Seeking key volunteer leaders

Local conservation happens because volunteers step up to take on leadership roles. This year we have a number of positions where you could help make a difference locally, and hope that you’ll be interested in taking on one of the following volunteer leader roles.

Please email us at stvraintu@gmail.com with questions and to volunteer!

Adopt-A-Highway Event Lead: 

Program Description: The chapter's Highway 7 Adopt-A-Highway program is a partnership with the Colorado Department of Transportation. Each year our chapter organizes 2 clean-up events where we pick up trash along our assigned section, and in return we are recognized as the owners of that stretch of the highway.

Position Description: The event lead is a key role in the Conservation Committee. This position coordinates one of the chapter's premier and long-standing events. It's a great opportunity to contribute directly to Trout Unlimited's overall mission as a conservation organization and only requires a few hours, twice-per-year. No fishing skills required, just a passion to make a difference in your local community!

Tasks:

• Coordinate w/ CDOT via email to schedule clean-ups

• Coordinate with SVATU board to communicate to chapter and recruit participants via Newsletter/Website

• Coordinate with the Treasurer to supply materials (vests, gloves, trash grabbers, trash bags).

• Coordinate final trash pick-up or drop-off

• Coordinate/print waivers for day of event

Skills:

• Ability to communicate/coordinate via email

• No-need to house clean-up materials personally, just pick them up for the event

Time Commitment:

• 10 hours, twice per year in May and October

Local Trash Clean-Up Event Lead: 

Program Description: The chapter's Local Trash Clean-up program is a new program we’re trying to build in 2023. We envision partnering with the City of Longmont to conduct regular (monthly if possible) trash clean ups within Longmont (preferable along our local creeks and streams). 

Position Description: The event lead is a key role in the Conservation Committee. This position coordinates low-key, local clean up events monthly. It's a great opportunity to contribute directly to Trout Unlimited's overall mission as a conservation organization and only requires a few hours for each event. No fishing skills required, just a passion to make a difference in your local community!

Tasks:

• Coordinate w/ the City of Longmont (or other municipality) via email to schedule clean-ups

• Coordinate with SVATU board to communicate to chapter and recruit participants via Newsletter/Website

• Coordinate with the Treasurer to supply materials (vests, gloves, trash grabbers, trash bags)

• Coordinate final trash pick-up or drop-off

• Coordinate/print waivers for day of event

Skills:

• Ability to communicate/coordinate via email

• No-need to house clean-up materials personally, just pick them up for the event

Time Commitment:

• 4 hours each month

Please consider a year-end gift to support volunteer programs for our Chapter!

Dear Friends,

We are lucky to be able to ply our hometown creek for trout, and for the opportunity to pursue wild trout in its pristine headwaters just an hour upstream. St Vrain Anglers Chapter of Trout Unlimited works hard to ensure these angling opportunities will persist for generations to come, and we ask for your support of our 100% volunteer-run programs at year end.

2022 has been an exciting year—we are back to in-person events, back in schools engaging the next generation of watershed stewards, and back to planning more opportunities for a variety of community members to engage in the joys of fishing and hands-on conservation.

To continue this work, we need your help. Please consider a generous gift today.

Your gift will support our all-volunteer programs that allow us to bring additional water quality monitoring to priority stream reaches, spark a love of fishing and watershed conservation in youth, and engage new community volunteers and stewards. 

We all remember the fires that ravaged parts of the St. Vrain basin two years ago. While memories of the smoke, ash, and anxiety have faded for us, our fisheries will experience the impacts of the fires for years to come. This is precisely why we secured an $8,000 grant from Colorado TU to launch four real-time data loggers to monitor trout habitat at priority sites. These monitoring stations will collect actionable data about key trout habitat metrics to help our chapter and community partners plan and prioritize future public investment in our watershed. With your help, we can launch additional stations in the coming year.

Our volunteers are delighted to be back in person with students, both in school and out. During this fall’s Cast a Fly program, Barbara Luneau, our Past President, recounted how the smallest girl in a Lyons 5th grade classroom remarked that she didn’t think she would have the ability to learn to cast a fly rod. Through the work of committed volunteers, this girl learned not only the skills of fly fishing, but grew in her confidence as an angler and resident steward of the Saint Vrain. With your support, we can bring more volunteers into schools through expanded programs to develop the next generation of stewards.

We are also proud of our work to engage our communities in new and inclusive ways. From the fly tying socials chapter volunteers initiated this year, to a forthcoming women’s fly fishing clinic and field trip, we continue to build the constituency of the Saint Vrain. With your help we can create and deliver outreach that inspires our community to care about water management and the future of St. Vrain Creek.

Please join us in giving generously to Saint Vrain Anglers Trout Unlimited at year end at this link or by sending a check to our PO Box 1682, Longmont, CO 80502.
 

On behalf of the all-volunteer Leadership Team...THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

PS:We are a 501c3 and able to accept all monetary donations, including from yourdonor-advised fund, and qualified charitable distributions from your IRA. For more information or questions, contact Libby Earthman, Chapter Secretary:libby@libbyearthman.com or 720-487-3126

PPS: Support our Chapter when you shop on Amazon bylaunching from this link, and selecting St. Vrain Anglers as your charity.  

Grant Awarded: Comprehensive Trout Habitat Monitoring in the St. Vrain Creek Watershed

“Your home water eventually gets under your skin and begins to define you as a fisherman. If nothing else, the skills it takes to fish it are the ones you use the most.” -John Gierach, speaking of his beloved Saint Vrain River

By Royce Walton, Conservation Committee Chair and Chapter Treasurer

Like many watersheds in the western US, our beloved Saint Vrain River Watershed suffers from the cumulative impacts of abandoned historic mines, heavy angler pressure, climate change (including increasing water temperatures and catastrophic wildfires), and increasing municipal and agricultural demands. 

However, it is with great excitement that I am happy to announce that our chapter recently received a Colorado Rivers Grant award from Colorado Trout Unlimited (CTU), which will go a long way towards helping us preserve, protect, and restore our local waters.

In 2018 our chapter joined with community stakeholders/partners to develop the St Vrain & Lefthand Watershed Stream Management Plan. Significant historical data was used to analyze the current state of the watershed, identifying four focus areas: Flow, Habitat, Water Quality, and Water Management. As part of these goals, we identified a need to build capacity and implement adaptive management which includes addressing data gaps, expanding stream monitoring, and expanding citizen science and community learning groups.

The $8,000 we received from Colorado Trout Unlimited will allow us to collect data from various priority sites, selected to complement existing monitoring efforts. Specifically, we used the funds to purchase four EnviroDIY Monitoring stations that will bring more ongoing, comprehensive, actionable, and thorough data on water quality and trout habitat viability. The four sites will inform future management action related to mine reclamation, wildfire impacts, and fuel spills. 

We received the monitoring stations (aka: Mayfly Sensors) this fall and we’re working through the setup and design of our site-specific set ups now. This spring we’ll train several volunteers on their operation, maintenance procedures, and data collection so they can become “site owners” who regularly check up on the devices and download data.

This citizen science project, led through the partnership of Saint Vrain Anglers chapter of Trout Unlimited and The Watershed Center, will allow us to collect data on trout habitat, benthic macroinvertebrate populations, and other metrics at each of the monitoring stations. The Watershed Center (a local non-profit with full-time scientists on staff) will be the main “customer” using the data for analysis and public dissemination via their annual watershed reporting.

Our four sites include locations on the following creeks in our watershed:

• James Creek

• Left Hand Creek

• South Saint Vrain Creek

• North Saint Vrain Creek

While we’ll be focused on these four sites in 2023, we’re excited about the potential to expand the project to provide a comprehensive network of monitoring devices distributed throughout the entirety of our watershed.

I look forward to sharing more information on our progress this spring.

If you would like to be involved in this volunteer-run monitoring effort, please be in touch via the chapter email address: stvrainTU@gmail.com

Embracing a New Technique - Euro Nymphing

By Charlie Morris, Saint Vrain TU Chapter member and volunteer

I originally posted this in a fly fishing forum July 29, 2019. I thought a few of my friends might also enjoy it. 

I want to let the reader know that I decided to learn the Euro Nymph technique in December of 2018. I've been working on this method for only about 8 months, I am by no means accomplished in this approach but I’m in the throes of the learning process.

This year I decided to learn euro-nymphing and with the decision came a couple of hurdles I had to overcome. First, I was a little too good. I was a fairly accomplished fly fisherman, I’ve been fishing for around 25 years, so I am not great but I’m also not bad. I could generally catch fish and moving to a new technique was going to inevitably reduce my numbers, at least for the near future. Expecting to increase your numbers the first time out isn’t practical so I had to set reasonable expectations. The second hurdle I faced was learning how to learn. Learning how to learn can be the hardest part of something new! A friend of mine had introduced me to the technique but he was no expert and was also trying to figure it out for himself. So how was I to learn this new method without “reinventing the wheel”? That’s the question I’m aiming to answer to help you reduce the time spent fumbling around before you can take this technique onto the water.

My basic strategy of learning how to learn is five fold (six if you tie your own flies):

1. Videos on the subject

2. Books on the subject

3. Classes

4. Individual lessons

5. Knowledgeable friends

6. What flies to tie (if you tie your own flies)

Step 1: Videos on the subject (a couple are purchased but most are free on YouTube)

By watching videos before you go any further in learning you are priming your brain to become familiar with new terms that go with this technique and it helps prevent the amount of learning whiplash we’ve all experienced. 

• Video 1: Modern Nymphing - European Inspired Techniques (Devin Olsen & Lance Egan) - This video is an absolute must for an introduction to the whys and hows of Euro nymphing and can be purchased on Vimeo.

• Video 2: Modern Nymphing Elevated - Beyond The Basics (Lance Egan & Devin Olsen) - The second in the two part series of videos created by Devin and Lance, this is again a great resources for learning

• Video 3: Euro nymphing Class With Lance Egan an excellent resource for the introduction to Euro nymphing - Free YouTube class: https://youtu.be/UWszBCAuyo0 

• Video 4: Nymphing Techniques (George Daniels): Free YouTube class

  • Part 1: https://youtu.be/Y9XlK3Q5mcU 

  • Part 2: https://youtu.be/6xJiSb0wb1w 

  • Part 3: https://youtu.be/WxhIx1tocPo. 

• Video 5: Euro nymphing Setup: What you need to get started - Free YouTube class:

  https://youtu.be/NhV12-HB2b8 

Step 2: Read a couple of books on the subject

• Book 1: Dynamic Nymphing: Tactics, Techniques and Flies from Around the World by George Daniels. I found this book as a helpful resource in my introduction to Euro nymphing. If you want to learn more check out the Goodreads page here 

• Book 2: Tactical Fly Fishing: Lessons Learned from Competition Anglers by Devin Olsen. This book was released after my introduction period and I haven’t read it yet, but it is certainly on my list.  If you want to learn more check out the Goodreads page here

Step 3: Classes

I’ve taken and enjoyed classes from both George Daniels and Devin Olsen. Devin focused on the material presented in the videos, while George’s presentations seemed a little more focused on rigging and how to use the rig in particular. Both George and Devin were great instructors and very interactive with the class participants.

Tips before attending the class: 

• Watch the videos and read the books before you take a class 

• Have questions ready for the instructor 

Step 4: The personal lesson

This might be the most important and overlooked aspect of learning. My private lessons were from two members or former members of Team USA, Rob Kolanda and Lance Egan. These guys are among the best in the world and it showed in their training methods. I took my first lesson from Rob in April and my second lesson from Lance in late July. Having a gap in time between lessons was helpful in giving me time to practice what I had learned with Rob and gave Lance a foundation to take me to the next step. So here is what I want to say about instructors/guides. Most guides don’t fish Euro, so having a guided trip with an inexperienced Euro instructor serves you no purpose in the learning process. Second, you’re not going to learn Euro from a boat, so if you want a boating trip save this technique for another day. It is key to get a good experienced instructor. Asking around for references for guides in your area that can fish Euro will help you grow in the technique! Finally REMEMBER this is an instruction lesson, NOT a guided trip. Put the focus on technique and the fishing will take care of itself. 

Here are a few contacts for instructors I recommend: 

• Front Range Anglers (Boulder, Colorado) https://frontrangeanglers.com - This is where Rob Kolanda works and there are several other team USA members at the shop. 

• Fly Fish Food (Orem, Utah) https://www.flyfishfood.com - Lance Egan works in this shop. This shop seems to really focus on the Euro technique and very likely a good source for other instructors.

Step 5: Knowledgeable Friends 

This can be tough but not impossible! When you’re learning a technique not widely known by the fly fishing community it can be hard to find a mentor. The first response from most of my friends is, “this is just tight lining without an indicator.” This statement is not correct. There are many aspects to Euro nymphing beyond tight lining without an indicator. The rigging is not the same and for good reason, the rods are different, and for good reasons and finally the reel needs to balance the rod, and for good reasons. Don’t let the differences in thinking steer you away, there is a community for everyone in fly fishing. Growing your community around this technique is going to help you learn and grow. Not sure where to start? Come check out St. Vrain Trout Unlimited’s Browns and Brews on January 24th, 2023 where we will be talking all things Euro-nymphing! 

Step 6: What flies to tie (if you tie your own flies)

As with most of the learning for this technique YouTube is a great source for how to tie Euro flies. 

Channels you should check out: 

• Fly Fish Food - https://youtu.be/tYaVWOahZFk. This is probably my favorite channel on YouTube and is one of the best sources for fly tying materials (https://www.flyfishfood.com). 

• Tactical Fly Fisher - https://youtu.be/Td1VaolBbmY. This is another YouTube channel at the top of my list focused on Euro - nymphing. (https://www.tacticalflyfisher.com.)

• Front Range Anglers - https://frontrangeanglers.com. They have a solid staff (many team USA members) who are knowledgeable in Euro-nymphing and fly patterns

• Laughing Grizzly - http://www.laughinggrizzlyflyshop.net. My local shop here in Longmont 

• Special shout out to Tim Cammisa - https://youtu.be/mkF4xR8g1y0. Tim is probably my favorite tier on YouTube.

The last thing I want to say is, I’m used to fishing tailwaters, the Green River below Dutch John UT, the Bighorn River below Yellowtail Dam, the San Juan River in New Mexico. All of these rivers are known for tiny tiny flies with conventional suspension nymphing methods. Using the Euro nymphing method, you’ll be tying on much larger flies. As I said this is a technique that I am continually learning and tweaking every time I’m on the water.

"I look into... my fly box, and think about all the elements I should consider in choosing the perfect fly: water temperature, what stage of development the bugs are in, what the fish are eating right now. Then I remember what a guide told me: 'Ninety percent of what a trout eats is brown and fuzzy and about five-eighths of an inch long."  —Allison Moir

Hopefully I’ve given you a method for figuring out this new technique and a few contacts that can help you along the way! 

2022 Update

Since the original publication (2019), I’ve made quite a few changes to my technique. I no longer call the technique I use “euro nymphing” but rather refer to the method as a “mono-rig” technique. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: So, do you prefer Euro, fish it religiously, or just another arrow in the quiver and use whatever method is most productive? (2020)

A: I consider euro nymphing just another arrow in the quiver. But it is the most used arrow. Nothing beats dry fly fishing in my book for unadulterated fun. When I was with Lance he modified the euro-rig with a dry fly (caddis) on top. The weight of the dropper allowed for controlled skitters across the surface and the fish hit the fly with such ferociousness, words don’t do the bites justice. (By the way, I had several hits on the dropper). If I expand the story a little bit, I helped my friend Michael Johnson along in learning to fly fish. As Mike got better, he started judging competitions and learned about euro-nymphing. It wasn’t too long before Mike was consistently out fishing me. Mike was actually the first person to take me out with a euro-rig. A credit I should have given in the original post. The student became the master

Q: Has “euro nymphing” increased your numbers?

A: Yes, I think so. Up to 2019, I had landed two sets of doubles (having two fish on the line simultaneously). During my first year of euronymphing, I landed five sets of doubles

Q: What kind of euro fishing line (euro-line) do you use?

A: I don’t! I use a straight mono-rig. Euro-lines are designed to meet FIPS-MOUCHE (The International Sport Fly Fishing Federation) regulations. In the class with George Daniels, he mentioned giving up the euro-line for straight monofilament if you’re not fishing in competition. George suggested using 30lb OPST Lazer line instead of a fly-line. I now use a mono-rig with OPST Lazer line. I find the Lazer line has less memory than many other monofilaments but on cold days, line memory can be an issue. Check out trout bitten for a discussion on the mono-rig (Design and Function of the Troutbitten Standard Mono Rig (*UPDATED*) ) 

Q: Are the euro-rods constructed differently than a standard 9ft rod?

A: Yes! The rods constructed for euro-nymphing generally have a longer reach (10 ft or more) and a softer tip. The softer tips allow you to load the rod for, at least some semblance, of casting with a mono-rig and the ability to feel strikes and taps on the bottom when using only a sighter.

Q: Can I use my standard 3wt rod?

Yes, of course, you can, but the reach and construction of a euro-rod make fishing easier.

Q: Can you recommend a good entry level-rod?

A: My first euro-rod was the Fenwick Aetos (10ft 3wt). I was pleased with the performance of the rod and I use it to this day. I’m sure there are a lot of great entry-level rods out there.

Q: Is a special reel required?

A: No, but a reel that balances the rod will reduce the fatigue in your arm after a long day of fishing. Also, to me, having a reel that has a full frame is important. The full frame will keep the monofilament leader from escaping the reel.

Q: Do you use an indicator?

A: When required yes but if not required no. The addition of an indicator increases drag in the system but, there are many times on a windy day that the wind will put a large bow in the mono-rig making a good drift impossible. On those days I put on an indicator and lay my rod down low keeping my line out of the wind and keeping me tight from the fly to the indicator.

Q: Do you use split-shot on your rigs?

A: The FIPS-MOUCHE rules don’t allow for the addition of weight and so the weight is tied into the flies, BUT I’m not fishing in competition. I will often add weight to the rig which will allow me to get very small flies down deep.

I truly hope this helps as you search for new techniques! 

Feel free to ask me questions at charlie.p.morris@gmail.com