Category: Quick mends

Short takes from around the Web.

Quick mends

Quick mends: Celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act with your fish tales
FROM SALMON TO SARDINES, it’s time to share your story with the NWF to help celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act.

This just in from the National Wildlife Federation: It’s time to celebrate clean water thanks to the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act. We wanted to let you know that NWF has just launched a photo event called “Share Your Fish Tales” that we plan to continue through mid-October.  Through the “Fish Tale” event our goal is to reach as many anglers and fishing families as possible and have them communicate through their fish pics and tales why clean water and fishing matter to them. 

Here’s what is happening: Land Tawney has just kicked off the event with a personal blog on NWF’s website. He has shown his own Montana fish pics and told his fish tale and encouraged folks to do the same, by providing a link to post fish photos and short fish tales (200 words or less) on a dedicated Flickr site. As Land says, we not only want photos of you “gripping and grinning” with big fish, but photos of the waters they came from, and pictures of your child’s first fish and fishing experience. 

Throughout September and early October, we plan to post guest blogs and otherwise share many of these pictures and stories, highlighting the importance of clean water to good fishing. We also want to share these messages with federal, state, and local decision makers.  We welcome your groups promoting this message and this event through your own websites and blogs.  As every angler knows, clean water and good fishing go hand in hand. To honor the passage of the Clean Water Act and to help renew clean water protections for our streams, lakes, wetlands, and bays, please help us raise the chorus of sportsmen voices in support of the Clean Water Act.  

 Share your fish tales and photos with us at  bit.ly/NKtFKL and  bit.ly/NcCFXK

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Quick mends

Quick mends: Gov. Brown signs river access bill
PADDLE UP: The L.A. Conservation Corps guides a group through still waters and overhanging willows. (Jim Burns

Los Angeles Flood Control, open thy gates!

The dog days of summer have brought us more than just heat and a freakish rain storm: the bill opening the river to recreation  and education is now  law. I’m surprised by the lack of MSM coverage of this important event.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Quick mends

Quick Mends: Will ‘carp dogs’ replace the original?
Could ‘carp dogs’ become the hot dog of the future? (Courtesy Kunzler).

If you missed last night’s  PBS Newshour segment about keeping exponentially breeding Asian carp out of the Great Lakes, take a look here. The news clip views like something from a sci-fi novel: loathsome predators a la Terminator; an electric river barricade similar to the great Scottish wall in Doomsday ; food of the future, as in Soylent Green(OK, not that bad!). Turns out, according to the piece, America is the only country where we don’t eat carp, and the citizenry is generally creeped out by the idea. But … that could change.

It really does make me wonder exactly what a carp dog tastes like. Here in the L.A. River, I’ll just keep throwing them back, but if I get to Chicago, I’ll take mine with mustard and mayo.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Quick mends

Quick Mends: San Gabriel wild trout get into the summertime swim

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Quick mends

Quick Mends: Obama carp strategy puzzles Chinese
A recent White House carp eradication story caused much more of a stir in China than it did in the U.S. (Courtesy Weekly Times Now)

This fun read from Bloomberg’s Adam Minter explains how the Chinese view President Obama’s pledge of over $50 million to eradicate carp from the Great Lakes: with hungry amusement.

Wild carp is No. 1 on the Chinese dinner menu, according to Minter, and they find it odd that we don’t want to eat this fish as well.

The story earned its own Twitter tag, #Asian Carp on an American Rampage, and received over 85,000 hits.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Quick mends

Quick Mends: Strong California salmon fishing season predicted

It might be time to gas up the buggy ( even at a predicted summer $5 a gallon), and get up to Northern California for some salmon fishing. Peter Firmite’s recent article in the San Francisco Chronicle quotes fishery experts as saying there are more chinooks swimming in the ocean now than at any time since 2005. A two-year commercial fishing ban on the fish ended last year, which may account for their increase.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Events, Quick mends

Quick Mends: L.A. River Update Meeting scheduled for Thursday

Quick mends

Quick Mends: New York Times gives a thumbs up to catching carp on the fly
How many guys carry their own scale? Jim Graves does!

The title says it all: The newspaper America either loves or hates, depending on political affiliation, has sanctioned catching carp with a fly rod. Best quote is that it’s like soccer: No. 1 sport in the world, yet, just catching on in America. Take a look at the piece, written by Chris Santella.

Lots of action on our own river, Friday. We spotted at least 30 fish.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Ecology, Quick mends

Quick mends: Denver’s Sand Creek spill
A dead carp floats in Denver's Sand Creek, site of a recent benzene leak. (Courtesy Will Rice)

What can you do, as a recreational fisherman, to protect the environment?

You can write letters to the powerful, join an environmental group, give money, pitch in to restore habitat, tell your friends, hell, turn them into fly fishers, so they’ll see what they’re missing. After all, at the habitat-loss rate we’re enduring, fishing for fun could sadly end up solely on private water a la England. And … that’s un-American.

Not what we want to see happen in L.A.

Or you could let your nose tell you something stinks, as in this story. While recently stalking our favored gamefish, carp, Denver-based fly fisher/blogger McTage knew something wasn’t kosher. He reached for his cellphone, reported it, later dogged it, and made sure the agencies charged with protecting his waters actually did their job. Important story here.  In his case, what he reported after getting a whiff  turned out to be benzene. How long did it take from his first call to actually getting some action? Read the story and be appalled.

Writer Will Rice of Drake Fly Fishing magazine, describes the chemical this way: ” If you are on the fence about Benzene, here are a few things you should know: Petroleum ether, also known as benzene is a group of various volatile, highly flammable, liquid hydrocarbon mixtures used chiefly as nonpolar solvents. During the Second World War some extermination camps experimented by killing people with benzene injections. Benzene causes cancer. Benzene is useful for removing the gum from self-adhesive stamps.”

Stay alert, vigilant. Whoever thought fishermen could be first responders? But when you think about it, we all could be. Bravo, McTage.

See you on the river, Jim Burns

Ecology, Quick mends

Quick mends: Trickster scissors send an environmental message on Matilija Dam
Cut and paste: A pair of painted scissors show exactly where to cut the concrete. (Courtesy PeakWater.org)UPDATE

UPDATE: “Damnation” is a documentary well worth watching.

What a week for dam-busters. First, news of the bulldozers marking out space to begin the destruction of Elwha Dam in Washington, and now, closer to home, graffiti artists have painted a large pair of scissors and a dotted line on Matilija Dam, near Ojai, Calif.

Take a look at the reporting from the Los Angeles Times, then look for yourself at the amount of work dedicated to razing this old timer. It seems all sides are in agreement that it’s time to pull out the dynamite, but a lack of federal dollars stands in the way.

See you on the river, Jim Burns