There’s not a hell of lot that’s free these days, but here’s something that is, and should grab the attention of any of our readers with a pulse…

Fish Can’t Read is giving away a three day Montana Mayfly Madness scenic road and float trip to be undertaken during April or May of 2010.

Read the details here – spring mayfly hatches in Montana accompany some of the most beautiful (and unpredictable weather) and the arrival of spring in Big Sky Country.

Sweepstakes winners will spend three days seeking the most active mayfly hatches the state has to offer at the time – all ground transportation, lodging, and food provided.  Bring your camera and cold weather gear just in case.

To register just subscribe to Fish Can’t Read; if you’ve already subscribed no need to do so again.

Drawing 10 January 2010 with the winner to be announced in the 15 January 2010 issue.

Hot damn.

(Please note this post  has been rewritten after a chat today with the Montana Board of Outfitters.)

Tags: Fish Can't Read

The team over at Fish Can’t Read has announced this morning that their Film Festival to be held in 2010 will donate all proceeds to the Henry’s Fork Foundation.

The Henry’s Fork Foundation was founded in 1984 and has spent the last 25 years fighting many a battle to preserve the remarkable integrity of the Henry’s Fork watershed.

If you’ve ever been driven through the metropolis of Ashton, Idaho – the headquarters of the Henry’s Fork Foundation -  you know these guys and gals are not a bunch of empty suits working out of some high rise office in the big city.   Ashton is still for the most part a farming town populated by real workin’ folks who have made a living working the land and keeping the river for generations.

Read more about the Fish Can’t Read Fly Fishing Film Festival here and the Henry’s Fork Foundation here.

Sounds like there are still some olives bringing fish up on the lower and the upper sections of the river.

Bet it will be pushing 60 around Last Chance today before this weekend’s storm moves in…..

Tags: Fish Can't Read

As part of the team working on the Fish Can’t Read magazine, we’d like to thank you for taking a look at Fish Can’t Read, the newest online fly fishing magazine now just 9 days old.  The attention the magazine has received has been far beyond our wildest collective imaginations and is growing steadily.

The team is working on a host (over 100 on our working list) of new features, tweaks and improvements for the magazine that we’ll be sharing over the next several weeks as we weave together the November issue.

We’ve also been dumbfounded by the number of folks who have shown interest in contributing astoundingly good prose and images from across the fly fishing spectrum – clearly there’s a large and enthusiastic group of fly fishers out there who are hungry to share (and read) some new and different thoughts and reflections about our shared mental illness that is fly fishing.

Many thanks.

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Before sharing some good news about the Bitterroot, I’d like to add my ‘well done, boys’ to the growing list of people who are saying good things about Fish Can’t Read. What’s been particularly impressive to me is that some of the old school, crusty, I’ve seen it all fly fishing guides and shop folks over in my neck of the woods have looked this over and said it’s the first web based fly fishing Ezine or magazine that has taken a stab at offering some real solid information along with some great images. I’ve already sent Jake, Mark and the gang my ideas for the next issue – make the damn font bigger is one…..

Now back to the river.

Like much of the state we’ve been experiencing lots of sunshine and warm if not hot weather, and it looks like it will continue through Sunday at least. Despite that the Bitterroot has been fishing very well some days and steady on most days. The upper sections of the river have been offering up some really good fishing on terrestrials (ants and beetles in particular), and there’s even been some good mayfly hatches during the middle part of they day. There are still lots of morning Tricos on the lower river, say below Stevensville and closer to Missoula, though you’ll find the fishing a lot easier on terrestrials in the afternoon.

A friend has tied up a bunch of ants that have been deadly over here lately – he called it a headlight ant, though the image I dug up this morning from the Orvis site called it Skilton’s Quick Sight Ant. Whatever the hell it’s called, you might want to whip up a few of these.

Whenever some cool and cloudy weather rolls in the baetis and other fall hatches should really bust out, but don’t stay home now if the sun is blazing…..

Tags: River - Bitterroot

Roughly nine months from initial concept to birth today, Fish Can’t Read is off and running.

As part of the team that has wrestled with the creation and production of the magazine, we’re overall quite pleased with the feature work in this issue, humbled at the number of hours and the amount of effort to pull something like this together, and mindful that there are several score things to do better and improve upon with the November issue.

Is this first issue anywhere near perfection?  Hardly.

A modest beginning with some very good content gives our team lots of room to grow the magazine organically and fine tune the technical bells and whistles (though we’ve had many a discussion / argument regarding how appealing simple, clean structure can be).

There will several new regular columns added in November’s issue, as well as more inspiring photography, videography and art work.  We’re even making room for a fiction piece now and then;  some would argue that most fly fishing related pieces are probably as much fiction as fact, though there are some nifty short fiction pieces floating around out there.

The team is also planning a very interesting approach to gear reviews that you’ve not seen in the fly fishing literature thus far; we’ll debut this in the next issue as well.

Written, artistic, photo and video submissions will be welcomed with open arms and minds; Fish Can’t Read will be compensating contributors for work published in the magazine.

We’d love to hear what you think about it……

(There’s a somewhat interesting story about the very final most steps of getting the magazine live last night that we’ll tell in a day or two – something about a terrifying problem that developed in the last three hours of a several thousand hour journey…..it doesn’t seem very funny to me this morning after three hours of sleep, but it will be….)

Tags: Fish Can't Read

For those of you who missed the announcement a few weeks ago, we’re fortunate to be part of a team that will be launching a new online fly fishing magazine – Fish Can’t Read – on the 15^th of September.

The Fish Can’t Read team has tuned up their submission criteria for photography, the written word, and videography and posted the full details on their site here.

Submissions have been pouring in and we’re frankly astounded at the diversity and quality of the work.

Your creative work is valuable in so many different ways.  While it won’t make you a millionaire, Fish Can’t Read will be paying creative folks for published works in the magazine.

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We’re pleased as can be to share with our Chi Wulff readers and friends the impending arrival of a new online fly fishing magazine – Fish Can’t Read.

Why another online fly fishing magazine?

Way back in February when the icy grip of winter still had a grip on the neighborhood a couple of us here in Bozeman were challenged by a group of friends and investors to pull together a team to charter a new fly fishing magazine – something different – something reaching beyond the boundaries of current print and online fly fishing media.

The challenge / vision was to provide not only jaw-dropping photography and videography made possible by an online venue, but to marry that with insightful, useful and deeply content-rich written work as well.

Like most of the folks we’ve talked to over the past five months or so, we initially laughed at the prospect of such an unlikely marriage.

Some ideas seep down into your innermost consciousness and take root, rumbling to full attention now and then before clawing their way back into the world of potential.  Fish Can’t Read was just such an idea.

As the collective vision expanded we knew that to really capture the full potential of the project we needed to pull together a team representing not only the wide spectrum of fly fishing ‘niches’, but also of varying ages and gender.  We’ve been very fortunate to assemble just such a team.

See the Fish Can’t Read team in their unadorned splendor here (pics and bios) – here’s the short list of team members with links to their blogs or business sites–

• John Juracek, Fly Fishing Section Editor, West Yellowstone, Montana
• Camille Egdorf, Women in Fly Fishing Section Editor; Bozeman and Nushagak River, Alaska
• Lani Waller, Steelhead Section Editor, Novato, California
• Alex Landeen, Brownliner Section Editor, Tucson, Arizona
• Keith Barton, Humor Section Editor, Somewhere, California
• Jake McGlothlin, Tech Master / Dry Fly Media, Bozeman, Montana (part of our Chi Wulff team)
• Mark McGlothlin, Publishing Team Leader / Dry Fly Media, Bozeman, Montana (part of our Chi Wulff team)

The magazine will be free, feature make-you-drool photography and videography, artistic creations and inspiring written works, and delivered online.

Submissions are welcome and encouraged; it’s our very strong conviction that free lance photographers, authors and videographers shouldn’t give their work away – we’re going to pay you for your creative work used in the magazine.  You won’t become a millionaire, but we’re convinced it’s the right thing to do from the outset.

Fish Can’t Read will be hosting a film festival next January to benefit a local fishery – we’re finalizing discussions now as to when, where, and who gets the proceeds – all profits from the event will be donated.  Yep, a road show is being discussed.

First issue will roll 15 September 2009 and follow every other month.

Fish Can’t Read.  Fly fisherman can.

Subscribe here.

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