Spring 2018

Anglers Journal

A Fishing Life

Anglers Journal4 min read
Spring Tides
The handwriting is familiar, but I have a harder time picturing the boy who wrote the words. The spelling was bad even then. Fish swam in “scholls,” and on a spring evening 50 years ago, a man in a canoe “caucht” a 12-pound striper. But the enthusias
Anglers Journal3 min read
Contributors
Writer and hard-core surf nut Dave Anderson has been contributing to fishing publications since the early 2000s. He is the editor of the online publication Surfcaster’s Journal and spends his nights fishing for striped bass. Dave and AJ contributor J
Anglers Journal6 min read
Mail
I love the quality of Anglers Journal, especially the slant toward making everything in it a bit of art. High quality, to my mind. On that note, I thought you might enjoy my latest bronze sculpture. It’s Ernest Hemingway’s Pilar fighting a marlin in
Anglers Journal2 min read
One Of A Kind
Bernard “Lefty” Victor Kreh — one of the most influential figures in fishing during the past 70 years — was an author, journalist, photographer and tackle innovator who taught thousands of people how to cast a fly. He died March 14, 2018, in his Cock
Anglers Journal7 min read
‘One Damn Fine Month’
Sometimes you should just take the day off. May 12, 2017, was one of those days. If I had not, if I had let that May 12 slip away, if it had become just another workday where I woke up, fought traffic, sat in meetings, and answered emails and phone c
Anglers Journal15 min read
Tom And The Fat Boys
Over coffee one day during the spring of 1969, Woody Sexton introduced me to his friend Tom McGuane. At the time, Tom; his wife, Becky; and their young son, Thomas, were living on Summerland Key. Tom, a tall, handsome writer in his late 20s, was fish
Anglers Journal5 min read
Spring Silver
Most spouses get sent to the couch after an unresolved argument, or for neglecting household chores. In my house, if I’m riding the sofa it likely means I’ve forgotten to take out the trash for the fifth or sixth week in a row, or fixed the smoker in
Anglers Journal5 min read
Finest Time
Folks who reside in colder climes tend to look scornfully upon those of us who call Florida home when the subject of seasonal change comes up. “You don’t even know what that means,” one friend scoffed as he regaled me with quaint tales of crisp apple
Anglers Journal6 min read
Out There
The Cessna’s powerful engine yanked the tail rope from my hands as the aircraft leaped forward. The plane skimmed across the surface of the water and lifted majestically into the late spring breeze. As the drone of the engine faded into the distance,
Anglers Journal8 min read
Secret Order of Scup
We all have a fish that kicked things off: bullhead, cunner, bluegill, mackerel, snapper blue, hickory shad. Often these are the fish that still hold some weight, a portal back to blue-jean shorts, bicycles and badly organized tackle boxes. For me it
Anglers Journal9 min readCooking, Food & Wine
Catch It, Cook It
I cooked the first fish I ever caught. I was in my 20s, on vacation in the Florida Keys. The weather was crazy cold: in the 30s. Lying around in the sun in Margari-taville wasn’t in the cards. With nothing better to do, I took a drive from Big Pine K
Anglers Journal3 min read
First Run
Smells trigger memories, each one unexpected and explosive. Spring has always had an aroma, but somehow its nostalgic effect is not as far-reaching as a sniff of stagnant pond mud and green algae, which might as well be a ride in a time machine to th
Anglers Journal8 min read
Postgame
Legendary Dallas Cowboys coach Jimmy Johnson has a gym in his Florida home. It’s normal enough for somebody from his line of business, and its walls are covered with framed football awards, fishing photos and magazine covers picturing him. It’s the u
Anglers Journal13 min read
Art Of The Possible
It is a hot, airless September afternoon in the Catskills, the transitional stretch of that month when corn maze signs appear and swaths of summer birds begin to vanish. I’ve traveled to fish a favorite pool on the Delaware’s West Branch, and while y
Anglers Journal10 min read
Sonar Revolution
I’ve danced this dance hundreds of times, yet it never fails to make my pulse race. “Throw it steady off the port side,” the captain’s voice crackles over the loudspeaker. The deckhand pitches one or two live sardines at a time over the side as the b
Anglers Journal2 min read
My Boat My Life
My first boat was a kayak, my second boat was a 15-foot Gheenoe, and my third boat was an 18-foot Privateer bay boat. All three had two things in common: They were great for the shallow waters of Chesapeake Bay, and they were limited and potentially

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