What, as an industry, can we do to help?
As many of you have seen, recent floods have taken a severe toll on Colorado’s Front Range. A number of fly fishing businesses have been impacted. Is it time to react?
Share your thoughts. If you need help, let us know. We’ve done it before (Guide for the Gulf, after Hurricane Katrina) and we can do it again.
All of us must be tuned into the long-range impacts these floods may have on several of Colorado’s most prominent trout streams. With our input and effort, these streams can and will be restored, and the infrastructure used to do so will be more effective, efficient and fish friendly.
4 Comments
Thank you for acknowledging. This has been an incredible blow for both my town of Estes Park and the fishing and guiding community here.
While the efforts and collaboration among everyone have been amazing to be a part of, going forward with solid management practices and a vision towards nurturing of the environment –and inclusion of the fishing industry within the context of that — will be crucially important for the future.
It may be important to make sure we don’t give people the wrong impression about our streams. Make no mistake, there is lots of damage and there will be impacts. But we should also remember fisheries can be quite adaptable. I think it’s important that we share good news with the bad. There is lots of property damage and the guiding/fishing season for many has been prematurely cut off. But let’s not give people the wrong impression that there are no opportunities here and that people shouldn’t come to Colorado. Shops in Estes Park are already catching fish again in the Big Thompson even though it remains high and off color. Transportation will be an evolving problem, in some watersheds for a good deal of time. But one thing that will help the industry locally is if we can get the word out that there are some opportunities and more will re-appear so people with trips scheduled or who were considering coming may need to do some new research, but there may be no need to cancel trips or cross Colorado off the list. Come visit, fish and patronize the local shops and businesses.
Agreed, Al.
Ligas Flies in Boulder Colorado is a website http://www.ligasflies.com selling to the public for 35 years. Our Sunshine creek which is usually dry this time of year went wild and got into our house that we have worked out of all these years. We got our inventory moved upstairs before the water came in and now have it back in the basement. Back yard looks like disaster area, lost carpet, drywall flooring hot water heater and furnace. While we have store accounts we mostly sell to the public and they have been very supportive and have received emails from many of them, So far FEMA is doing what they say they will do. Maybe Angling trade news will stop by for a visit some day as they are in Boulder too. Wally Allen