He would walk down the middle of the river with a spin casting rig with a "fly" on the end of it that he swore was within the rules...It did have feathers on it. "You guys can't tell me what to do! I have had my cabin here on the river since the 30's and all your new rules and catch and release haven't improved a damn thing! It's actually gotten worse". Etc.

I'm not sure where all this is heading and the feeling of "dinosaur" in me I can live with...I'm just not sure, after all those that went before us, and fought for tackle restrictions, if they would recognise what we do as fly fishing if they were to return from the dead.

I have a great deal of respect for the opinions I have heard on this web page. For the most part we are fly fishermen that visit this site. I'm interested in what you all might think here. Are we too much in to the "end justifies the means" or is the whole process, the learning entomology, learning a drag-free float, tying an imitation of an aquatic insect, knowing a few knots and names of the insects fish feed on...heading down a road where we can't in reality restrict how someone fishes on any river?

I mean what is the difference between a Michigan Big Ugly and a jig?

The one nice thing I have discovered with the "new" style of fishing...The folks walking down the middle of the river won't be in your hair long...If they aren't getting any hook ups they move on...Back to the parked SUV, off to the local watering hole, usually to complain on how bad the fishing is..."Hell! There's no fish in the Au Sable!"

What do you think? I know that what we discuss here won't change a damn thing, but what the hey?! I know what I'll be doing...I'll be living in the basement till spring wrapping feather and fur around a hook, re-reading for the umpteenth time Marinaro, Schwiebert, Charlie Fox, and Justin Leonard's, "Mayflies of Michigan Trout Streams"...Trying my damndest to create a fly that will fool Herr von Behr say on a size 24 Trico in the middle of broad daylight!

Now I know Mr. Leisenring said something about "We all fish for pleasure, you for yours and I for mine." I am thinking about the upcoming debate here in Michigan over regs.

Spence

Spence

i wonder if we still have time to get our comments in on the new fishing regs.

great subject spence. if you've ever fished the little manistee fly only section you know how tight it is. during salmon and now during steelhead season i've returned to my original thinking before i knew how to cast a fly. i'm pondering tying some flies so heavy i could cast them with my ultra-light spinning rod and going to the little river fly only section. i gotta figure it doesn't get fished nearly as much as the manistee or the p.m.. is that wrong? obviously if your a diehard fly fisherman you would probably be insulted. while it's true it may fit in your category of being results oriented i get my most enjoyment just from being in the water. sometimes i take more pictures than i do fishing. i do find catching fish more satisfying on a fly rod. it's more difficult for me and i have more pride in catching something on a fly i tied.

i almost wish we could have "dry fly only" sections on rivers. or maybe a weight and hook gap limit. i like that idea. i do feel that i could go to my orvis shop, pick out materials and tie a fly that would rival a spinner or a rapala. but then why not go all the way and just buy a rapala. so, i agree. some kind of restrictions or definitions of a fly needs to happen. those who know, know how to cheat.

Scott,

I was introduced to the woods by my grandfather. He never finished elementary school, but was the wisest man I have ever met. We use to hunt together in the 60's. I had an uncle that had married my dad's sister and he grew up near Marion and would shoot pretty much at anything that moved in or out of season.

My grandfather taught me what he knew of years spent in the woods and I know that when he was young he wasn't a saint, but he always told me that there was a right way and a wrong way and the rules are for everyone. He also taught me about how the animals we hunted behaved in the woods. If I paid attention to this I would have all the success I could handle and wouldn't have to break any rules.

We have very little restricted water in Michigan and next to no water set aside as catch and release...Especially if you consider just how much river mileage we have in this state. Still folks want to snag salmon, and keep fish in waters where they are not supposed to. I can't tell you how many canoes I have seen floating through the no-kill sections on the Au Sable with spinning gear.

You probably know that we had some rep in this state that has a place on the river in the middle of the Holy Water...Catch and Release. He went and added an amendment to the fishing regs allowing children under a certain age the right to keep a fish in the no=kill and fish with whatever gear they wanted. A small stretch of river in all of Michigan was too much for him to keep his hands off of because he lived there and basically feels the rules shouldn't apply to him!

The local fly shops even offered to teach his children how to fly fish and outfit them out.

I'm not pushing here the old fight between the different styles of fishing...i.e. nymph vs dry fly etc. I'm just concerned that we have stretched the envelope in terms of what passes as fly fishing to be almost unable to logically argue for gear or terminal tackle restrictions.

Don't get me wrong. I am for even more stricter regs and more no-kill sections, I just don't know if we can support our argument when we are throwing things that more resemble jigs and lures than flies.

I don't know the answer here...There are some serious anglers that visit this web site and maybe they could help us out. I toss bugs and let all my fish go...There is some science behind a single hook and fish mortality...May be the problems I think I see have to do with how folks were introduced to nature...I was lucky...Maybe others just see it as something akin to a resource, there just for their pleasure. Everyone seems to be in to instant gratification these days...They want the fish without the work involved.

Hey! Maybe someone out there will just tell me to chill...Maybe they will tell the old fart to just stay out of their way...Who knows.

Thanks for the response!

Spence

Here's my two cents. I strive to be a well rounded fly fisher. I'll nymyph,through size 24 trikes or big ol grasshoppers, slap zoo cougars against the bank, really whatever I feel like doing. I do believe the fixation on big magazine cover trout has pulled some of the nuance from the sport. Dawn to dusk all ya need is 5 split shot and a Sex Dungeon, and you're set. Granted this outfit will produce the largest trout, it takes less skill than to spoon feed a twelve incher on a sultry July morning during trico fall.

Theres seems to be a rift between the extreme streamer chuckin monster chuggin big fish slayer that make up th under 30 crowd. And the quiet studied almost ghostly approach of a veteran hatch matcher. Really both sides could learn something from each other. Please lets not pick fights.

I believe it is crucial not to polarize the fishing community. Be it by Fly, Bait, or hardware we all like to fish for trout. Trout fisheries can be better protected if there are more stakeholders.

Spence if you feel that some of the streamer guys are missing the boat take them to fish a really good hatch. It only takes one experience with Hennys, Trikes, the mighty Hex, March browns, Brown drakes, White flys,or the ever present Baetis to broaden a fisherpersons horizons. This kind of fits with the Take a kid fishing theme.
P.s. I really dig your high quality posts keep it up
Shane

Shane,

Wonderful post. I especially liked the following, "I strive to be a well rounded fly fisher."

I know that you really don't know who I am and we have limited space here, but in reality I have fished all my life. Until I was nine I hung out with my navy father in a little rented boat, in the back bays of Chesapeake Bay catching flounders and croakers near Norfolk. As a small boy, after my parents divorced when I was ten, I spent Huck Finn like summers on my grandmothers 40 acres in northern Michigan filling buckets with pan fish and chasing the mystery fish (read trout) in the Middle Branch of the Muskegon near Marion. I hunted with my grandpa every winter for bunnies in a shack with no elecricity, a good old out house (try dragging your ass out to one of these in the middle of the night in January!), just the beagle, the old man, and me...Paradise really! All we spoke of was when I would be old enough to hunt deer.

I have fished pretty much all forms of fly fishing, including what my old dry fly buddy used to call, the "black art" of nymphing. When he first took me out years ago, he told me on our first week that he was going to show me everything and everyway to fish and I could make up my own mind. I know all about the Michigan Big Ugly because I've tied it and rolled some nice trout with it.

My buddy tied my first flies for me, built my first rods, and called me in the middle of the winter, when he knew I was watching Hockey Night in Canada to see if I was practising my knots. "Damn it Spence, I'm not tying the damn things on for you! You will need to do it nearly blindfolded, in the twilight, with 20 mosquitoes biting you on your knuckles...Now get to it!"

So, I'm not really picking a fight here. I'm just thinking out-loud among a forum or community of fellow anglers about where we may be as fly fishers. What does "Flies Only" mean now on the old Au Sable for example? Single barb? Use of a fly rod? What? I'm just saying the line has been blurred and maybe, if I was being honest, some tradition has been strained. One of the nicknames my friend tagged me with is "Mr. Lore"...Knowing all the ghosts of the river, the old river-gods, the history of a local pattern etc, he would say, "Won't help you catch more trout." But I think it may make me a "more well rounded" angler to paraphrase you.

Our sport has had streamers around for a very, very, long time. The great Joe Brook's stone was so weighted that if it hit you in the back of the head it would nearly knock you out! This stuff pre-dates Spence, I guess I'm just...Concerned a bit. I wish that some of the old guard were still with us and that they just might tell Spence to "shut up kid and fish! You will only swallow flies with your mouth open...and if your fly isn't on the water, or under the water, you won't catch a damn thing!"

I think some times that I'm somewhat divorced from reality a bit...I have questions even if the answers are sometimes painful...Self knowledge...Looking at yourself/ourself in the mirror is difficult etc.

I have questions about non-native species that we have placed every where in the world for example. My beloved Au Sable used to only have Grayling in it...The Bows, Browns, and even the Brooks were placed there in the late 1800's. I hate the word "managed" when I hear the word used in terms of nature...I think it's just another term used by those, who really have no clue, when they are trying to distract us from what is in reality exploitation.

Think of this one...Some of the species we hunt in this state didn't exist in any numbers where they are at, if it wasn't for the logging era. They moved in after the habitat changed and now we have interests that want to manage forests to maintain the populations of species that wouldn't exist there if it wasn't for the ax. What is "wrong" with an "Old Growth Forest"? The things we like to blast don't like living there...We can't exploit the damn thing.

Anyway! Call me Mr. Dialectic I guess...I'm just sticking a stick in the pile of you know what!

I have had other posts where we discussed my territorialness. Maybe I just don't like humans much especially when they are cast and blasting through my "made-up" "phony" solitude...My "secret" hole, that's not so secret...I'm not really in a forest...Hell! I could be back at the car in less than 15 minutes! In a couple hours I'm back in Detroit...Maybe I'm just bemoaning what I think may be our separateness from good old, beat up, mother nature.

Shane. If I get a free moment I'll send you a short (I promise) email telling you a couple great Michigan Big Ugly stories...What was that old thing that used to be floated around about the evolution of an angler? Maybe it really is somewhat elitist to judge...Maybe if I can somehow become non-judgemental I will have reached the highest plane of the evolution of an angler...Nirvana!...Shane...Maybe the problem is Spence?! He! He!

Thanks for your very thoughtful answer mister...Tightlines! May you and I learn something new every time we dip our waders in a stream!

Spence

When it comes to a particular method of fly fishing I think that the saying about pleasure, "I Fish for mine you for yours", rings true. If you daydream about chasing around the entire country following every major, minor and inconsequential hatch known to man the do it. It makes ya happy. Same thing with nymphing or streamers, Fishing is for fun so do whatever you like to do.

In my world, there aren't the funds to barnstorm all the storied hatches and waters so You learn to adjust. I fish the same stream in January in two feet of snow, the never ending days of early June to Blustery September afternoons. Conditions are drastically different so you hve to adjust in order to catch fish, the whole point. Personally I enjoy fishing my home streams, none of them you've read about but all have oodles of brown trout and enough bugs to go around.

I am also a grouch when it comes to fishing partners. I want the entire stream to myself, but I share sometimes ;) Usually I meet the other guy and he is just like me , just out trying to enjoy himself and catch some trout, regardless of method.

Fly fishing for trout has so many facets that you cannot possibly perfect them all there is always something to do. I still have to find a Hex hatch, white fly, Sulfer and hendrickson spinner fall, actually catch a fish on a midge dry, Catch a twenty incher, Catch a steelhead, master no indicator nymphing.

Do we really need twenty different BWO patterns when a size twenty adams fits the bill? No, but thats no fun.

East of the rockies trout fishing would be radically different minus brown trout. Most of the hatch matchers like schwiebert, marinaro were trying to fool big browns. I prefer browns to brooks or rainbows.

I have seen a polariztion among trout fishers that is worrisome. Uppity city fly fishers who bring with them C&R No bait regs and the local who is more harvest oriented and primarily uses bait. With siltation due to erosion, feedlot issues, crops being planting right next to the stream, ag chemicals running off into creeks, we should unite to protect trout resource not bicker among ourselves.

I'm off the soapbox now. Deep breaths, Deep breaths.

Good points. I'm glad to listen.

Nothing, and if you’re casting it with a fly rod you’re not fly fishing, you’re fishing with a fly rod. There’s a reason the word “fly” is in “fly fishing”. Hey, don’t get mad at me, just google “fly fishing definition” and see what you come up with. But call it what you will, if you think it’s fly fishing I won’t argue, I just don’t agree. I’ve caught trout on streamers, woolly buggers, bunny leaches, sculpins etc. etc. and never did consider it fly fishing. I caught my biggest trout on a #16 salmon egg imitation, and let me tell you that’s difficult for me to confess, what a let down! But then again I hope none of you will hold that against me.

If some sort of fish was spawning and you collected and matched their eggs in Size, color and, shape, you've got nothing to be ashamed of. That's quintessential match the "hatch" fly fishing;)

I thought what differeniated fly fishing was the method of casting. Spin casting set ups use the weight of the lure to pull out line, while fly rods use a heavy line to cast. The "fly" goes along for the ride. I guess the test would be if the "fly" could be effectively casted and fished on traditional gear. Of course does this really matter?

Hey Guys,

I'm not trying to really debate one style against another here. My concern, and I'm sorry I babbled on and maybe confused the issue, was in terms of our existing regs, "Flies Only", "Quality Water"...etc.

As I said we are in the middle of a reworking of our regs here in Michigan. I'm afraid that the rules we created over the years that are really fly fishing specific are at risk...Getting those restrictions in the first place was not an easy task and there is, in my opinion, far too little of it. These rules came about over the years after hard work by angling groups, T.U., FFF, the Angler's of the Au Sable...Whatever club you have trying to protect your homewater, etc. My question was I guess, If they change in a negative way, as percieved from a fly fishers standpoint, did we not bring this on ourselves because we can no longer argue that there is a difference between "lures" and a Michigan Big Ugly.

Will a "Flies Only" stretch of river morph in to a "Fly Rod Only" section...? Will the state DNR's start saying that we no longer need fly fishing specific protection on our rivers because it's all good??? I'm just asking here...

In terms of maybe being divisive here, I just don't buy that...There is nothing that "should not be debated"...It just don't work that way. If we are going to progress in anything there has to be debate...Don't be afraid of it. You and I may disagree about a lot of things, but I'll still be standing next to you when we are cleaning up your stream, improving habitat, and federating over beers and telling lies about our angling success or lack there of.

Maybe this old fart needs to dig out his old Dylan records and find, "These Times They Are A Changing" and just resolve myself to the fact that it's not the good old days...

You know in the early days on the Au Sable, pre trout, they used to drop railroad cars along sidings with the hoi pol-loi anglers from the city in them. They had butlers and the whole nine yards...They fished tandem rigs with multiple flies on them and the Grayling, may they rest in peace, were yanked out by the hundreds...The only Grayling left in Grayling hangs on the wall of the Grayling Restaurant.

We can do whatever we damn well please, us humans, we think it's our right...But will it actually benefit us in the long run...I guess, if it all breaks down, we can forget maybe chasing "Wild Trout"...Non-native browns, non-native bows, non-native salmon...There will always be the hatchery truck...

I'm rambling again!

Spence

This probably isn't going to be particularly popular...:)

>>Will the state DNR's start saying that we no longer need fly fishing specific protection on our rivers because it's all good??? I'm just asking here...>>

If they follow the lead of most of the other states I know of with a significant wild trout resource, fly-fishing specific regs may end.

Whether this would be "good" or "bad" is a highly subjective call and depends, IMO, on whether our criteria is more about conserving/preserving wild trout or adhering to a given tradition.

If the former, I'm not sure there is a biologically sound preference argument to be made for flies only compared to artificials only.

If the latter, that's fine, but the situation will always be precarious and vulnerable to complaints of exclusion and the roving predation of state legislators. And the only defense the fly angler really has in this is "preference". And in today's increasingly polarized world, that's not much of a defense at all.

I'm old enough to have been involved in the wild trout wars in Pennsylvania in the late 70's and early 80's when the Fish Commission (as it was called in those days) took a huge step forward in wild trout management and stopped stocking several hundred streams because they had sufficient wild trout to support a fishery. They counted on the TU/fly angler community to be their strongest advocate and supporter in the public storm that was sure to follow. This support (what came) was tepid at best. It was muted by method and reg based quibbles that arose from the same community.

This always disappointed me and struck me as frustratingly rigid. The Commission folks were also frustrated. The Chief of the Fisheries Division at the time, who put his career on the line to make these changes was also disappointed and wrote at length about the situation for Tom Pero at Trout Magazine, in 1984 I think this was.

But that's the way I saw it because wild trout are/were primary to me and more important than fly fishing, although I've done 98% of my fishing with a fly rod for the last 35 years.

So, I will always support initiatives that maximize the opportunities for wild trout over those that maximize the opportunities for fly fishing exclusivity. We need to do things that expand the stakeholder base, not contract it.

Just my view..

spence if i'm understanding you correctly your being a bit nostalgic. you don't like people using big heavy streamers for trout. it seems like you said people are different these days, more interested in catching than tradition. i will tell you a little about me. i'm new to fly fishing, in my fourth year now, i can tell you i prefer dry fly fishing above all other methods. i made sure this year in the spring i got my glasses so i could see a dry floating. i keep about 2-3 fish a year. that results in a release rate somewhere in the 99 % range. one of my first posts on this site compared streamer fishing to using a spinning rod and spinner. i think i may have upset some people with that. i feel nymphing and dry fly fishing to be the most challenging. that's why i like it.

i went to fly fishing shortly after i started fishing for trout. when i saw at least a dozen trout rising under a tree on big creek one day and i thought about how many small fish i killed with my treble hooks i knew i had to do something different. i went to the n branch of the au sable for the first time with a fly rod and a green woolly bugger on the end. just so happens a guy from the board of the fff was there and he gives me a royal coachman to try instead and after a quick lesson in casting he was downstream. before he got out of shouting range i had landed my first brookie on a dry. addiction set in at that moment for dry fly fishing. my whole point in this conversation is this. not everyone is just out there to land a fish. i feel if i'm using a woolly bugger i'm cheating, and i should pack up and go to an appropiate stream and pull my spinning gear out. i want to ask the community here though, didn't fly fishing start out under water with winged wet flies and dry fly fishing become popular decades later? i thought i read that somewhere.

i don't see big changes coming with the new fishing regs. i think the au sable system is going to pretty much stay the same. part of my thinking behind this is that the state doesn't have much money and they don't have a lot to spend for tearing down fishing reg signs or putting new ones up and they just don't have a lot of money to put into change. i think there will be more streams open year round. i believe the reason there is to just give people more opportunity to fish.

question for you though, do you think the state is planting less fish over the last couple of years?

Lee & Scott,

Thanks for the thoughtful responses! It's great here...We have a seasoned vet and a relative newbie, this is what makes this medium what it is. The sharing of ideas is incredible! Somewhere on the web I even spotted a black and white vid of Sawyer tying his famous nymph.

Lee...I want to thank you for your comments. I was around through some of those "battles" where support wasn't always what one might think when dealing with like minded anglers. We are as diverse, I guess, as any other group.

I actually left TU years back, and I have fished for decades in front of the Barbless Hook on the Mainstream where it all began. I left because I just couldn't get my head around the Mepps Spinner ads that were showing up in Trout magazine...I know that this may sound odd, but I guess your both right and I'm "old-school".

I can only be pleased really at the thoughtful comments I have received so far on this thread. Everyone has been gentle with the old fart! But I prefaced my post with the thought that I have read some of the stuff on this web site and I expected thoughtfulness.

I think you are on to something and maybe we, as anglers, need to get the message out about just how interesting out sport can be. I use to say, when someone found out that I fly fished and they would always say how much they wanted to try it, that there were only two types of anglers...Those who tried the sport and are getting out of it and fanatics.

Every fly fishing expo or tying show that I go to I see gray beards. We need to somehow make the sport interesting for the next generation so we have some folks out there that will fight for the wild trout and their habitat that we love so much.

I have tried, in the past, to get nephews interested and it's not worked out so well. A good friend of mine told me that with young folk they need to have action and Spence teaching them to catch the toughest trout in the river with a rather skill heavy method, dry fly fishing, just didn't get them sparked.

Maybe I have become a bit too tradition bound...I guess I just find all of it so intersting and the lore etc just resonates with me. It's kind of odd in a way since in the late 60's I was considered Mr. Radical...He, he!

Now Scott...You and I are going to have to hook up next year and I'll show you a couple places you might like so much you won't want to go home. To your question about stocked fish...In the "storied" sections of the Au Sable there is no longer any stocking. Just as Lee stated in his post we have pushed a catch-and-release wild trout philosophy there. The mainstream, South Branch, and North Branch are self sustaining.

I do believe that elsewhere the state has cut back a bit...They are flat broke. I haven't been able to get them to throw a little patch on the highways near my home in a couple years...Only the dangerous spots get attention. Pot-holes are hell on my low profile tires! The stretch of road up near Wakeley Bridge & 72 they changed back to gravel...This piece of road has been paved since I was 16 and first saw the river in 1970! Up there, on some roads, they are throwing patch on top of patch...You can see through to ground.

I am 55 years old and have never...I mean never...been asked to see my fishing license by an official...There is only one DNR guy, I have been told, for all Crawford Co. and in the summer he's on Lake Margarethe chasing folks acting up in boats...More bang for the buck there...More monies for the state in fines in other words.

You are correct that dry fly fishing post dates the use of wet flies. I guess it depends on how far you go back...Some believe that the first attempts at fishing with a fly came from someone watching a fish take a bug off the surface and he developed some method of pulling this off...More than likely for food. The "tradition" of our sport came from the British Isles and there are some great debates in print between those that pushed nymph fishing and those that pushed dry fly fishing as the "proper" form of angling...I wasn't trying to go there here...I was concerned about how we define our sport and what may happen with the fishing regs that have been developed in all states with trout populations.

Any way! I have promised myself that I would try, for everyones sake, to start editing my posts...

Thanks again guys! Really!

Spence "Mr Lore"

Spence, I'm 17 and definitely agree that there are very few kids getting into fly fishing. I've noticed a pattern in angler development. Most start with bait, graduate to Panther Martins or Rapalas, then they start seeing fly fishers and try fly fishing. Not many do what I did and skip the hardware stage.

Here in Mn, we have artificial only regs on some streams. These are designed to reduce the hooking mortality associated with bait. The regulations are created to protect the trout population, increase numbers of big trout, and overall to provide a positive angling experience.

I do not think it is the governments job to regulate tradition. Fly only should be implemented only when it neccessary to protect the population. Also when not warranted fly regs create a rift between the different methods of trout fishing. I'm not familiar with the regs that you mentioned, why were they created?

One last thing TU is not a fly fishing club. Some may argue that it is a de facto one but its mission is to protect cold water resources. I think conservation minded hardware fishers should be included, hence the Mepps ad. My chapter (Hiawatha) is doing a fabulous job protecting and enhacing the areas streams. I know that there have been some spinning rods offered in raffles. Again inclusiveness is important.

Spence,
I think I see where you are going and it does present an interesting conundrum.
If regs are based on style where does one draw the line?

Since you are a self aknowledged "dry fly guy" perhaps turning from the Michigan Big Ugly Comparisson and looking at something like "corkers" might remove some of the percieved apples to oranges comparisson. ( For those of you who are unfamiliar with corkers: they are a fine PA tradion of forming terrestrial insect imitations from pieces of cork rods and them painting them to match and glueing them to the shank of the hook and are considered by many a legitimate dry fly) One could make a reasonable argument that there is little to no difference between a corker and a miniture lipless stick bait ( a la Reble's Bumblebug). Now comparing apple to apple how do you tell the guy who is throwing the lipless stick bait he isn't fly fishing while the guy with the corker is.

Here in PA the reg reads something like "artificial flies constructed of natural or synthetic material wound singly or in combination around the hook" with a further descriptor relating to the type of equipment which it must be fished with as well as a maximum length of monofilament ( or equivalent) that you can use. This does result in a reasonable criteria for "fly fishing" However there is nothing that would prevent an angle from casting a bucktail or marabou jig on their fly rod.
I think this it is helpful to look not solely to the item at the end of the tippet but at the entire almalgumation of equipment.
The other interesting thing here in PA is that the FF only waters (formerly referred to as HERITAGE FF Only) are those that have a historical significance in fly fishing OR have been so heinously treated under general regs that the only way to maintain access was to limit by tackle type as a last resort.


To all:
Very intelligent and enjoyable discourse
John

Wow I thought that the Montana fishing regs were complicated. I guess you learn something new every day. I.M.O. I think that if you switch the regulation to a single non trebled hook without a barb then you will go light years ahead in protecting fish. Also bait fisherman pay for their licenses as well and also have opinions on regulations for their fishing waters.

Aaron-

I would be willing to put the our state fishing regulations up against those of any other state in terms of complexity.

I apologize for my last post and have deleted it. I obviously stuck my foot in my mouth as a result of spending too much time listening to Jack’s BS last night.

John,

I seem to remember a beetle imitation that was a coffe bean glued to the shank of a hook and painted as well. I think I saw a couple odd fly's, if my memory is working here, in C Lively's book. One was a hopper imitation made from a porcupine quill and had some legs glued or lashed to it somehow. It looked like a childs plastic toy version of a grasshopper.

I agree with Dryfly above when he states that regs should be used in a logical way to prevent basically the wasting of the fish population. But I also understand your reference to rivers of "historical significance"...

I had a friend who guided on the Au Sable for years before he passed away a few years back. He had always used the traditional Au Sable Riverboat on the three branches that are fished up near Grayling; the North Branch, South Branch, and Mainstream the so-called Holy Water.

Over the years the water below Mio, called the "Trophy Water" now has improved as a fishery. It is quite a ways downstream from the traditional "Flies Only" stretches near Grayling. It is a much bigger river down that way and my guide friend purchased a McKensie style boat for fishing down that way.

We were down there, actually the week before he passed, and were talking about fishing related stuff over a streamside lunch. He had been with our DNR here prior to guiding. I told him how I was fishing one evening on the South Branch and I turned around to see a huge McKensie style boat coming right down the middle of the river...It looked like a cruise ship...It looked so out of place! His comment to me was that there really wasn't "any tradition" of that style of boat on the wading sections of the Au Sable and it shouldn't really be there...Even though there are no rules preventing it from floating the river.

As I have mentioned here, the anglers and fishing groups have lobbied for decades to get some sensible regs in place and once they were there it's been a fight to preserve them. The folks that have been involved in these regs were not just anglers but fish biologists and folks that have the health of the river and the trout at heart. The population of wild trout on the Au Sable is self sustaining (there has been no stocking for decades) and some serious money has been invested in the river in terms of habitat improvements and unfortunately fighting lawsuits in attempts to preserve the rivers quality.

I didn't really mean this to be a blog over one style of fishing over another, eventhough it's obvious by now which camp I pitch my tent. I wish I was better at expressing my concerns here better than I have. There is very little water in Michigan, for example, that is no-kill. Thinking about how much water the "Great Lakes State" has it's surprisingly little...Two sections of the Au Sable, one on the PM, one on the Huron (a smallmouth bass fishery), and a couple lakes come to mind.

We have one of the best water purifying geological situation here in Michigan thanks to the glaciers etc...Maybe I just wish it wasn't such an uphill battle everytime someone trys to fight to preserve it...Even when the science is with us...Not just Spence clinging to his tradition laden past...I know I fish with ghosts, but what ghosts, eh?!...Schwiebert, Swisher (Doug is actually still with us but in Montana) & Richards, C Lively, Paul Young, George Mason, George Griffiths, Marinaro visited here (read his "In the Ring of the Rise"), and these are just some of the names that folks might recognise...The local Hall of Fame is just as rich...

I wish that someone would sit down and write a new history of the Au Sable...(We have Hazen Miller's "The Old Au Sable" but it's years old). I think that the angling world, that's not already tuned in to it, would be surprised on what all has gone on there both from a scientific/research standpoint in terms of trout and clean water, and on the fly fishing tradition side of things...

Look in to "www.ausableanglers.org and check it out...Hell! It's almost winter anyway and except for tying flies , if we don't hunt, we don't have much else to do...

Spence

Spence, Who?
Just kidding, I've heard of those guys before.

My main point about catch and release no kill regs is they are a culturally volatile issue among fisherpeople. Many, many people would be irate if our DNR started willy nilly slapping up C&R No Kill regs. The support is there among fly anglers and some of the more conservation minded hardware guys but the bait people would be disenfranchised. The rural cohort of trout anglers are predominantly bait guys. They own the stream bank, if they get mad they quit selling easments and we all lose out on access. Again, Diviseness is baaaad.

When warranted C&R No Kill regs are great, providing a sport fishery for browns in streams with lackluster natural reproduction. These streams also produce the biggest trout due to their expanded forage base, more chubs and suckers, all big trout chow. The regs can protect the few trout to grow to larger sizes, providing a trophy fishery for all to enjoy.

I still have a Michigan Hex hatch on my fly fishing bucket list, so I don't think michigans fly fishing mystique has worn off. The sheer variety of hatches has to make it close to nirvana for a hatchmatcher. I guess I'm saying if life took me to the Au Sable or Pere Marquette I wouldn't be crushed.

Maybe your DNR could make it artificial only. That would keep the high mortality of bait fishing away from Michigans best rivers. If there isn't a big bait fishing tradition, Artificial only should not be hard to get passed.