Agricultural occupancy conditions and ‘dependants’

The wording of the model agricultural occupancy condition (No. 45 in Appendix A to Circular 11/95, which remains extant following the cancellation of the remainder of that circular) has been widely used by many LPAs. It reads:

“The occupation of the dwelling shall be limited to a person solely or mainly working, or last working, in the locality in agriculture or in forestry, or a widow or widower of such a person, and to any resident dependants”.

The question inevitably arises as to whether there would be a breach of such a condition where a member of the family living with the agricultural worker is not financially dependent on that person. The point was considered by the House of Lords in Fawcett Properties Ltd v Bucks CC [1961] AC 636, and the general impression derived from that judgment was that financial dependence was the qualifying criterion.

However, the question arose again in the case of Shortt v. SSCLG [2014] EWHC 2480 (Admin), in which judgment was given on 22 July. An LDC had been sought from the LPA on the basis of a continuous 10-year breach of the AOC, based on the fact that (a) the person actually working in the locality in agriculture had made a consistent loss in the agricultural enterprise throughout that period and (b) that, in consequence of this, the person’s husband was not financially dependent on her, and so could not be a ‘dependant’ for the purposes of the condition. The LPA failed to determine the LDC application, so the applicant appealed to the Planning Inspectorate under section 195.

The Inspector took what many would consider to have been a very sound commonsense approach to this issue. In his view, the appellant’s contention in reliance on Fawcett was an unnecessarily restrictive interpretation of the wording of the condition. In the context of people living in a family, the words subsistence and support are capable of having a non-monetary construction, he suggested. Furthermore, were the meaning of ‘dependant’ in the condition to be invariably interpreted as financially dependent, it would leave members of a family who lived in a dwelling whose occupation was the subject of such a condition, but who were not themselves working in agriculture, at risk of enforcement action whenever the agricultural worker’s income fell below a level deemed to establish dependency, which would be a nonsense. The Inspector considered that the wording of the condition should be interpreted so as to avoid such a possibility, having regard to the potential impact on, or interference with, ordinary family life.

For the purposes of the High Court application, the judge assumed that Mrs Shortt was an agricultural worker, but made no profit from the farm in any year, and therefore made no financial contribution to the family. This was clear from the evidence of her accounts. After considering various statutory definitions of ‘dependant’ in other legislation, His Lordship observed that, so far as the definition of “dependant” is concerned, context is everything.

Turning to the decision of the House of Lords in Fawcett, in His Lordship’s view that decision was is itself equivocal as to whether “dependant” in the statutory context from which agricultural occupancy conditions derive necessarily requires an element of financial dependency. Various appeal decision had been called in aid by the applicant, but these were not entirely in her favour. For example, in one case (Land at Meadows, Colwell Road, Freshwater, Isle of Wight: Planning Inspectorate Appeal No App/C/96/P2114/643380), the Inspector did not consider that “the condition could be construed as excluding a married couple, one of whom works outside agriculture”, where the agricultural worker appears to have earned nothing from that enterprise. Therefore, His Lordship held, even in the statutory context (or a context in which the precise statutory wording had been adopted), there is no clear authority to the effect that “dependant” necessarily implies financial dependency.

The wording of the condition in the present case differed slightly from the model condition, and this appears to have had a material effect on the judge’s decision. The condition did not simply refer to agricultural workers and their dependants, but agricultural workers and “the dependants (which shall be taken to include a widow or widower) of such persons”. So “dependants” here were deemed to include a widow or widower of an agricultural worker, whether or not, before that worker’s death, the spouse was financially dependent upon him or her. It would strain the construction of the condition too far for it to mean “the dependants (which shall be taken to include a widow or widower who was, prior to the agricultural worker’s death, a financial dependant of that worker)”.

Given that “dependants” may or may not include dependency other than financial dependency depending upon the context of the word, it seemed to His Lordship that, if the term is to include a widow or widower irrespective of earlier financial dependency, looked at objectively, it must have been intended to have included a husband or wife without financial dependency. In his view it could not have been the intention of the condition to prohibit spouses who are not financially dependent upon an agricultural worker from occupying the dwelling during the worker’s life, but allow such spouses to occupy it after the worker’s death.

Therefore, the words as used in the condition, looked at as a whole, appeared to His Lordship to envisage “dependency” in a wider and more open-textured way than one requiring an element of financial dependency, certainly to include a spouse and minor children of the worker who is their wife and mother and who provides them with usual family services and care.

To that extent it could perhaps be argued that this judgment is dependent on its facts, that is to say, on the precise wording of this condition. The judge himself pointed out that he was restricting himself to construing the particular condition in this case. It was unnecessary for him to seek to construe “dependants” in the statutory context, and he declined to do so. No doubt he was unwilling to be seen to be differing from a House of Lords decision, but Fawcett was decided over 50 years ago in a very different social and economic context, and a broader interpretation of “dependants” may now be more appropriate, not least because a narrow interpretation could throw up some undesirable and even nonsensical anomalies in such cases, as the Inspector pointed out.

It remains to be seen how much weight can be placed on Shortt as an authority on this issue, but I suggest that Fawcett, even though it was a House of Lords decision, should no longer be uncritically accepted as authority for the proposition that, in the context of an AOC, the interpretation of “dependant” is necessarily confined to financial dependants. It should reasonably be taken to include those in a family relationship with the agricultural worker living with them, such as spouses and even perhaps adult children, even though those persons are financially independent.

© MARTIN H GOODALL

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Racer cruisers and vice versa

I WAS THINKING the other day that I need another little Santana 22 sloop.  I owned one about 20 years ago. I turned her into a miniature “sport cruiser” and loved her to bits. She was the first successful  design from the board of Gary Mull, one of my favorite sailboat designers. About 800 Santana 22s were built by the Schock company in California in the late 1960s and early 70s. You’d think there would be at least one still around here in reasonable condition, but if there is, I can’t find it in this neck of the woods.

Mull was one who had very definite ideas about the difference between cruiser/racers and racer/cruisers. He didn’t design either. He simply created what he called “good sailboats.”

He was quoted as saying:  “If you call one a club racer, what you are really saying is that it is a racing boat that isn’t quite good enough to race against the real racing boats. It can only do club racing.

“If you call it a cruiser/racer, that’s some sort of hermaphrodite that is neither fish nor fowl, but is probably slower than a racer/cruiser, which is also a hermaphrodite but maybe looks racier than its cruiser/racer cousin.”

Whatever other people called his designs, it didn’t matter to him. Here is what he strove for in all his boats:

* Good looks and performance. “It has to be good-looking and it has to sail well.”

* Good balance.

* An airy, bright, pleasant interior. (“So you don’t feel like you’re going to jail when you go down below.”)

* A comfortable cockpit. (“Where you can work the boat without bashing your elbows or tripping over or whatever.”)

As for cruiser/racers and racer/cruisers, his philosophy was simple: “If you want to cruise for a while, you can do it by simply loading aboard the stores and some clothes, and just do it. If you want to race it, you can do that by off-loading some of the stores and gear and going racing.

A “good sailboat” like this wouldn’t be a successful racer under the International Offshore Rule “because it’s not an IOR boat,” said Mull. “But it’s probably going to be a better cruising boat than 99 percent of the cruising boats on the market, which are caricatures of cruising boats.”

Strong words from a strong character who was one of America’s most talented designers.

Today’s Thought

To me, the drawn language is a very revealing language; one can see in a few lines whether a man is really an architect.

— Eero Saarinen, NY Times, 5 Jun 77

Tailpiece

Rumor has it that the Feds are going to replace the dollar bill with a metal coin.

It’s called the quarter.

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Noah and an ark of reeds

I DON’T RECALL having heard anything said about plants on Noah’s Ark. Animals, yes, two of every kind, but no flowers or trees or vegetables. Noah certainly had sufficient meat on board for a circumnavigation but he would have found it hard going without barley for his beer and rice for his breakfast crispies.

I like to think of him as one of the first yachtsmen in the business, but perhaps he was more like Thor Heyerdahl than Joshua Slocum, because, contrary to what most of us were taught in Sunday school, Noah didn’t build his ark of wood. At least, not according to The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Seahe didn’t.

The OxCom says that the ark, in which Noah and his family escaped the deluge with all the animals, was probably not built of wood because there simply wasn’t enough wood in the entire Tigris-Euphrates region to build it of timber.

You will recall, of course, that the ark measured 300 cubits in length by 50 in beam and 30 in height. In terms of Egyptian royal cubits of about 21 inches each, that translates to a vessel measuring 521 feet long by 87 feet wide by 52 feet high. More of a ship than a boat, actually.

This has led researchers to assume that the ark was therefore built, according to the local traditional fashion, of papyrus reeds, roughly in the shape of a tea tray, with a little local wood used in the domestic quarters, cowsheds, pigsties, and so on. It sounds an awful lot like a larger version of Heyerdahl’s Kon Tiki raft.

Of course, one has to ponder how a 500-foot-long vessel constructed of reeds would hold together in any kind of seaway, but it is not for us to wonder why. Noah had faith, which is apparently as useful as a good solid wooden keel, and is not to be questioned.

Today’s Thought

God’s revelation to Adam didn’t instruct Noah how to build the ark.

— Ezra Taft Benson

Tailpiece

A little girl had just finished her first week of school.

Im just wasting my time, she said to her mother. I cant read, I cant write, and they wont let me talk!

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Permitted Changes of Use – the book and the seminar

By the beginning of October, preparations were well in hand for the publication of my book - A Practical Guide to Permitted Changes of Use, but we were still awaiting an announcement of the government’s intentions with regard to the completion deadline for the residential conversion of offices under Class O, which had been due to expire on 30 May 2016.

This announcement eventually came on 12 October, and was supplemented by a further press statement from De-CLoG the following day, which included the news that demolition of existing office buildings and new build will in future be part of the permitted development under Class O.

The announcement could not have been worse-timed from the point of view of our production schedule for the book. We had to make a rapid assessment of the details that had been announced and decide how to deal with the prospective changes to Class O (and one or two other expected changes, such as the residential conversion of launderettes and light industrial buildings).

A crucial factor was clearly going to be the actual timing of these various changes. De-CLoG’s Press Office are still unsure about the precise timetable, but the best guess seems to be that these changes will all take effect at the end of next May. We have decided that there would be no point in delaying the publication of the book for six months, and so (having included in the text such details of the forthcoming changes as are presently known) we have now sent the book to the printers. This unexpected delay has meant that we will miss our intended October publication date, but the book should now come out about a week or ten days into November.

Bath Publishing have extended the pre-publication price offer on the book until 13 November, and so this is your last chance to order this book at the special pre-publication price of £35. You can order your copy now by clicking through on the link on the left-hand side of this page.

In the meantime, bookings for the seminar linked to the publication of the book have been going so well that we had sold out all the 106 places that were originally available by 16 October. Unfortunately, the larger lecture room at the Institution of Civil Engineers in Great George Street is not available, and so in view of the continuing demand for tickets, we have moved the seminar to the RIBA at 66 Portland Place, London W1B 1AD. This is equally central and equally easy to reach by public transport, and moving to the new venue will ensure that we don’t have to disappoint anyone else who would like to attend. Bookings had reached 146 by this morning, and we now have capacity for up to 250 in total. If you have already booked, Bath Publishing will be in touch with more details about the change of venue later this week.

In view of the phenomenal response that we have had, we have also extended the deadline for ‘early bird’ online bookings at the reduced price of £120 (for readers of this blog only) to 13 November, but this will be your last chance to book for the seminar at this bargain price (including a copy of the book within this price). You can book your place now by clicking through on the link on the left-hand side of this page and entering the discount code COUPRE25 when prompted, or by calling Bath Publishing on 01225 577810. Bookings made after 13 November will only be accepted at the full price of £145.

© MARTIN H GOODALL

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Folding Gable Ends

We were aware that this beast with its generously gabled roof would be pretty tall.  Especially on a flatbed.  So I worked on some mechanism that would allow the gabled roof to fold down flat.  The question is:  How can you fold down the gables and then the two roof sections without anything binding?

I came up with a solution that I liked.  The gable end walls are a little shorter, so the gable ends can fold down without binding the roof sections.

If the roof sections themselves are in danger of binding (which I doubt since their overlap is minimal), the two side roof sections could be slightly different heights, though this might introduce other problems or look weird.

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Columbia Gorge Fishing Report September 7th

A great evening on the Klickitat

Fishing Report

For this week’s fishing report, we have a guest contributor.  Sam Sickles of www.steelheadoutfitters.com gave us an update on Saturday. 

The Klickitat is really starting to turn on too.  Chinook are now piling into the river and the meat crowd should be showing up in full force rather quickly.  The steelheading is really becoming more consistent every day and we are shaping up to have a great fall. 

Hailey had a great evening fishing on the Klickitat on Saturday, swinging flies on a dry line with her new Sage ONE and Lamson Litespeed.  She swung up a dozen trout, including a couple of really nice ones.  What a way to break in that new rod and reel. 

For the Deschutes, see the screenshot…  Clarity has dramatically improved from the White and dry line fishing is happening.  See you out there.

Drano Lakehas been great for steelhead and fair for Chinook.  Fishing should dramatically pick up for salmon this week as numbers are skyrocketing.  Traditionally, we peak out around this week for Fall Chinook numbers through Bonneville, and with falling river temps, the bite should really turn on quickly. 

We have heard very few reports on the trout fishing lately, but I would bet that it is improving nearly everywhere.  The lower river temps should really get bugs hatching and the fish biting.  I would love to be able to head over to the Metolius this month, as the fishing is at its best there in September and October.  Mahogany Dun Mayflies should be hatching on rivers, and trout love them.  Caddis hatches in the evening are also bringing trout up to the surface. 

Lost Lake has still been fishing really well.  It has been one of the bright spots to holdup this summer during the heat.  Laurence Lakehas been great too.  The level in either lake never got too low and fishing has been really good.  Remember, targeting bull trout in Laurence Lake is prohibited. No reasonable fisherman would be able to argue that an 8wt and a six inch rainbow trout pattern are appropriate gear for catching the 12 inch average rainbow trout that reside in the lake. 

                                          

As always, we are happy to talk fishing any time.  Give us a call if you have any specific questions on local rivers, gear, and tactics, or if you just want some encouragement to get out of the office.  

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

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And now back to the trailer

Remember the trailer? This one, the one that almost killed us?

We left the shantyboat hull pretty complete. Now that the boat is ready to be flipped, we turn our attention back to the trailer.

It is really a rusty, janky old thing. Ive owned it for fifteen years or so, or sorta owned it since I bought it with Sean for our Burning Man theme camp, the Costco Soulmate Trading Outlet. Its been stolen and recovered, broken and repaired on the road. We used to haul that thing back and forth loaded to the gills over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, taking our lives into our own hands. Then we realized that if we stored it in the desert, we could save wear and tear on our mortality. So there it stayed for about ten years.

When the camp realized it could buy a shipping container and have it dropped off at their campsite every year without the hassle of dealing with That Trailer, the poor thing got abandoned for a few years out in the Nevada wilds. You remember that I drove out to the desert with Alex to rescue our friend the trailer, a trip with nearly fatal results.

So here it is, a 20 foot flatbed, maybe suited to my shantyboat, maybe not, needing suspension work, a coat of paint, deck repair, and maybe some repair welds.

The first thing I did was fire up my cutting torch and cut off the weird distinctive triangle things, and ground down the cuts. I always assumed they were there as a token gesture to structural reinforcement.

I replaced all the deck bolts that had rusted through, grinding off and replacing any that had loosened. The deck needed about 50 new bolts. This alone made the deck much more stable.

I gave all the metal on the entire trailer, top and bottom, a new coat of Rust-Oleum. I had to get suited up to prevent myself from being painted too thoroughly, climbing under the trailer and applying paint overhead.

It looked pretty good when I was done. Though crawling around under the trailer, I saw several places where the metal was cracked, principally around the lateral beam that joined the two pairs of leaf springs on either side.

For a while, Id been sweating how to make the skids that would hold up the boat. I considered using recycled railroad ties since I could get them for free at the local trainyard, but their height and condition were too inconsistent. Eventually I got a ridiculous deal from a friend at the local lumberyard who found me some 6x6 treated lumber seconds that had a barely perceptible twist or were split a bit at one end.

I positioned the skids so one set would lie just inside of the skegs, and the other set so they lay at the outside edge of the trailer, as far out as could be secured. I figured this would support the boat along the stringers as well as give it side-to-side stability, something I thought would be extra important as we were trucking down the highway.

I drilled bolt holes through the skids and into the support brackets under the trailer.

I put big long 8 inch carriage bolts through the skids. For extra measure, I painted the bottom and tops of the carriage bolts. Lawrence joined me for a bit and serenaded me with excellent banjo tunes.

To prevent the skids from damaging the surface of the hull, I chamfered the sharp edges of the skids with my skill saw.

I cut the ends of each skid at an angle to guide the skegs while the boat was being trailered. Though honestly, I dont think the skegs at the back of the boat will be anywhere near the skids, since that end of the trailer will be deep under water and the back of the boat high above it during a boat launch or trailering. But it seemed like a good idea.

Then I covered the skids with indoor/outdoor low-pile carpet, stapling and using roofing nails at the edges.

The result was surprisingly legit looking.

Then Jen and I sat on the trailer and had a beer.  Something about this trailer makes you want to sit on it and have a drink.  Whats that about?

Next, the superhero of heavy duty welding flies the trailer high into the sky and melts it with his heat ray vision!

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Flooding crisis – the blame game and the EA

My recent piece on the flooding crisis elicited the following contribution from David P of Sussex. I don’t necessarily agree with all he says, but I thought that it deserved an airing.

David P writes: -“Your blog post on this topic is most interesting. But have you considered that it is not so much the lack of money or people that is the problem, but more likely the allocation of them? Too many chiefs and not enough Indians? Good and capable people in the wrong jobs? I would suggest as an old farmer who has made his living from the land, that everyone in the EA employ wants an office job - nice and warm, better wages and higher status, so they try to climb up the ladder. Now I would suggest that for every person in an office job there should be 100 manual workers, four of whom should be supervisors or gang masters if you prefer. That’s where it goes wrong in every organisation and it brings them to the point that if it is a business it becomes top heavy and unviable, or if it is a public authority we all have to pay too much for the implementation of the service it provides and the service deteriorates to below an acceptable standard. We need hands on the ground, not in the air when it comes to flooding.

“By the way it’s not only the United Kingdom that has this problem; it’s worldwide in the west, particularly Europe. So I dare to say that, for the benefit of the community running properly, too much education can be a bad thing and a bit more manual graft and guts might just get things in proportion. Only the very best brains should have access to the ladder. A mini ‘cultural revolution’? A few less Lord Smiths and a few more Mr Smiths with old fashioned wheelbarrows and shovels? Perhaps the invention of paper has had some questionable benefits - by allowing more people than is necessary to spend their lives in centrally heated offices and achieving very little.”

_____________________

My thanks to David P for this contribution.

I have some sympathy with the view that we need more people in the field and fewer in the office. I have long felt that many organisations in the public sector (especially in local government, where I worked for some years in the earlier part of my career) are ‘over-managed’ and under-staffed.

There may be a need to re-balance the EA, and I wonder whether it might be advisable to revive the National Rivers Authority as a separate organisation, putting under it the sewerage and drainage functions currently carried out by the privatised water companies, so that the whole problem of land drainage is put under a single roof, in an organisation that can concentrate exclusively on tackling this issue in all its aspects. I also wonder whether this authority ought to be given powers to direct refusal where development is proposed on flood plains.

This is perhaps the answer to those critics who questioned the relevance to town and country planning of my piece on the flooding crisis. The answer, I suggest, is that it has a great deal to do with planning, and the need to ensure that new properties are not vulnerable to flooding is clearly going to be of increasing importance in the future.

© MARTIN H GOODALL (with acknowledgements to David P)

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Ross Reels A Closer Look at the Animas and Cimarron II

Back by popular demand!
The original Double R logo

Its been about a year now since Ross Reels announced their return to a fly reel ONLY company and I have to say we were glad to hear the news. After Ross Reels acquired the new ownership from a company called the Mayfly Group (who happens to also own Abel Fly Reels) it was decided that the right direction for Ross was to drop the line of imported rods and get back to their roots of building high quality USA made fly reels.  

Ross Animas
The Animas is named after the Animas River that flows through Southwest Colorado and conjoins the San Juan River in Northwest New Mexico. Some key features to note about the Animas is the machined aluminum reversed taper crank, tool-less easy right-to-left conversion and a time honored drag system taken from the indestructible CLA and remodeled with some high grade component upgrades.

Animas Specifications

Model	Diameter	Width	Weight	Rod wt	Line
3/4	3.125"	0.97"	4.3 oz	3/4	WF3+75yds/20#
4/5	3.25"	0.97"	4.5 oz	4/5	WF4+100yds/20#
5/6	3.50"	1.01"	4.9 oz	5/6	WF5+150yds/20#
7/8	3.875"	1.09"	7.0 oz	7/8	WF8+200yds/20#
9/10	4.25"	1.17"	8.5 oz	9/10	WF9+250yds/30#
10/12	4.625"	1.19"	9.5 oz	10/12	WF12+275yds/30#

Ross Cimarron II
The Cimarron II replaces the aging CLA (Cimarron Large Arbor). The Cimarron II models the drag system from its predecessor but sees some upgrades including some new composite  and stainless steel materials resulting in a much more powerful drag pressure while maintaining smooth startup inertia. In keeping with the CLA tradition the new Cimarron II offers high performance large arbor disc drag design in a lightweight economical USA built fly reel.

Cimarron Specifications

Model	Diameter	Width	Weight	Rod wt	Line
3/4	3.125"	0.97"	4.77 oz	3/4	WF3+75yds/20#
4/5	3.25"	0.97"	4.85 oz	4/5	WF4+100yds/20#
5/6	3.50"	1.01"	5.11 oz	5/6	WF5+150yds/20#
7/8	3.875"	1.09"	6.82 oz	7/8	WF8+200yds/20#
9/10	4.25"	1.17"	7.54 oz	9/10	WF9+250yds/20#

Oh and the one of the best changes that happened at Ross Reels was the return of the double R logo! Sometimes you have to take a step back to see the correct path forward!

Ross is Back!

Just Wrong!

Greg Darling 

Gorge Fly Shop Internet Sales Manager | Product Specialist

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

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Fishing Big Alaska Bows with Sage 3 4 and 5 wt Switchers

LEFT: Scott O donnell - the "O" in MOW...mccune odonnell ward = MOW4
RIGHT: Ted Larsen - AZ Cards

A week at Royal Wolf Lodge
All spring I looked forward to a return to Royal Wolf Lodge in Alaska—fly fishing for rainbows, char and grayling with dries, streamers and mice. With a lower snow pack this year and the weather gods smiling, June 26 to July 3 was shaping up to be epic. Flying out to a different river each day and fishing like a rock star would be fun and engaging.

Sage has two new “Baby Speys” a 2 and 3 weight. Both are in the Sage ONE series of Switch rods at 10’6” and 11’. They relate to singlehanded rods in the 4-6 line weight range. It was my good fortune to fish with the 3 wt prototype this week, along with my ONE 4116-4 and 5116-4. Fishing with “live ammo” like cone headed leeches, sculpins, and mice for wild trout is the best way to learn what these three rods were about.

All three rods were fished with the Rio Skagit Short heads with sinking and floating tips. The running line was the OPST Lazer line, which is made in smaller diameters that match up well with the lighter heads. (I did not have access to the new Rio Skagit Trout Max 11’ heads.) Guidelines for head weights are #3, 275-300; #4, 325-350; and #5, 375-400 grains.

Fun, Fun Fun!

Reward

These are not toys or rods for kids. They are very efficient fly rods that make effortless, precise casts. One afternoon we floated and fished mice mostly from the boat. I fished the 4 wt with ridiculous ease. With a larger trout on, like the size of summer steelhead, it was BENT, but not overpowered. To cast any of these rods, you do not need to change your casting stroke, but just listen to that little voice that says “sloooow the %&#! down”. The sheer number of fishing casts made in a broad range of water, various flies, wind, along with near constant action made for relaxed fishing with no conscious thoughts about the mechanics or the tools. After awhile I forgot what rod I was fishing. You look at a spot and it goes there.

The typical single-handed line up for Alaska trout fishing is 5, 6 and 7 weights, fished with a floater and a sink tip or two. The two types of rods complemented each other well. The Sage Circa 589-4 was by far the best and most fun dry fly rod.


Royal Wolf is one of the top fly-out lodges in Alaska. Their staff of very experienced guides, pilots and chefs make for an extraordinary week.

Jerry Swanson

Fish Head Expeditions

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

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Those Troublesome Skegs Bolt Holes and Finish

Here we drill all sorts of holes in our newly made skegs and finish them.

You know, it really helps to have the right tools. And you know what helps having the right tools? Money. I dont got none of that, so I have to make do with the tools I have. And sometimes that is a ridiculous process.

Here I am trying to level my handheld power drill in a slightly broken garage sale drill press with a bit that isnt quite long enough to go through the piece.

I have to drill bolt holes in the skegs. Then I have to drill through the newly fiberglassed and sealed hull to insert the bolts through structural members in the frame.

First I drilled a countersink to hide the head of the carriage bolts, then a hole through the skeg.

I placed the skegs in position on the hull, and then used a long bit to drill through the skeg into the hull and into the structural member of the boat.

Then I went under the boat and countersunk all the receiving ends of the bolt holes.

Actually, Im lying. But thats probably how I would do it now if I did it again. I doubted the accuracy of drilling down into the hull from above, so I marked the desired hole locations under the boat and drilled up. Then I marked the locations of the actual holes on the skegs. Then I took the skegs into the barn and used my sketchy drill press to drill the bolt holes in the skegs.

After all this stressful drilling, I finished the skegs with stain and a couple of coats of UV blocking polyurethane.

Next we install the skegs in the hull. Not once, but twice. Ahem.

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Nautilus Fly Reels Then and Now!

In 2003 7th generation fishing industry Kristen Mustad brought to life a vision to that would forever change the fly fishing reel industry. In that year Kristen bought out the small company of Old Florida Reels and in 3 months showed the fly fishing industry the first Nautilus CCF #8 Fly Reel. Since its introduction Nautilus Reels have become the benchmark that all sealed disc drag fly reels must be measured against and most reels in this class today still fall short of the standard that Nautilus Fly Reels established on this day in history. 

CCF-X2

CCF-X2

Ten years after the introduction of the industry changing CCF(cork and carbon fiber) fly reel, Nautilus unveiled a completely new version named CCF-X2. Besides stunning new looks the X2 doubles the drag strength (20lbs+) while being smoother and with less start-up inertia than the former CCF. If you were familiar with the former CCF reels you want to know that a major change in this model is that the retrieve is now switchable without need of replacing the complete drag hub. Not only is this a good feature for the new angler trying to determine what retrieve is best for them but also a huge help for the dealer to maintain and provide reels without concern of what retrieve they are.

The New CCF-X2 Silver King

Spey Rings

New for 2015, The addition of The Silver King completes the CCF-X2 lineup with a true large arbor 5 inch reel designed to tackle all things Silver. Each crank of the big game handle can retrieve up to 14" of line per turn. Like the smaller CCF-X2s its packed with features like Sealed drag, hybrid ceramic bearings, TPX bushings and an over-sized drag knob capable of dialing up more than 20 lbs of drag force.
Two hand enthusiast will be glad to know about the Silver King innovation of Spey Rings. Spey Rings eliminate the need for a fully caged reel by reducing the tolerance between spool and frame to stop thin shooting lines from escaping between the gap.

FWX (Feather Weight Xtreme)

Feather Weight Xtreme

FWX - Technologies

The second series of reels to come out of the Nautilus factory was the FW (Feather Weight) Series. These lightweight Trout to Bonefish sized reels became an instant success. The SCF (Sealed Carbon Fiber) drag system provided unparalleled performance in a small scaled down version of the award winning  CCF and NV series reels. An FW revision took place in 2011 and Created the FWX. Since then its sales have proved to be one of the most popular reels of all time. With additions like Giga Arbor, Torque X and the wildly popular LASER-ID for easy write your own line identification on the spool has pushed this reel into history changing status.

NV-G (~EN-VEE)

NV-G

Conceived in 2007 the NV has won many awards over the years.  At the heart of this reel is a NVCCF Drag Hub capable of taming any beast you pursue. While the original NV has seen many changes over the years the guts and frame remain the same today as the first NV that rolled off the production line. Some things are better left unchanged! 

The list of technologies in the NV-G Reels is impressive to say the least. 

Starting with the heart of the reel is the sealed NV-CCF drag hub. Inside this hub is two ceramic thrust bearings ensuring the smoothest drag on the market. The Cork Carbon Fiber hub fits over a titanium shaft and sealed by the Nautilus exclusive Activseal

which perpetually repels water and contaminants from entering the system creating a reel that is impervious to the elements. Moving out from the heart of the reel is the  G-Spool design that transformed the original NV reel to what Nautilus has defined as Über Arbor fly reels. The G-Spool (Giga spool) is what puts the "G" in NV-G and enabled a design that significantly reduces weight

and generates faster line retrieval. The G-Spool also allows for your backing to dry much faster than traditional spool designs by allowing air to circulate through the open arbor all of which helps reduce corrosion cause by prolong wet backing. Your backing almost appears to float on the arbor.

LASER-ID standard on all Nautilus reels

In addition to these high tech features are some really awesome user friendly stuff you wont find on other reels. LASER-ID is one of my favorite features. Simply use a sharpie to write on the spool what line it is. No more tacky stickers that fade and fall off leaving sticky dirt trapping spots on you fly reel. If you need to change the ID just dab a little spot remover on the laser etched area and its ready to go again.


Hooker comes standard on NV-G reels and is available as an optional add on to all Nautilus fly reels. This little peg comes off the reel seat and lets you wrap your line on it or hook a fly to it.

NV - Spey

NV - Spey

Within the NV Series is two sizes of spey specific reel sizes. Using the existing NV-G 8/9 and NV-G 9/10 frames Nautilus has created two Spey specific spools. The Spools feature tighter tolerances for the use of thinner running lines. Capacity is also increased to accommodate the larger size of Spey lines.  The great feature of this design is the same reel you are using today for Permit or Bonefishing could be fishing Steelhead tomorrow in the Northwest with just the change of a spool. Instead of just increasing the spool size to match spey angler needs Nautilus also gave these spools their own unique look and intentionally made them a bit heavier to aide in balancing two hand spey rods.

NV to NV-G changes

As I mentioned earlier the NV to NV-G has seen many changes over the years while the heart of the reel has remained unchanged. Any NV no matter when it was purchased still is 100% compatible with todays available spools. So if you have an older NV and you wish to purchase an extra spool or gain the benefits of the G-Spool or purchase a Spey spool than youre in luck. These charts can help sort it out. The easy way I have found to match past to present is think about it in term of reel diameter. (IE; If you have a past NV 8/9 this is a 4" reel. Todays 4" reel is a NV-G 7/8) Measuring the outside of the spool rim will tell you what the diameter of your reel is.

COMPATIBILITY TABLE 

NV-G		NV
5/6 Frame		NEW*
6/7 Frame		NEW*
7/8 Frame	Compatible with	8/9 spool
8/9 Frame	Compatible with	10/11 Spool SPEY 400-550 Spool
9/10 Frame	Compatible with	11/12 Spool Spey 450-750 Spool
10/11 Frame	Compatible with	NV Monster

Specs for all Nautilus NV-G series reels as of 3/18/2015

Model	Line	Capacity	Weight	Diameter
NV G-5/6	5/6	WF6+(125yds20#)	5.1 oz.	3.50"
NV G-6/7	6/7	WF7+(150yds20#)	5.7 oz.	3.75"
NV G-7/8	7/8	WF8+(200yds20#)	6.6 oz.	4.0"
NV G-8/9	8/9	WF9+(200yds30#)	7.2 oz.	4.25"
NV G-9/10	9/10	WF10+(200yds30#)	8.3 oz.	4.50"
NV Monster	11/13	WF12+(350yds30#)	9.9 oz.	5.0"
NV Monster G-10/11	10/11	WF10+(225yds30#)	9.9 oz.	5.0"
NV SPEY 400-550	SPEY	550gr head with .030 running line +(150yds30#)	8.1 oz.	4.25"
NV SPEY 450-750	SPEY	750gr head with .030 running line +(150yds30#)	9.1 oz.	4.50"

About the only trouble youll experience with a Nautilus reel is getting one. Really this is a good problem. What I mean is since becoming k

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Christmas Island Trip January 2016 OPEN SPOTS!

The Gorge Fly Shop appreciates the use of all photos, thank you photographers!

BOOK YOUR TRIP TODAY - Before its too late!

We have had a few spots open up on our Christmas Island trip January 12 to 19 2016. Here is your chance to join us on this great trip! Spots are very limited. 

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Christmas Island, Ikari House

Morrison Files - Great Christmas Island Trip

Christmas on Christmas Island - Jimmy Buffet Style

Contact Travis at info@gorgeflyshop.com or 541-386-6977

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Columbia Gorge Fishing Report August 10th

MP Quote

Fishing Report

Fishing has really picked up on the Deschutesand is primed for some good days on the Klickitat this week.  Get out and fish!  The 2:00 restrictions have been lifted for the Deschutes, but most others remain in place.  Please check with us, Washington or Oregon Fish and Game Departments before fishing if you are not sure about the current regulations. 

Summer Steelhead is generally the fish of choice for most of the hard-core anglers in the area and prospects for a fabulous day on the river are looking really good.  We heard fabulous reports from the Deschutes River last week and expect it to be good this week and next week too.  The White was spilling dirty water for a few days, but it did not stop the fish from snapping.  The dirty water usually just prevents anglers from getting out.  I love fishing when the clarity is 1’- 3’ because the fish tend to be in closer to shore and you can typically fish a light tip as they are sitting in the shallower water than typical. 

The Klickitat Riverhas been fluctuating clarity from around 1’ to 3’ or so (and we love it).  It never quite got to that “steelhead green” color that everyone else likes, but it has been fishing pretty well nonetheless.  The clarity hasn’t seemed to match the temperature as much as typical.  I believe (and I am usually wrong) that the “in-river” work that has been going on is affecting clarity as some natural settling of the dirt is throwing some sediment into the river that wouldn’t be there otherwise.  The work that I am talking about is the removal of an old road above where the Little Klickitat comes in.  This work is a good thing.  Improvement of habitat and returning portions of the river that were altered back into a natural state is one thing that we should all be able to agree on, even if it causes a little extra sediment to flow down the river.  So that being said, the clarity should get better, but I love fishing with it hovering about 1.5’ because I can go wherever I want; there is no one to compete with and there are just as many fish around as when the river is clear. 

Smallmouth Bass fishing has been excellent on the John Day Riverand Columbia Riveralong with many of the impoundments along the freeway on both the WA and OR side of the Gorge.  The Columbia came up quite a bit as the powers that be have been pushing water downstream in a successful attempt to cool down the big river.  It should finally drop below 70 this week for the first time in two months.  This should get the smallies moving and opens up a bit of water as the weeds have not been able to grow up to the surface yet in a lot of spots that have otherwise been really weedy this summer. 

Carp fishing has been good this past week as the rising flow in the Columbiahas moved fish into some new flats that are relatively weed-free right now and holding quite a few fish. 

Trout fishing has been great in most places this past week.  Unfortunately for you trout guys, the reports on trout fishing tend to get pretty sparse as soon as the steelhead start to show up.  As soon as one guy says “steelhead”, everyone seems to forget about the trout fishing.  I would bet that the Crooked, McKenzie, Metolius and Upper Deschutes are all fishing really well.  The upper part of the Lower Deschutes (near Warm Springs) has also been great lately with both Slate Wing Duns and a few early Mahogany Mayflies hatching that have been getting some attention as well as the evening caddis hatch just before dark. 

Lost Lake is still fishing very well, and trout have been coming up to the surface early and late to eat Callibaetis, Grasshoppers and Carpenter Ants, as well as just about anything else including beetles, damselflies and maybe some early caddis. 

As always, we are happy to talk fishing any time.  Give us a call if you have any specific questions on local rivers, gear, and tactics, or if you just want some encouragement to get out of the office.

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

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Friends Trout and Teriyaki

When I was in elementary school, my absolute favorite event of the year was our annual fishing trip to eastern Washington for opening weekend of trout fishing. Forget the water park, Mariners games or the zoo; the boys’ annual fishing trip was the thing I looked forward to the most. Drowning worms, debating which color of powerbait was better, and bringing home a cooler full of trout was all part of the experience. I even wrote an essay in sixth grade about my favorite place; Lake Jameson.

Fins and Friends

Things have changed for me since then. I rarely drown worms, I have decided that the blue and pink sparkle powerbait is by far the most effective color, and I mostly bring home empty coolers that started out the weekend full of beer.

Emerald green waters

I have made a spring trout trip to the “basin lakes” of Eastern Washington trip almost every year except for a few times when living in Idaho. Getting out of Eastern Idaho in April was a bit more difficult than it sounds on this 80 degree day.

I made it happen every year in college when there were many other things that I should have been focusing on; mostly studying… but I always managed to get a friend or two to go camping for a few days while we celebrated the rites of spring at a beautiful lake.

This year I convinced Jon and Ryan to join me at _________ Lake for two days. Jon and Ryan had never met, but I know two peas in a pod when I see them. Both are recent transplants from what I call back East, but both have convinced that Austin, Texas and Chicago are not actually “back East”. But to me, anything east of Wyoming might as well be New York.

Unable to get out of the Gorge after work, we met up at o’ dark thirty in my driveway, the beginning of many epic trips. Three and a half hours after departing Hood River, we arrived at a chain of lakes that I had been curious about for some years now, but had only camped at many years ago with some friends when it wasn’t open for fishing. While I didn’t fish these lakes back then, they were put on my radar and I have been reading up on them and hatching a plan for several years now.

Camping in the Desert

This year however, fishing was the primary objective of the trip. We struggled to find a nice camping site, but eventually found a nice quiet little spot on the opposite side of the lake from the hordes of RVs. I had forgotten that arriving at a busy lake on a Friday morning can make for a tough time finding a good spot, since I am normally not a “weekend warrior” and rarely find myself camping in such a well-used area.

Packing Float Tubes

The lake that I really wanted to explore involved a very short drive, then a “nice” hike. It was maybe a little under a mile over broken basalt, a crooked path and a several hundred foot drop in elevation. Not the easiest thing to accomplish while carrying an Outcast Fat Cat, two rods, and all of our gear and food for the day. After what seemed like too long since we left town, our arrival at the lake could not have been better. There were several nice trout working just under the surface about ten feet from shore where we had just arrived.

One poor cast, made too quickly with a terrible presentation and the fish were gone. We took a minute, sat down and rested in quiet solitude, gaining a bit of focus and calm that would guide us through the rest of the day.

Jon

Once launched, it took a few minutes to get the first fish or two to our nets. Jon landed three before I was even settled in. I then missed the first four I hooked, but fish were coming to hand with ease within an hour. The rainbows in this lake were not huge, but they put up a huge fight. We believe this is due to being released as fingerlings; they are forced to fend for themselves and grow strong from an early stage. Fourteen to seventeen inch trout are still dandies in most places on earth.

We soon found this little point in the lake where fish, wind, currents and food all met. Soon after that, we stopped being impressed with double hook-ups and only made a passing notice when all three of us had bent rods at the same time. Laughter echoed across the otherwise empty lake as grown men giggled like school boys every time a rainbow trout went airborne.

Leeches and Buggers

I caught most of my fish on a chironomid nymph, but we all caught fish on just about everything that we could throw at them. Leech patterns, callibaetis nymphs, damselfly nymphs, soft hackles, and dries were all working just fine. Jon mostly fished an olive or black bugger, while Ryan threw a squirrel fur sculpin pattern he calls the Mohawk.

On the way out, Ryan and I hiked into a couple of other lakes as it was getting dark, but didn’t see any signs of life. The approach to the first lake included a treacherous descent of a basalt cliff, and nearly falling to great injury several times. I wish that there had been enough light to get a picture or two of this backwoods journey. The jagged basalt faces, endless thorny brushes and loose rock made our trek more of an adventure than we were expecting. Unfortunately, there were no fish in these small lakes. After such an amazing day, the lack of trout in those last couple of lakes didn’t affect our day at all and I am so glad that we had the opportunity to see these little gems.

Trout bugs

While Ryan and I explored these little side lakes, Jon made it back to camp and was prepping steaks and potatoes for us to be just in time for a gorgeous sunset at our campsite. After a filling meal and a couple of frosty beverages, we turned in to bed quickly. We all slept like bears in hibernation until morning.
Day two proved to be a little bit harder than the first. Jon was too sore to hike back into that lake. His knee was bothering him, so he fished a couple of the lakes that were close to camp and required no hiking. He reported that there were indeed trout in those lakes and indeed, they did eat flies with gusto.

While Jon explored the “camp water”, Ryan and I hiked back into the lake that we hit the day before. While the first day offered a fish every couple of minutes, there were a couple of near hour long stretches on day two that fishing was really tough; alternated with hours of slaughter. While we were exploring a different part of the lake, we got sucked into sight casting for pre-spawning fish in the shallows that were not at all interested in our flies. Once we got back on track working the productive shoreline, it was “game on” again. While we still hooked and landed tons of fish, the best part of the day was spent on unproductive water.

Worth the Hike

The hike into the lake was strenuous the first time. The way out was fueled purely by adrenaline from a day of slaughter. The hike in on the second day was definitely tough. Every muscle in my legs and back burned with every step. Through pure grit and determination, we fished hard until 5:00 and then we had the hardest hike out of a lake I have ever experienced. Every time I looked up from the trail, the rim of the canyon (our destination) appeared to be further away than when we started. We made it out running on fumes only to have to pack up camp and drive four hours or so back to Hood River.

Tiger Trout

A quick stop for Teriyaki in Ellensburg mildly fueled us up for the final couple of hours of driving. Upon arrival at my house just shy of midnight, we haphazardly dumped all of our gear in my driveway and went our separate ways, agreeing to deal with our camping gear in the morning. I am guessing that I was asleep within 21 seconds of Ryan and Jon getting back in the car.

It’s so nice to take a break from steelheading every year and get back to my roots. I don’t spend nearly enough time on a lake, but I enjoy every minute of it regardless of the size or quantity of the fish. No matter where I am, I will always plan to take a weekend in April or May to get out to a desert lake, camp with my friends, and catch a trout or two.

Andrew Perrault
Gorge Fly Shop | Product Specialist
541.386.6977


Float Tube Buyers Guide

"Fly Fish the World with Us"

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