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Changing times, changing tactics
Published
12 years agoon
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AdminBy Pat Straub Gallatin River Guides
Fishing guides struggle with the change of summer into fall, our shorts and flip flops dangling from goose-bumped legs.
“It’ll warm up in a few hours,” we tell folks as our frozen hands grasp warm coffee mugs. Like an early season salmon fly clinging to a streamside willow, guides hang on to summer, despite frost on the pumpkins, ice in the boats, or fish no longer eating hoppers.
One day in mid-September I guided a high mountain freestone river. It’s a place so beautiful, I’m lucky to guide it and my clients are even luckier to get to fish it. After vigilantly force feeding trout flies that caught fish three weeks prior, my client finally said what we were both thinking: “Hoppers are done. Let’s try a size 18 Para Adams.” Next cast, a buttery golden Yellowstone cutthroat to net.
The following day floating the Yellowstone River with the same angler, we started the morning casting size 8 Fat Frank dry flies, but ended the day stripping streamers, looking for under water structure. The dry flies produced a few trout, but going deeper with big ugly woolly buggers and bunny-fur streamers served-up brilliantly colored, well-fed brown trout, more typical of fall then late summer. The shadows grew long as I pulled the boat from the river.
The streamer and woolly bugger fishing was so good the clients booked a few more days at the end of the next week.
When penning their dates in my book, I said aloud, “Sept. 22, first day of autumn.”
The client said, “brown trout eating streamers. Go figure.”
Our bittersweet progression into fall fishing is inevitable. It reveals human nature’s grass-is-greener tendencies, but fortunately, this year our fall fishing will be stellar. This resistance to change is perhaps our unwillingness to accept the end of summer and its tourist traffic (and the money they bring).
But, in a skitown like Big Sky, that’s OK, because as each day summer is in our rearview is a day closer to fresh powder.
Pat Straub is the owner of Gallatin River Guides. He is also the author of five books, most recently, The Frugal Fly Fisherman.
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april, 2024
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We all are familiar with using a limited palette, but do you use one? Do you know how to use a
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We all are familiar with using a limited palette, but do you use one? Do you know how to use a limited palette to create different color combinations? Are you tired of carrying around 15-20 different tubes when you paint plein air? Have you ever wanted to create a certain “mood” in a painting but failed? Do you create a lot of mud? Do you struggle to achieve color harmony? All these problems are addressed in John’s workbook in clear and concise language!
Based on the bestselling “Limited Palatte, Unlimited Color” workbook written by John Pototschnik, the workshop is run by Maggie Shane and Annie McCoy, accomplished landscape (acrylic) and plein air (oil) artists,exhibitors at the Big Sky Artists’ Studio & Gallery and members of the Big Sky Artists Collective.
Each student will receive a copy of “Limited Palette, Unlimited Color” to keep and take home to continue your limited palette journey. We will show you how to use the color wheel and mix your own clean mixtures to successfully create a mood for your paintings.
Each day, we will create a different limited palette color chart and paint a version of a simple landscape using John’s directives. You will then be able to go home and paint more schemes using the book for guidance.
Workshop is open to painters (oil or acrylic) of any level although students must have some basic knowledge of the medium he or she uses. Students will be provided the book ($92 value), color wheel, value scale and canvas papers to complete the daily exercises.
Sundays, April 14, 21 and 28, 2024
Noon until 6PM.
$170.
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14 (Sunday) 12:00 pm - 28 (Sunday) 6:00 pm
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Please join the Arts Council of Big Sky for free music from Jacob Rountree at the Wilson Hotel Lobby Bar from 5-7 p.m.
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Please join the Arts Council of Big Sky for free music from Jacob Rountree at the Wilson Hotel Lobby Bar from 5-7 p.m. on April 24.
Jacob Rountree is an alternative/indie songwriter living in the stunning alpine of Montana. Contemplative yet playful, his lyric forward style is reflective of his love for philosophy, poetry and quantum physics.
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(Wednesday) 5:00 pm - 7:00 pm
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The Wilson Hotel
145 Town Center Ave
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Trivia from 7 to 9 p.m. at The Waypoint in Town Center. Participation is free, food and beverages available.
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Trivia from 7 to 9 p.m. at The Waypoint in Town Center. Participation is free, food and beverages available.
Time
(Wednesday) 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Location
The Waypoint
50 Ousel Falls Rd