All One River GIS

Fly fishing and Mining, can it be? Can they exist in the same sentence?

Most “non-mining people”… (What should I call non-mining people for future reference sake? Hmmm, NMPs! That’ll do…) would shiver at the mention of these two industries in one thought. Most NMPs would never believe or be willing to accept the reality of the strong fly fishing-to-miners-ratio that exists. I would venture to say that per capita more miners fly fish than say, skiers. I focus on this phenomenon because both industries have the mountains in common, but are usually at odds in proposed house bills or endorsements or ad campaigns. The reason skiers are in the mountains are obvious, but the reason miners are in the mountains may not be so obvious to the NMPs. Miners work at, well — mines. And mines are, well, in remote places where most mineralization has likely been exposed to the surface by means of uplift and erosion, i.e., the mountains near streams and drainages. Of course, there is a hard rock bent to that observation. Coal mines in the flat lands might skew the numbers…. Point being: outdoors enthusiasts are often in the mountains but not neccesarilly fly fishing. And within the skiing population, if they fish at all, I speculate it is probably in summer, probably on a lake or reservoir, maybe with a motor boat. Yes, I know a lot of skiers who fly fish, but most skiers do not. However, most miners do some kind of fishing and year round and many fly fish and I do not know why but I bet it has something to do with combining methodical personality with the love for the outdoors. We need a study on this topic, I think — a demographic swath across the fly fishing industry of skiers versus miners.

This is going somewhere, patience…

I grew up in Colorado. I lived on the Colorado River and on the Eagle River and I skied. It wasn’t until I started working in Cripple Creek at the mine that I learned to fly fish, and that was because most everyone I worked with was an avid fly fisher. Even one of the drillers owned a dory (I have often wondered at the similarity between “dory” and “doré “.) To this day, most of our fly fishing trips are with other mining people floating the Green River, the Rio Grand, the Arkansas, the Colorado, etc. When venues come up in conversation, we think of two things: the mining (can I work there?) and the rivers (can I fish there?) in the vicinity. For example:

• Butte, Montana: Arco and the headwaters of the Clark Fork River. (See “Fly Fishing a Superfund Site”, Infomine )

• Coeur d’Alene Mining District, Idaho: well, Idaho (like Montana, Alaska, Colorado) is simply one of the world’s premier fly fishing venues and you have way many choices of where to go on your way to or from work or during lunch to fish
• Stillwater, Montana: the Yellowstone River
• Delta Junction, Alaska: Arctic grayling on Clear Creek
• Juneau, Alaska: some fly fishing for salmon, but great halibut fishing with mighty hooks
• Ketchikan, Alaska: fly fishing for salmon / trout but great sea fishing too
• Bingham, Utah: The Provo River and Green River  and all those lovely streams to the east up in the mountains.

BTW – “one hundred years of open pit copper mining, grazing, and unregulated emissions from the old smelter at Magna, Utah took a toll on foothill areas. Current environmental management focuses on vegetation, water, and wildlife.

The mine’s tailings ponds are being reclaimed and replaced with green fields. The ponds were “pinched off” and planted to grasses. Cattle and wildlife now graze the area. In the image above, to the right of the green fields are active tailings ponds. In the background is Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake. Various tree species are also used to vegetate the tailings ponds, including Salix and Populus species and occasionally tamarisk on very difficult sites. Vegetated tailings ponds provide habitat for many species of wetland birds as well.

South of the mine, material containing high levels of lead and arsenic was removed, clean soil deposited where needed, and more than one thousand acres of land recontoured and reseeded. The company has received three Earth Day Reclamation Awards and several national and international awards for these projects.”

– Source: Infomine

• Morenzi, Arizona: Um, this is predominately a lake fishing venue, but as long as you’re not going for an Arctic Grayling, there are (apparently) a few creeks that host trout all over Arizona.
• Elko, Nevada (You’re gonna have to drive): South Fork of the Humboldt (16 miles) Lamoille Creek (25 miles) Owyhee River (112 miles) Bruneau River (75 miles) Tabor Creek (35 miles)
• Colorado: Henderson, Cripple Creek, and many many many other venues all of which have a mine or mining district near them, whether active or historic – including:

Alma, Aspen, Breckenridge, Creede, Crested Butte, Fairplay, Georgetown, Idaho Springs, Leadville, Nederland, Ouray, Park City, Durango, Silver Plume, Silverton, Steamboat Springs, and Telluride (to name the mining towns-turned ski-towns that come to mind.)

Other mining towns in Colorado that do not benefit quite as directly from the ski industry but retain qualities both aesthetic and strategic for mining include St. Elmo (BTW, St. Elmo MURRAY is the namesake of that town, true!), Boulder, Meeker, Phippsburg, Oak Creek, Gold Hill, Lake City, Salida, Victor, Guffey, Buena Vista, Yampa, Walden, Tapona, McCoy, Burns, Bond. Those are the ones I have visited in Colorado for both mining and fly fishing interests.

My huzbun and I both work in the mining industry and it is no coincidence we both fly fish as a result. When we go somewhere to work as an exploration geologist we always fly fish. In the near future, we are planning to expand our fly fishing experience southward to Sinaloa, Mexico, for some world class bass fishing  as a result of an assignment there.

Note: InfoMine’s online magazine latest issue of Mining.com main topics are “GREEN ISSUES” this month (http://www.mining.com/). This is a nice electronic document to have on hand when engaged with an NMP who needs to learn more about how modern mining operates today.