A couple of weeks ago I went bird hunting in Montana at the invitation of Dave Perkins. A gracious invitation to say the least, and one that offered up a most notable new experience. This was different. Standing on the ridge I looked across a sea of grass with mountain islands here and there, and the distance defined only by the last jagged range in the distance.
“How far are those?”
“ About 120 miles.”
“Damn.”
I was hunting sharptails near Great Falls. Next-door neighbors are calculated in miles. It looks flat, but it’s not. It rolls and dips and rises like ocean swells and not until you get out of the truck and immerse yourself in it, do you discover the detail, the variations of terrain and vegetation, the places where sharptails find cover.
Orvis Dogs of the Day- Milly, Maddie, and Piper!
Winter getaway at the beach
– Sasha, Salt Lake City
Enter the Orvis Cover Dog Photo contest for your chance to put your dog on a future cover of the The Orvis Dog Book catalog, win a $500 gift card from Orvis and help us beat canine cancer! Enter online at https://www.orvis.com/coverdog.
Restoring the Mighty Penobscot- Trout Unlimited Joins the Orvis Fly Fishing Guide Podcast
 |
Photo: Cheryl Daigle |
We are adding a new feature to the Orvis Fly Fishing Guide Podcast by partnering with Trout Unlimited to bring you updates on their conservation programs. Tom is a huge fan of Trout Unlimited and Orvis has been a long-time partner in their efforts to restore and protect coldwater fisheries.
In this episode TU President & CEO Chris Wood interviews Jeff Reardon about restoring the Penobscot River. Involving miles and miles of river and multiple dam removals, this is the largest project of its kind in history.
We hope you enjoy this new feature of The Orvis Fly Fishing Guide Podcast. Let us know what you think on our Facebook wall at facebook.com/orvisflyfishing or by dropping us a line at podcast@orvis.com. Listen by clicking the play button below.
In the Loop 9.28.10
Matt Skoglund of the Natural Resources Defense Council describes the pleasures of finding and fishing for golden trout on a three-day trip with his brother into the wild Beartooth Mountains of Montana. These small, beautiful fish have been an obsession since Skoglund was a child: That you can’t find goldens in roadside rivers also titillated me. To catch a golden,…
Read MoreBrookies for a Good Cause
 |
Photo by Phil Monahan, 2010 |
Last winter, Casting for Recovery held an online auction to raise money for their programs, which combine fly fishing, counseling, and medical information to help breast-cancer patients and survivors focus on wellness instead of illness. One of the auction items was a day of fishing in southwestern Vermont,…
Read MoreBark, Don’t Bite. Dog Bite Prevention
Morris Animal Foundation, a nonprofit organization that promotes longer, healthier lives for animals through humane research, recently funded a study to determine how educated veterinarians and physicians are about dog-bite prevention techniques. Of the respondents, only 21 percent of veterinarians and 5 percent of physicians reported that they had acquired most of their knowledge about dog bites from medical or veterinary school. Most interesting, the study found that the vast majority of those surveyed would like to have had more information about dog-bite prevention during their schooling. “We hope the information from this study can be used to develop better curricula for medical and veterinary training programs,” said Patricia N. Olson, DVM, PhD, president/CEO of Morris Animal Foundation. “This curriculum could prove to be of benefit to both people and dogs alike, helping us to better live side by side.”
Read MoreRehabilitating the Dogs Rescued from Michael Vick’s Kennels
Ever wonder what happened to the dogs raised to fight and then rescued from Michel Vick’s “Bad Newz Kennels”? National Public radio ran a piece a few days ago on the efforts to rehabilitate those dogs and the people behind the effort.
“We had started developing a battery of tests … : Could you touch the dog and handle the dog? Was the dog reactive? How did it respond to people? How did it respond to other dogs? Was the dog safe around food, toys and children? Things like that. So when we sat down to take a look at [the Vick] case, we needed to understand what the potential aggression problems were going to be. And we also needed to satisfy the government’s concerns about liability. If this dog goes out and we permitted it and it attacks a small child, it’s going to get back to us somehow. So we really needed to demonstrate to the government that the dogs were going to be safe when we made some recommendations for placement.”
You can listen the story or read it in its entirety here.
Read MoreUnconventional Dog Training
Come autumn, I have the best job in the world. As a bird hunting guide for PRO Outfitters in Central Montana, I spend 28 days a month with my dogs walking rolling hills under a big sky, looking for wild sharptail grouse, Hungarian partridge, and ring-neck pheasant. My dogs are ideal co-workers: every morning their eyes light up when they see me, and they can’t wait to get to work. Bird hunters know that few things compare to the bond you share with your dog in the field. And nothing compares to watching your young pointing dog gain confidence, put the pieces together, and finally “get it.”
Read MoreDown. Stay. Come. Good Boy.
We enrolled Logan in obedience training during the winter of 2007. I remember because my wife, Erica was pregnant with our first child, Joshua. The reason I mention my wife’s pregnancy is because it was she, at 7 months pregnant, who participated in the classes while I, like the world’s most self-absorbed, uncaring husband, tipped back on a metal folding chair and watched her march around the room in a parade of dogs, led along by a 70-lb. Labrador.
Read MoreThe Orvis Fly Fishing Guide Podcast- Fly Fishing Pocket Water
Fly fishing in pocket water can be challenging, but it also provides a lot of opportunity. Make a stealthy approach and keep your casts short to avoid drag.