Our Own John Mitchell Found … this big wild rainbow trout on private water in Montana’s upper Beaverhead area. At 7 pounds and 25 inches long, it is John’s personal best — so far. You can check out the massive size by remembering that a page of your St. Helena Star measures eleven inches wide from the fold on your left to the page edges on the right,. Double that — and add a couple — to see how big that trout was.
And, what an accomplishment it is to bring one to the net. Working against the angler are a big smart trout, strong currents that they learn to use and skinny little line tippet so the fish don’t get scared away before they even bite.
I can remember some time ago that John took me fly fishing for stripers in the upper California Delta. What a treat; his guide created special big flies for us made out of composition shower clog soles. During those certain times when you had to bang the shoreline rocks with your lure, this material didn’t break or lose its color the way wood or plastic can.
“Restore The Delta” … is one of our key voices in trying to bring balance and fairness to the allocation of California’s fresh water. Their Executive Director, Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla (barbara@restorethedelta.org) keeps score for us — and helps direct our own activism in positive ways. Her latest email speaks to the evil of senior water right holders who want to keep their preferred position on water ownership — even though this “me first” stance misses the point that California has committed to give away more water than it has. We all must back off and start again from that point. How much water can we allocate; to what type of users; when, where and how? Anything else is a “house of cards” that will fall with disastrous consequences for us all.
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