I first met Brad Jackson over the phone. This was back around mid1992, and he had called to ask about the rumor that I was launching a fly-fishing magazine focused on California. Although I no longer remember the details of our conversation, Brad generously offered his insights, and I was very impressed with his knowledge of our sport and the industry it supports. Here was someone who had cofounded what would become the top fly shop in the nation (maybe even the world), who at this point in his career was an industry consultant, as well as a featured speaker and often-published writer and photographer, and who would within a few years start a highly regarded fly-travel business that was sold this past June to the folks who own Sage and RIO.
I’ve learned over time, too, that Brad is someone who is generous also in giving back to our sport and our fisheries. He helped found the Sacramento River Council, has raised countless funds for angling-advocacy groups, and has received California Trout’s Streamkeeper Award for his efforts protecting the Sacramento River.
Although Brad now works as a financial advisor for a national brokerage, he, his wife Melanie, and son Dylan live near Redding, and his heart is still much attached to the NorCal waters that he has fished for more than four decades.
Richard: How did you get started fishing?
Brad: I bet that my childhood fishing experiences are similar to a number of your Southern California readers. I was born in Long Beach in 1954 and grew up on the Palos Verdes Peninsula, which still is a more rural residential area than LA (which is directly north of the PVP). I am sure a few of your readers got their first grab in the same places I did: hatchery trout ponds in the Santa Monica Mountains above Malibu. For me, that first grab was in 1958. Fishing those ponds is my most vivid early childhood memory. I used a tapered bamboo pole (literally a pole, with a piece of mono tied to the tip) and cubed liver for bait. My dad hooked me up, I slung the meat in the pond, and a rainbow grabbed my bait. Magic. My first yank. I can still feel it. A mysterious force pulled on my line. I pulled back. After a tussle, I hauled a trout out of the water. There it was, hidden treasure, all mine — and I was permanently altered. If there is such a thing as a seismic experience for humans, this one measured about an 8.0. This fishing thing felt terrific, and I wanted more. That single experience was the catalyst for a lifetime of fishing adventures, meeting so many gifted and personable anglers, developing many great friendships, and ultimately, the inception of The Fly Shop and subsequently Flywater Travel.
That day on the trout pond also sent me on a regular mission: beg and badger my parents to take me fishing. Fortunately, my father loved angling and happily cooperated.
We started with salt water because it was close.
In that era, we took party boats to barges that were anchored over artificial reefs in Santa Monica Bay. That’s where I got my introduction to artificial lures. We usually fished live anchovies, the bait of choice, but when the bonito went on a hot bite, we switched to crude flies made of saddle hackle that were rigged behind a cylindrical wood float, and we hucked the rig as far as possible. We experimented with retrieves to find out what worked — usually, it was the faster and more erratic, the better. When schools of bonito, mackerel, barracuda, or yellowtail showed up, they would crush those saddle-hackle concoctions called “bonito feathers.”
We regularly fished the San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains. Big Bear Lake, Lake Gregory, and Deep Creek were favorites. But we soon switched to the east slope of the Sierra Nevada. Our mentor was Ken, the owner Ernie’s Tackle Shop in June Lake (which is still open there). Ken sent us all over the eastern Sierra: Rush Creek, Rock Creek, Hot Creek, Grant Lake, Lundy Lakes, Virginia Lakes, Convict Lake, Crowley Lake, the upper Owens, Twin Lakes, and plenty more. Ken’s recommendations were invaluable and influenced my later interest in fly shops.
The eastern Sierra was where I learned to read water, wade, and understand the basic dynamics of trout-fishing strategy. Dad took me on my initial backpacking trip into the Sierra when I was 11. When I got my California driver’s license on my sixteenth birthday, I returned to the Sierra to backpack with friends. We hiked and fished Mineral King, Thousand Lakes, Yosemite — all up and down the spine of the Sierra. We took dozens of road trips to fish and pack. After my senior year in high school, three of us drove all the way to Yellowstone and Jackson Hole to fish the Rockies for three weeks. This was a different level of freedom and mobility than that of today’s teenagers, but as my generation knows, it was a different time with much more permissive parental attitudes about unsupervised road trips — and the self-reliance that develops along with that kind of freedom. Can you imagine? We told our parents (we really did not ask them for permission) that we were heading to Yosemite’s backcountry for a week or the Rockies for three weeks. And by the way, “Can we borrow the station wagon?”
Richard: How did you get interested in fly fishing?
Brad: My father introduced me to fly fishing on the Middle Fork of the San Joaquin near Reds Meadow in Devils Postpile National Monument. I can still see that day in my mind’s eye. We started with salmon eggs and spinners, but Dad switched to a Wright and McGill bamboo rod and tied on a Cow Dung. He fished his wet fly on the swing in a fishy riffle about two feet deep. I was skeptical. How could anything but a Super Duper or worms or Pautzke’s Balls O’ Fire catch trout? As I watched (with disdain), Dad miraculously hooked a trout. At first, I thought he was pretending to be hooked up. But I realized he was not faking it. He fought the trout. He landed the trout. I was astonished. Then he landed two more trout. Needless to say, my skepticism morphed to fascination. Fly fishing was clearly something I needed to learn. This was my second seismic experience about fishing.
The next day, we fished Rush Creek. I saw trout rising in the tailout of my favorite pool. I tied on a California Mosquito that Ken had sold us, dressed it in Mucilin, and drifted the fly over a rising fish. It rose again. It took the fly. I set the hook. The brown was there, shaking its head. It ran across the pool and jumped. This was seismic experience number three and counting. How does that Carol King song go? “I feel the earth move under my feet.” That’s how I felt.
Richard: It’s a rare angler who turns avocation to vocation. What inspired you to pursue a career in fly fishing?
Brad: The Big Three outdoor magazines first sparked my interest in a recreational fishing career. I faithfully read Outdoor Life, Sports Afield, and Field and Stream. Lee Wulff, A. J. McClane, Ted Trueblood, and countless other writers painted images of destinations and adventures that mesmerized me. I realized that I could earn money — maybe even start a career — as a writer, guide, lodge owner, or merchant like Ken at Ernie’s Tackle.
I was spellbound by their articles. Whether it was a fishing career or a business that paid me enough to fish on a recreational basis remained a question, but I had total clarity that I needed abundant time to fish whenever I chose. Surprisingly, I had this insight somewhere between the ages of 10 and 12. I would not let anything interfere with my ambition to fish as many days each year as I could manage. I was not specifically focused on an angling career, but I absolutely knew that I had to control my time so that I could fish whenever I found a good opportunity. Looking back, I believe that my desire to fish was innate, somehow woven into my DNA.
Richard: So how did you, a SoCal kid, end up in Northern California?
Brad: Fast forward to late 1971, during my junior year in high school. I had already abandoned high-school team sports because they interfered with fishing and backpacking, but I had to decide where to apply for college. My father and mother wanted me to go to Stanford, where my father and uncle had graduated with degrees in aerospace engineering, or the University of California. However, I was adamant that whatever the college, I had to get a higher education where I could find great fishing. Fortunately, I had heard about the recently published Underground Guide to the College of Your Choice, by Susan Berman. That handbook led me to the conclusion that from a fishing perspective, no California university compared with Humboldt State University, in Arcata. The Underground Guide said that Humboldt was close to great steelhead and salmon fishing. And I could earn a forestry or f fisheries or wildlife degree at HSU. And I could live hundreds of miles from the SoCal traffic, crowds, and pollution that I vowed I would leave behind soon after high school graduation. Consequently, I submitted my application to Humboldt, was thrilled when I received an acceptance letter, and enrolled in the fall of 1972.
Moving to Humboldt County and entering the HSU Fisheries Department was my fourth seismic experience. In Arcata, I was surrounded on three sides by salmon and steelhead rivers. The faculty looked promising, and the campus nestled in the redwoods. I had at least four years to explore Northern California and figure out how to catch salmon and steelhead — and learn all that water. I was totally stoked and got busy. Within the first two months after arriving at HSU, I fished the Trinity, Klamath, Mad, Eel, Van Duzen, Smith, and several smaller and lesser-known streams. The whole fishing landscape thrilled me, lit me up, and tantalized me. Honestly, it was a struggle to maintain enough self-control and discipline to allocate time for classes and study.
Also during my freshman year, I heard that Bob Kelly, a physical education professor, offered a course at HSU in fly fishing. Naturally, I enrolled immediately. Bob and I quickly became friends, and he proved to be a huge source of inspiration and the development of my fly-fishing skills. Fortunately, he loaned me his entire f ly-fishing library. Titles included the usual suspects of that era: Selective Trout, by Swisher and Richards, Matching the Hatch, by Ernest Schwiebert, and books by Joe Brooks, Wulff, McClane, and many others. No kidding, within a few months, I read everything Bob had. As I think about it after all these years, I guess I did not just read these books. I think it is fair to say that I devoured them. I practically memorized them. And my reading naturally led me to fly tying, which I embraced to the point that when the rivers were at flood stage and blown out, my roommates still would not see me for days at a time. I was tying flies.
Richard: What was the fishing like around Arcata, and how did these waters educate you as a fly fisher?
Brad: Humboldt offered so many benefits, both the school and the location. If you have seen Justin Coupe’s film Rivers of a Lost Coast, you get an in-depth feel for that era, the 1970s, with regard to North Coast rivers and the talented and legendary anglers who fished them.
Our local river was the Mad River. It was the go-to if you had only a few hours to fish, early or late. Mad River winter steelhead runs vary annually, from OK to outstanding. During my years at HSU, if fish were in the Mad, we were there. We fished holding water from well upstream of Blue Lake down to the estuary.
Because the Mad River is not big water, it is friendly to fly anglers. It was a great river to learn winter steelhead basics. But the Mad has always been home to plenty of conventional-tackle anglers who fish drift rods and bait-casting reels. Consequently, our competition was fierce. We had to scout the flows, fish early, fish smart, and outguess other anglers regarding where the fish were. Candidly, that is the rule, rather than the exception for steelheaders. It was a terrific education. We learned to be flexible and not just swing Comets and Bosses on Hi-D sinking heads, although that certainly was effective and the primary strategy. When conditions were right and water was low, we fished Glo-Bugs using what is now referred to by some as the redneck swing — a floating or sink-tip line with an egg pattern and split shot. Other times, we dead-drifted Glo-Bugs using the Ted Fay short-line method.
In drought years, we fished 15-to20-foot leaders with small Comets or shrimplike flies in tidewater using 4-to-6-pound-test tippet. I’m compressing a five-year learning curve into a couple of paragraphs, but you get the picture. We learned to be versatile — and we learned a lot of tricks from the veterans we watched with great interest. In fact, we learned almost as much from conventional gearheads as we did from fly fishers.
When we had half a day or more, our regular stop was the lower Eel, which has a wonderful steelhead fly-fishing history. Pools such as Singley, Fernbridge, 12th Street, and Car Bodies have yielded countless steelhead and salmon on the fly. I still remember fishing the pool below Fernbridge for the first time and watching local legend Nelson Rossig drive out onto the gravel bar. I had landed two half-pounders. Nelson grabbed his rod, waded in, made one cast with a shooting head, and hooked and landed a hot, gorgeous nine-pound November steelhead. He then grinned at me and left. It took about ten minutes, door to door.
Above the Forks of the Eel, you have a lot of great holding water. I remember epic days on the South Fork around Garberville. In comparison with that Lost Coast era, the Eel now is a more troubled system, with lots of habitat challenges, and that saddens me.
However, restoration efforts seem to be making some headway despite floods, dams, illegal water diversions for ganja growers, viticulture, timber harvest impacts, and roads, all of which have taken a massive toll. I believe that the weed growers and viticulture arguably impact anadromous fish and habitat in some areas to a greater extent than more obvious threats such as logging, road construction, and dams. I fear the worst and hope for the best for the Eel.
In the 1970s, with a full day or more to fish, our favorites were the Klamath and the Trinity. We usually fished Hoopa Valley below Willow Creek on the Trinity or farther upstream above Junction City. On the Klamath, we fished at Klamath Glen or drove to Weitchpec and fished from Johnsons Bar upstream to above Somes Bar.
I had read Claude Kreider’s exciting stories about the Klamath and Trinity in his classic text Steelhead, and local fly casters raved about how eagerly half-pounders and fall adults came to the fly. We quickly confirmed the reputation of the Klamath drainage. Those fish ate the fly on the swing — and still do — and I continue to fish these two rivers. They remain California treasures. Every wild steelhead in those drainages is precious. If you swing, and if you learn your way, rewards abound. Like all Lost Coast rivers, the Klamath and Trinity and several other tributaries in the drainage have threats and challenges that will continue to require attention and effort by conservationists, and the best way to become an advocate is to fish the Klamath and Trinity. If you do, you will want to speak up on behalf of these terrific rivers.
The Smith River was and is the free-flowing gem of the North Coast. The Smith’s watershed was (and is) largely intact. Enormous kings and California’s biggest winter steelhead were our targets and Bill Schaadt was our bellwether. As dozens of his peers will still tell you, Bill was a gifted angler. He was also truly obsessed. Bill worked erratically and only to fund his fly fishing for steelhead and salmon on the North Coast. Fair-minded anglers will tell you he had no peer. And for that matter, he had no job much of the time. Bill lived cheap, once fishing over six hundred days straight with a budget of about a thousand dollars. He scavenged fishing tackle. He often lived out of his vehicle if he was not home on the Russian River. And he caught anadromous fish on a fly like no fly fisher the world has ever known. I felt honored when Ben Taylor allowed me to write a chapter in his wonderful anthology of memories, I Knew Bill Schaadt. Each chapter is written by one of Bill’s friends. The gist of my memoir was: when Bill was there, you had found fish. If a friend asked how you the fishing was that day, and you responded “Schaadt was there,” you did not have to elaborate.
Richard: What was the initial step in your development as an entrepreneur in fly fishing? Did it happen while you were in college?
Brad: Larry Simpson opened Time Flies just off the Arcata Square shortly after I entered HSU. It was a full-fledged fly shop, albeit in a cubbyhole location. I was so eager to learn the trade that when I applied for a job, I worked gratis because Larry was on a shoestring budget. My compensation consisted of a $1.25 deli sandwich at the Plaza Gourmet for lunch. Believe me, the financial relationship sounds like exploitation, but I actually ended up with a great deal. I was nostril-deep in steelhead flies, tackle, splicing custom lines and shooting heads, rod building, retail sales, and inventory control. The juiciest part was the customer grapevine about river conditions and fish runs. I gathered decades of knowledge and experience from Time Flies customers in short order. Larry was generous with his extensive fly-fishing know-how. He introduced me to buggy nymphs that worked on Klamath and Trinity steelhead, taught me to match shooting-head densities to water conditions, and schooled me about a number of lesser-known coastal anadromous fisheries. Payday-free hours were no issue; Larry compensated me with priceless advice and insights. I am so grateful to Larry for letting me work in his store. It was essentially a graduate course: Fly Fishing Retail 101.
In retrospect, my most important experience at Time Flies was the day Mike Michalak walked in the shop’s door. Mike was a pharmaceutical rep at the time and had just transferred to Humboldt County with Upjohn Pharmaceutical. We hit it off immediately. Mike loved fly fishing, he was energetic and enthusiastic, and we became fast friends.
Richard: Are there other things that furthered your professional development?
Brad: In winter of 1974–75, I set my sights on becoming a fishing guide, gathering up contacts from a variety of sources. I started a letter-writing campaign to dozens of lodges with a simple message that a Humboldt friend who had guided in Alaska suggested: “I am an experienced angler. I know my way around tackle, boats, and guns. Further, I am a fisheries student at Humboldt State University, and I intend to start a career in sport fishing. I am available for your 1975 season and assure you that I am honest, hard working, and get along with people. If you have a position for a fishing guide, please contact me.” Fortunately, three weeks after I mailed my inquiry letters, I got a reply from Olney Webb, manager of Yes Bay Lodge, near Ketchikan, Alaska, on the Inside Passage. Olney offered me a job at YBL, and I jumped at it. In April 1975, I cut off my shoulder-length hair, did an in-flight attitude adjustment while I flew to Ketchikan via Seattle, and transferred to a Coast Air float plane to reach Yes Bay Lodge.
In a day, my life shifted enormously, and I was permanently altered. I forged durable friendships with some clients — and with several of the guides I worked beside — and those relationships have been a source of joy (and business) throughout my life. Incidentally, Richard, with respect to your readers who have kids that love to fish, I recommend they suggest guiding as a potential summer job or even a step to other aspects of the sport-fishing industry or other professions. My stint in Alaska in 1975 was essential to my later professional development and successes. I recommend the guiding experience to any kid that has a deep love of fishing and the outdoors and who enjoys people.
My next guide job, in 1976, was based in West Yellowstone, Montana, working for Jim Danskin. “West,” as we called it, was known then (and now, for that matter) as fly fishing’s Mecca. The Madison was our primary fishery for clients. Danskin also had an Idaho license, so we guided the Henrys Fork from Box Canyon Dam to well below Ashton. We guided in Yellowstone National Park on the Yellowstone River for cutthroats, on the Firehole, and on the upper Madison. We also day hiked with clients into some of the park’s lesser-known fisheries.
During the 1976–77 seasons, my West guide buddies and I had countless adventures all over western Montana. I learned an enormous amount about fly fishing for trout, the fish that Mother Nature designed for the fly rod. At the end of the 1977 season, I opted to stay for another month to fish for big autumn browns that migrated out of Montana reservoirs and moved upstream to spawn. Hooking dozens of these huge trout in driving snowstorms ranks among the most vivid fishing memories of my lifetime. On Halloween, I broke down my rods, grabbed my gear from my cabin at Colonel Bill Biely’s Fly ’n’ Fish Camp in West Yellowstone, loaded my drift boat with my luggage, and skidded over icy Targhee Pass into Idaho on my way home to Humboldt County. At that point, I knew I wanted to start a fly shop.
Richard: Many fly fishers dream about owning a fly shop. How did you go about turning dream to reality?
Brad: I mentioned the significance of the day Mike walked into Time Flies and that we quickly became close friends and angling companions. We fished all over the North Coast, which deepened our friendship. Also, our energy and ambition levels matched up well.
When we fished, we discussed our goals — which included opening a fly shop — and we compared backgrounds and experience. Mike was not fulfilled by his pharmaceutical job, but he was clearly a talented and persuasive salesman, and he had solid retail and corporate sales and merchandising experience. Moreover, he knew construction. Mike was fearlessly confident and ambitious, not to mention having a lot of other traits that define successful entrepreneurs. By comparison, I brought my guiding, instructing, and fishing experience to the table. I had started to develop a reputation as a writer and speaker. Further, I had fished throughout the West and had worked at Time Flies and understood the how fly shops operate, what product lines would sell, and I had relationships with owners and sales reps of many of the major tackle companies.
In West Yellowstone in 1977, I had entertained the idea of starting a fly shop there. After that season, after I headed back to Humboldt County, I thought better of what, looking back, would have been a big mistake: launching a shop in West Yellowstone, a town that already had more than its share of f ly-fishing storefronts and experienced only seasonal business.
With my West Yellowstone option out of the picture, Mike and I got serious about starting a shop together, and Redding was clearly the best location. With that in mind, we attended Ed Rice’s International Angler’s Exposition in San Mateo in the winter of early 1978 with the goal of investigating fly-shop retail opportunities and feasibility. We prowled the aisles at “The Show,” as it was known in the industry, and sized up the vendors and the dealers. We sensed growing excitement and dynamic growth potential. We listened to speakers and watched casting demonstrations. It was an environment that was energetically infectious. And we became confident that we could compete with shops in California and throughout the western United States.
I believe it was on our drive back to Redding from The Show in 1978 that we doubled down on our commitment to launch our venture and started making plans. Within weeks, we decided which product lines we wanted to carry, researched exclusive pro-shop dealerships that were allocated by geographical territory, and firmed up the services we planned to offer. But we did not anticipate what happened next.
Keep in mind that Redding was an ideal and obvious location that needed a fly shop. It is no secret that our community sits in the northern part of a state that has an economy that, in 1978, already rivaled or exceeded all but a handful of nations. And California had — and has — the largest number of affluent anglers in the United States. Redding was and remains in the middle of California’s best and most diverse fly fishing. Interstate 5 bisects Redding, and thousands of anglers drive through our community every day. Multiple state highways and scenic byways intersect Redding and take anglers in all directions to top fisheries. And the Sacramento River, a fishery with opportunities we did not at that time fully comprehend, runs right through the middle of town.
In the spring of 1978, we targeted a date to open. Then we received unexpected news that immediately altered our plans. We heard that at least three other fly shops planned to open in Redding by midyear. Mike called me with news of one of these new shops, and we made the decision during that phone conversation to move up our timetable. We decided to open our new store no later than Opening Day of trout season in April 1978.
We rented our original space behind what was then Angelo’s Pizza on Churn Creek Road. Over the following week, I drove to the Bay Area to buy tackle from wholesalers, Mike went to work on building displays, and we placed orders with suppliers that I had met through guiding.
Richard: So you opened your doors. What happened next? And, what profit centers did Mike and you create to ensure the sustainability of your business?
Brad: Mike and I were confident, aggressive, and ambitious. Inevitably, we stepped on some toes of competitors. There was no shortage of criticism directed our way. And frankly, we made some foolish decisions. Nonetheless, we were so busy building the business that we viewed our mistakes as opportunities to get better and were oblivious to — or ignored — negative feedback.
I remember my first trip to our bank to make a deposit. I picked up a copy of the Wall Street Journal that was on the lobby coffee table for customers to read. Coincidentally, a front-page feature described how entrepreneurs start successful businesses. In the article’s first paragraph was the gist of the story’s message, and it did a good job of summarizing our approach to growing The Fly Shop. I remember the article’s entrepreneurial advice almost verbatim: “Work hard, have a plan, be disciplined, and ignore the naysayers.” We had plenty of naysayers, but undeterred, we plowed ahead.
We immediately launched our guide service. Mike was married and had a family, and I was a bachelor and had three years guiding experience, so I was the natural choice to guide most of the time. Mike contributed guide days as our schedules permitted. We used our income from guiding to pay our personal expenses, and that income let us reinvest retail profits into more inventory. We also taught fly-tying classes and casting classes, and we calendared four 1978 fly-fishing schools based at Rick’s Lodge (now Spinner Fall Lodge) on the Fall River.
We planned from the inception to start a catalog operation. In the fall of 1978, we put all of our surplus working capital on red and went for it. A local printer produced our first Fly Shop catalog using tabloid-style newsprint in a newspaper format. Candidly, when I look back, our catalog strategy and message were pretty brazen. We took a cover photo of ourselves — a very young pair of inexperienced and perhaps overconfident business partners — and we headlined the front page in large, bold font: “We Want Your Business.” We bought a mailing list(s) from Fly Fisherman Magazine and/or Fly Fishing the West (I am not sure whether it was one magazine or both), and a crew of us spent a day attaching adhesive labels to our new publication. Painted in printer’s ink, we drove our truckload of catalogs to the Redding post office and mailed our maiden catalog. I still remember our first mail-order customer, Tom Peppas, with an address on Cooks Way in Chico, California. By the way, Tom remained a good customer, and he and I stayed in touch. We ended up fishing the North Fork of the Feather together.
We soon saw an opportunity for another revenue stream, and this one really fired us up. Fly-fishing travel was growing quickly, and we wanted to learn all we could about it. We connected with Frank Bertaina and Bob Nauheim at Fishing International, known industrywide by the acronym FI. Both Frank and Bob have now passed away, but let me be clear: in their heyday, they were dynamic personalities, totally charismatic when they described fishing lodges and destinations. Wherever Frank Bertaina and Bob Nauheim fished, they brought innovation, camaraderie, and a true sense of fly-fishing adventure with them. Mike and I had a steep angling-travel learning curve ahead of us. After we met with FI, we were fired up about Bob’s and Frank’s anecdotes and global opportunities for fishing and business. Our travel operation was soon underway.
Richard: You left The Fly Shop roughly a decade after it opened. What happened, and in what ways have you stayed engaged in the fly-fishing industry?
Brad: By 1987, it was clear that Mike and I differed regarding some of our goals and vision for The Fly Shop. By early 1988, we agreed that Mike would buy me out. We executed the deal on May 1, 1988, and I was determined to live up to my promises. For the record, Mike did likewise and lived up to his end of the transaction. I could not have asked for more equitable treatment from my former partner. Mike was terrific to work with as my business partner during our 10 years together, and he was stellar in his treatment of me as seller of half the business. Mike’s accomplishments after my departure are formidable.
Two years after I sold my interest in The Fly Shop to Mike, I started my consulting fly-fishing industry career. Clients included about a dozen fly-shop start-ups or rebuilds, a number of lodges and private-waters operations, and major industry players. I also self-published a manual titled How to Grow and Operate a Fly Shop for prospective fly-shop owners and clients who hired me as their consultant.
I had a concept for a fly-fishing travel business that dates back to the late 1980s, after I had moved on from The Fly Shop. When my noncompetition agreement expired in 1998, I contacted Ken Morrish, a charming, talented, and bright angler, writer, and photographer who also had lots of retail experience. Ken immediately saw the opportunity. He agreed to join me, and he was adamant that his friend Brian Gies join us. The three of us launched Flywater Travel in 1999.
Richard: How has fly fishing changed in California since you entered the Fisheries Department at Humboldt State University in 1972?
Brad: Big Topic. I am going to give short answers that cover a lot of ground.
First, fly-fishing tackle. The introduction of graphite rods had a huge impact. Breathable waders and rain gear revolutionized angling comfort. Improved wading shoes and traction delivered welcome stability. Advanced polarized sunglasses promoted sight fishing. Effective sunscreens and modern garments made fishing the tropics comfortable and countered extreme weather everywhere. Spey and switch rods let less-skilled anglers cover more and bigger water with longer and more casts. New innovations in watercraft — float tubes, kick boats, pontoon boats, improved drift boats, better jet-boat and outboard-motor designs — gave anglers more access and mobility.
Next, flies and terminal tackle. Strike indicators allowed low-skill anglers to catch far more fish — a hot-potato conversation from which I will recuse myself. (Suffice it to say that I was initiated into one of the first iterations of indicators in a secret ceremony in West Yellowstone in 1976.) Beadheads enhanced the efficacy of weighted nymphs. (Tom Rosenbauer introduced me to beadheads at the Orvis Guide Rendezvous in Aspen circa 1989.) Dead-drifted nymphs, skated dries, and big-profile, Stinger-style swinging flies significantly altered steelheaders’ strategies and efficacy. Saltwater fly innovations led to remarkable improvement in catch rates for many saltwater species.
Third, California fisheries changed. New fisheries have developed, and others have been closed to anglers, while global destinations increased exponentially in number. Trout, steelhead, salmon, stripers, and bass were the primary targets when we opened The Fly Shop. Today, you choose from a remarkable array of destinations, private waters, species, lodges, and outfitters, not just in California, but on six continents and three oceans. Talk about change. In California, fly anglers fish far more fisheries for than we did in 1978. Conversely, some fisheries are now closed for good reasons. For example, lower Battle Creek steelhead historically attracted lots of anglers. The creek is now off-limits to protect spawning Chinooks and prevent poaching and snagging. Another example: an excellent stretch of the lower Sacramento in Redding is now closed for months to protect endangered winter-run Chinooks.
Richard: What are your favorite fisheries in California?
Brad: For trout, my favorites are the Sacramento drainage and its tributaries. It’s hard to get too specific, because I love so many streams in this incredible watershed. I have a soft spot for winter fish and the North Coast rivers; the Klamath drainage ranks first for steelhead. For kings, it is the Smith — but that great river’s fly-fishing window for salmon has changed a lot, and not for the better, since I first fished it in October 1973. For stripers, the Delta and San Luis Reservoir offer terrific fishing, and I really enjoy both
fisheries when conditions peak. For bass, we have what are arguably California’s three top lakes within two hours of Redding: Shasta, Clear Lake, and Trinity.
Waters that we guided from 1978 to 1988 were and remain among the most prominent fisheries throughout California, but there are hundreds of lesser known spots worth fishing in our region. It sometimes takes research, time, and legwork to investigate water that gets less pressure. However, I assure your readers that plenty of secret spots and off-the-beaten-path waters with quality fly fishing are there if you invest the time. I think our original thesis remains sound that Northern California offers the most diverse year round fly fishing in the United States.
Richard: And finally, our closing question that everyone has to answer: If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?
Brad: I cannot choose between the redwood tree and the California blue oak. Here’s my dilemma: I thoroughly enjoy fishing for coastal California steelhead and salmon, where Sequoia sempervirens flourishes. The redwood is an evergreen, quite long-lived, and is synonymous with landscapes in the drainages of California coastal steelhead rivers that I love. In fact, my name and my son’s name, Dylan Bradford Jackson, reflect this coastal redwood and steelhead theme. “Bradford” means “broad river crossing” in Old English, and “Dylan” means “son of the sea”
in Welsh. But I have spent most of my life living in the Sacramento Valley, where resilient blue oaks dot the foothills and stabilize the hillsides. Further, Quercus douglasii lives only in California. The former loves rain, as I do, while the latter is drought resistant and thrives on arid, rocky hillsides. Both trees live on our property west of Redding, minutes from some of California’s best trout fishing. I’m stumped about picking just one tree. Can I cross-pollinate these two species?
