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Angling his way to the world championships
Eventually the truth would have to come out and if finally did when Todd Oishi's wife Robyn grew concerned that the family's cat might have mange. Oishi, a national champion fly fisherman from Maple Ridge, never reveals what he uses to make his flies unless he has to. In this case, he had to let his wife know Tinker Bell was fine; Oishi had just snipped off a few off the cat's hairs in order to make a fly. As Oishi puts it, you can use any sort of feather or fur to make a fly, as long as it looks life-like. For example, he made numerous flies using the feathers from the three African guinea fowls he purchased for his wife's birthday. Sadly, they died a few years ago and their feathers are now part of Oishi's fly collection. It wasn't what he planned - he gave the birds to his wife for a birthday present, along with some jewellery - but it ended up working well for him.
Fishing is escape from war
Von Hagen spent a year as a civilian contractor stationed in Iraq, where he refused to let the fighting disrupt his fishing. His favorite fishing hole? One of Saddam Hussein's private lakes. "I was stationed in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown," said Von Hagen, 38, who attended Hillsboro High and Western Kentucky University. "When I arrived, I discovered three fairly large lakes in a walled-off compound that contained about 30 of Saddam's palaces. Being a fisherman, I immediately checked them out and found that the lakes were full of big fish, mostly carp and shad." Von Hagen wrote home, asking for his fishing tackle to be shipped. "The biggest fish I caught weighed 25 pounds," he said. "I caught it on spinning tackle. Then I started fly fishing, catching fish weighing three, four pounds.
Heat wave has driven local stream temps to dangerous levels
The big brown trout lay belly up at the tail of the bridge pool. Even though he had been dead only a few hours, his distinctive markings had already started to fade, and several crayfish were working on the 22-inch carcass. The record and near-record air temperatures, sunny weather and warm nights of the past two weeks have combined to stress trout populations and even eliminate them in the worst cases. Trout are cold-water fish. They prefer stream temperatures below 66 degrees and water with a relatively high concentration of dissolved oxygen. Shade and an influx of ground water are important factors in keeping stream temperatures low. Since cool water holds more dissolved oxygen than warm water, cool water temperatures and turbulence (riffles and waterfalls) keep dissolved oxygen at a healthy level.
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