MidCurrent

From the Archive | Originally published February 2025. By: Phil Monahan. Question: I’ve always used an improved clinch knot to tie on flies and a double surgeon’s to attach tippet. My fishing buddy keeps telling me I need to switch to “100% knots.” Is there really such a thing? —Mark C., via email Answer: No. A “100% knot” is supposed to be as strong as the same line with no knot in it, and a knot can’t be, because tying it bends the line and presses it against itself.

Fly Fish Food compares synthetic quill brands on the vise and walks through the mil-spec method for ribbing. The episode finishes with a brush tied in at the front of a streamer for extra profile and bulk.

A federal judge in Eugene, Oregon, says he’ll rule by the end of October on whether the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers can begin lowering Detroit Lake this fall. The drawdown is the first step in a multiyear plan to get young Upper Willamette chinook salmon and winter steelhead past Detroit Dam on the North Santiam River. View from Detroit Dam from Detroit Lake, Oregon. Photo: USGS The Corps said in July that it would start sometime between Nov. 1 and Dec. 31. At an Oct.

In a post from Flylab last week, Kirk Deeter announced he’s closing Angling Trade, the fly-fishing trade publication he’s edited for more than 20 years. Deeter said the decision is personal, not a verdict on the business: he’s focusing on an expanded digital-media role at Trout Unlimited beyond TROUT magazine, a new book, and a return to freelance writing. He says the Flylab team will keep following industry issues going forward.

Chris Daughters, owner of the Caddis Fly Angling Shop in Eugene, Oregon, runs a guide service that fishes in part for ESA-listed hatchery spring Chinook on the McKenzie River. He’s also one of five plaintiffs suing federal wildlife agencies over the Trump administration’s rollback of the Endangered Species Act’s “harm” definition. An angler casts over a section of the McKenzie River, Oregon.

The flies for this edition of Tying Tuesday start at the surface and work down the water column before heading out to the flats. Up top is the Ausable Wulff from Sophisticated Trout Angling, a bushy Adirondack dry created by Fran Betters that still catches fish around the world. Next is the UVR Green Hare Nymph from Lucian Vasies, a low-light autumn jig nymph with a natural hare body, a chartreuse UVR yarn rib for visibility, and a CDC collar for subtle movement.

When our friends Rob and Sam Edmunds came over from the UK, we fished a pattern that completely dominated all summer long: the Daddy…

The flies for this edition of Tying Tuesday start at the surface and work down the water column before heading out to the flats.…

Tom Rosenbauer breaks down the tapers on floating trout lines, from front-weighted designs to lines with a longer front taper and belly, and how to choose between them.

The second and final comment period on the Trump administration’s plan to rescind the 2001 Roadless Rule closed October 6, and the numbers look almost identical to the first time. Mountain goats at Jewel Basin, Flathead National Forest, Montana. Photo: Lily Henley/ USDA Forest Service A new analysis from the Center for Western Priorities, published October 7, found that 99.1 percent of the 370,238 comments posted to the Forest Service’s docket oppose the repeal.