[0:04]Okay Emilie, there's a monster on the bank that's all yours. That hasn't seen our flies.
[0:10]Is it down there? Yeah, like do you see where the dead tree is? There's a big rock.
[0:15]Wow. Yeah, yeah. Yes, and he's happy. He's eating.
[0:21]Oh, yoy. I'm trying not to even look at him.
[0:24]He looks so good.
[0:27]See if he eats again. Good timing. Eat it, eat it, eat it.
[0:33]So there he ate. There we go!
[0:42]My name is Emilie Björkman. I have been fishing all my life.
[0:48]Now I want to inspire more people to get out and to go deeper into nature.
[0:54]Because I believe fly fishing is the most awesome way to discover nature.
[0:59]And I think interest will evoke consciousness and consciousness will make you care. About nature, about wild fish and about wild places.
[1:10]And then you want to learn how to preserve all this for the future. Forever.
[1:18]Welcome to my world as a free fly fisher.
[1:35]So I am finally here in the state of Montana in USA.
[1:40]Being a dry fly enthusiast, this place is so special for me.
[1:45]And of course I dream about those iconic Montana hatches. But above all, I want to completely soak in that awesome fly fishing culture.
[1:59]But I'm afraid I have been a little bit too eager to come here.
[2:14]All aboard. All aboard. Vamanos. How big is like the city in Missoula?
[2:20]In this like general like city area is about 75 to 80,000 people. And if you add like the metropolitan area, you're starting to look more into like 100 plus thousand people.
[2:27]Oh, wow. How many fly shop do you have here in Missoula?
[2:37]Let's see, so we've got King Fisher, Missoulian Angler, Blackfoot River Outfitters and Grizzly Hackle. Four.
[2:49]I've been around that fishing community in Missoula for 25 years and uh it is like kind of a family. I really believe that.
[2:55]Yeah. I think I've got a few at home.
[2:58]Why don't I just call you? Call me. That sounds awesome. That'll be rad. Nice to meet you guys.
[3:05]Growing up as a fly fisherman as a kid, you always, you know, you'd get the fly fisherman magazine.
[3:11]And there was always articles about Montana. What is it about this place? You know, this place just sounds magical.
[3:18]There's rivers everywhere and the trout are huge. And it was an easy sell for a kid that loved to fly fish, right?
[3:27]And then you got here and you never want to leave. It's Montana, you know, it's home.
[3:39]In Sweden, we don't do this kind of fishing from a boat. So this was a totally new experience for me.
[3:47]Who knows how much snow is still left? But like today and tomorrow, I think it's going to stay like that.
[3:52]And then after that really hot weather, it could get a little bit higher and dirtier.
[3:57]This upper end of the Blackfoot early season, you're really trying to hit the salmon fly hatch.
[4:03]Oh, wow. They are huge. It's a big bug. Beautiful bug, too.
[4:08]Oh, cool. Don't worry, they're friendly. If you saw a salmon fly and you thought that that fly could bite you, if that thing had teeth, I wouldn't be taking you fishing on the Blackfoot right now.
[4:23]I say we just throw a big dry fly today. Yeah, yeah. Okay, we're not going to dropper fish. It's a little early in the salmon fly hatch. You have to see if they're going to want to like smack it in fast water or do they want it more like a walking pace?
[4:35]You can catch 20 plus inch trout on a size six or a size four foam fly.
[4:45]Emily, look at this fish.
[4:48]Oh, wow. Almost two feet. And that's Nick, right? That's Nick.
[4:53]To me, there isn't anything that gets me as excited as that in fly fishing for trout.
[4:59]What do you think? Like a four and a five weight? I love that five weight. That's going to be perfect. And we'll be able to use like really like heavy tippets. So yeah, a five weight I love.
[5:09]It's exactly what I've been fishing. Same deal. You guys do the half X.
[5:15]Yupp. Right now today, the one X is going to be the ticket. You don't have to fish thinner. Nope. No. When you see a fish explode on a natural salmon fly and you've got a salmon fly, dry fly on your rod, flies like this. They are huge. Yeah. And these are foam. Yep. If they've seen enough of those and they're keyed in on that bug, you can cast it in there hard.
[5:22]No.
[5:41]Sloppy casting. You can set the hook hard. No finesse. Yeah. No finesse. Thank you. I mean, it's just like the biggest bug I ever seen.
[5:46]Yep.
[5:49]Yeah. Yep. Yep.
[5:57]Got you. I'm going real slow. Ready? I hope it goes. Woo. Awesome. Thanks. Here, I'll hop in first and just like get this boat kind of secure for you. Thank you. Right on. I sit here, right, Peter? That's you, front and center. Just walk me through it. Yell at me and say: "Mend, goddamn it!" Or just tell me everything, okay? So, yeah, let's like go over it real quick. Like let's just pretend we're parallel to the bank. Like your body position right now is perfect for fishing off the right-hand side, okay? I'm just working with you and we just kind of work together. You get the angle of the cast off the side, like where your right kneecap's pointing. Or if like you're fishing off the left, there's a salmon fly on the water. Oh, yeah, the You want to get as long of a drift as possible, so you're just going to continue to put some like upstream mends in that. Cutthroat trout, rainbow trout, brown trout, whatever it is. You're totally engaged at all times. You know, a natural bug isn't going to move two feet in a split second, right? So like, you either want a dead drift or you want that fly going like this.
[7:24]I am so happy. In theory, yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. It doesn't take dozens of fish to have what would be considered a really special day on our watersheds. It's gonna be a good day.
[7:44]I really try to stay optimistic. I know that like, if I was to tell you that I thought that everything's going to be, you know, great and we're just gonna, all of a sudden, things are gonna improve and the fishing's gonna be, you know, kind of how it was 20 or 30 years ago, my friends would probably tell me like I'm full of shit.
[8:04]Like here we are right now in late May and it's 88 degrees for a high today. We're gonna hit 92 degrees this week. And what we're starting to see are either almost the complete disappearance of certain hatches or less sustained hatches, maybe a quicker period of time that an insect lingers around.
[8:35]That's becoming harder for us to do. Predict what we're gonna see on a day-to-day basis.
[8:41]And when you add pressure on the river along with seeing those changes in the ecosystem, it's I still love what I do. You have to be optimistic, but you also have to be like a realist.
[8:57]You probably have heard since there's been a lot of discussion and talk about this. Insects are not doing well generally worldwide. Numbers are declining heavily. Of course, there there are differences between different studies, there are differences between different areas, but it seems to be a quite general thing. Especially when it comes to like agriculture areas and populated areas. Densely human populations in Western Europe and in North America, for example.
[9:28]My name is Martin Green. I'm a biologist. I mainly work for the Environmental Protection Agency and for the County Administrative Boards in Sweden.
[9:41]Insects are extremely numerous. I mean, it's kind of the basis for the ecosystem as such. I mean, we have birds eating insects, we have fish eating insects and then we have other things eating the birds and eating the fish. The main thing is that if something's not right with insects, that will affect a lot of other things. And eventually it will affect us as humans as well.
[10:09]The environment in general is less affected by humans up here [in northern Sweden]. And if we compare with what has happened with the forests in Sweden, for example, that are heavily affected by forestry for a long, long time and the agricultural landscape where we have changed the way of agriculture from small scale to large scale, we have taken away a lot of water, we have taken away a lot of natural habitats.
[10:33]And of course, looking at the landscape up here, it's much, much less affected. People have been here for a very, very long time and used the landscape, but they have used the landscape in a much, what you could call, milder way.
[10:48]We think that that's the big reason why insects up here are doing much better than insects in other areas.
[11:03]This is where you could get a big one. Put it a little further into the shade. As soon as we come into these rocks, this is a good spot. Mend, good. Let that hunt, okay? The boat will just slide you right in. And I just love to fish with Peter. Beautiful. The fishing never gets boring because he's so excited for you to get the fish, you know.
[11:22]You got a chance in here, okay? I love where you're at. Little twitch mend. I think trout fishing is all about, can you get them to eat a dry fly? Nice. That was perfect. Beautiful. It's a little pushy in there, but they will eat if they're happy. Move it a little more. Good. Get ready. You're in a good spot. Juvenile bald eagle. Oh, really? That was good. Thanks, Emilie. That was worth a try.
[11:49]And you get rewarded with some pretty outstanding fish once in a while, right?
[11:55]Rip it out and go right back in. And again, don't worry about moving the bug. You see it okay? Yeah, yeah. Okay, have fun with it. Just let it ride down that bank. Mend it. Mend it. You're okay. Good. Leave it. Good. Leave it. Yep, yep. Nice. Whoo! Keep her tight. Keep her tight. How are you guys doing? Doing great. It's a nice one, Peter. Oh, big fish. It's a nice one. Big brown. Woo hoo! Okay. But we don't stock any of our trout, right? They're all wild. They're all self-sustaining. They all spawn. Look, nice first one. Welcome to Montana. That's a good introduction. Before we left Missoula for Bozeman, we had a chance to meet Casey at Trout Unlimited and see the dam removal site that Trout Unlimited had been involved in. So there was a dam here before? Yeah, we're about right here. And this was a part of the drinking water supply of Missoula, dating back to 1901 when this dam was built that blocked fish passage for over a century. I mean, I'm a fisherman heart.
[13:13]So, I mean, if we talk about the fish, I would love to imagine future generations to join the same resources that we are so lucky to have. This project is centered mostly on reconnecting that migratory habitat so native fish can go up and spawn.
[13:28]It's really inspiring to meet people that work for a better future. This is the edge of the Rattlesnake wilderness, so there is protected lands. There's a bald eagle sitting in that tree right up there. Part of the impact of climate change, is we have earlier runoff and lower stream flows, higher water temperatures later in the season. So anything we can do to put more water in groundwater while we're in the middle of this runoff, this kind of annual flood event, when all the snow melts out of the mountains. And you can see all this water moving across that. It soaks it up like a sponge and then later in the season, it comes back to the river as a higher base flow. This was completed in 2020. So you're starting to see the vegetation start to recover. They planted 16,000 plants out here. Oh, wow. Just nudging nature toward being able to recover itself to restore the site. It's amazing. I mean, this is a really gratifying to see that dam gone and just start nature start to take back over. And eventually, you would just like it to recover and be part of this natural system. Dams have several negative impacts on aquatic ecosystems. They act as barriers to fish migration, preventing them from reaching spawning grounds and disrupting their life cycles; and they reduce important sediment and nutrient transport. Dams often accumulate higher water temperature and reduce oxygen levels which negatively affect aquatic species. Therefore, dams are removed as a strive to reach better ecological status in watersheds. In simple words, to restore nature to set aquatic life, sediments and nutrients free again.
[14:44]Let's get some gear out. Okay, cool. I love your rig. Thanks. We'll cook out of this rig later. I mean, there's obviously more effective ways to catch fish.
[14:58]No way! So folks that choose to fly fish invariably don't do it for the fish. I get to fish. I get to guide all year round. So I feel very blessed and grateful for that opportunity. I have plenty of like 13 foot leaders with me. So I will bring that. What do you think? Just add some. Yeah, so 4.5 and I'll give you some 5.5. Why do you love it? I think fly fishing or a fly rod is a really direct connection to the energy of a fish. For a moment in time, you know, when you first lift up and there's that weight and then there's a dashing and stuff and that primeval connection is very real through a fly rod. So I feel like we're doing our very best to be part of that natural world. And the places fly fishing takes you to, man, I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for fly fishing. They don't live in, you know, ugly places. No, they don't. So true. Let's go fishing. Yeah, come on, let's just go this way. Straight out of the movies, here we go. This is Yellowstone. Oh, thank you. Pleasure. And has she chased the moose towards you? No, no, no, she is surrounded so it stands still. Oh, so she keeps going round and round. The very first day, 91 degrees and sunny, which is probably the worst type of conditions for bugs. I tell you what, it's bloody hard to guide on here when it's like this. It was fish everywhere. Super clear water, and the weather was hot. Come and have a look and they're midging. We might we might get the odd one. Yeah, yeah, so let's see. You got it? Yeah, yeah, left to right. You got it, you got it, you got it, you got it. What rig have you got on this? Well, here's the nymph. Oh, okay. Is that your finger? Yeah, it's All right, I'm going to get it, all right? Yeah, don't worry. Helps to have barbless hooks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Two ways we can fish these guys. A small dry with one of these flies underneath. Oh, yeah, it's going down there now. Yeah, yeah. See him, all right. You know, we'll try a single dry. So let's let's set up, small being the operative word, right? Look at the rise. See how it's got a high side. Yep. The fish is going in that direction. See him there, going now? Oh yeah, I see it coming my way. Oh, it's just outside. Oh, now it's going to the other side. Oh, nice. Yes, please! Nice one! On the dry fly. Yahoo! Awesome! 6x. Did you see the eat? No, I didn't. I just heard it. I might get you to unhook that. It's just that it's 6x. I just have to take my time, unfortunately. Let's get it in there. Woo hoo! Look at that rainbow. That's a pretty one. Look at this beautiful fish. No cut, so just a straight rainbow. Yeah. You know what? That is? It's a beautiful cutthroat. Oh, really? Yellowstone cutthroat. Is that your first one? Yes, it is! Yeah. Nice, Simon. Yeah, that's our native fish. It's hard to beat this upper Blackfoot when you've got salmon flies around. That's a good intro. It's not a ride. You're getting old. The tippet's getting smaller. It's not you. I'll kick the rattlesnakes. You remember your first fish on the fly? One of my first memories is a backpacking trip with my dad and my dad took us and my three siblings and we had llamas packing our stuff. It was ridiculous. We all had altitude sickness and we were puking. Oh, really? Oh, man! Yeah. You can do it. This is perfect. I'll get my net ready. Ultimately, it's a natural resource so we have to be concerned. We have to take care of it. We have to respect it. There's only so much water. There's only so many fish and bugs and we could ruin it really easily if we abused it.
[35:47]Yeah. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f-
[35:50]No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish.
[36:00]They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh my goodness, his head came right out of the water. Oh, got it! No, I did it! What the f- No. The Mo was just one long perfect dry fly glide. Look at all these fish. They got it! That's a nice fish! No, it's not a ride. Wow, what a beauty. We came all this way for the hatch and here we are. Oh, it took it? No, it wasn't me. Let's. Uh-huh. It took it? Oh, it took it? No, it wasn't me. Let's. Uh-huh. It took it? What if you change the fly, change it now. Oh yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. Oh, it took it? No, it wasn't me. Let's. Uh-huh. It took it? What if you change the fly, change it now. Yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. Oh, yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. There it is. There it is. Got it! Oh yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. That's how good it is. Oh yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. Yes! Oh yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. How good is this? Oh yeah, perfect fit. No. Let's. We just can't see. No, it's not a ride. No, it's not a ride. Thank you. There it is. There it is. Got it! Ow, that's a nice fish! How good is this? Nice, Karlie! There he is. Got it! It's all right, I'll get wet for him. The right fish. It's warm enough. Wow, there's fish everywhere. Oh, look there. Cool, this is gonna be great. Oh yeah, you see the bugs? Yes. Oh man, that's PMDs? Yep, I think so. Looks like it from here. You want them first? Yeah, go get him. You're the guest. Go get him. Fly fishing is everything to me. I love it. It's very important, it's very special. It defines my entire life. So like finding that balance of love and obsession and wanting to do it all day and the biggest concern is probably the balance of loving it to death. I'd throw dry. They're breaking the surface. They'll eat it. Then we need to share what you have in the pocket. Oh yeah, then it's just a matter of if they're gonna eat it or not, I think. Oh, good cast. There you go! Oh man, what the hell! Okay, let me just change the fly. You're okay. That was such a good pass. And then we saw how the fish was feeding. We put a caddis on and first cast. Good cast! With some team effort, me and Simon caught a really, really beautiful Yellowstone cutthroat. I don't want to push it with this thin leader. I'm glad we changed the caddis. Oh, don't go down here. Are you ready? Yaay! Oh, come on. Come on. You know what? That is. It's a beautiful cutthroat. Oh, really? Yellowstone cutthroat. Is that your first one? Yes, it is! Yeah. Nice, Simon. Yeah, that's our native fish. It's a natural resource so we have to be concerned. We have to take care of it. We have to respect it.
