Fishing For Words

Fishing books seem to be as plentiful as fish in the ocean. Yet choosing a good one is as tricky as hooking salmon with lockjaw. First, they’re hard to find. Fishing books rarely make the shelf of a bookstore, much less a best-seller list.

Second, fishing books tend to look alike.

Here’s some direction on a spectrum of recently published fishing books that stand out in a crowd.

From The Sea

Big halibut once had secrets they kept to themselves in deep, dark holes under the sea. But a book published last year has put the spotlight on catching the bottom-hugging barn doors that range to more than 400 pounds in Alaska.

How To Catch Trophy Halibut, by Christopher Batin and Terry Rudnick, also shares considerable insight on fisheries farther south, including the Washington coast.

Halibut are the meat-hunter’s trophy fish. A 200-pounder, Batin points out, can feed a family for a year with some of the most delicious meat in the ocean.

Batin, who is well-known for his fishing expertise in Alaska, teamed with Rudnick, an Olympia resident who thinks of the coasts along British Columbia, Washington and Oregon as his backyard.

The reader who absorbs everything in this book will appreciate the entire chapter devoted to landing a trophy halibut. As the authors warn, shooting or harpooning a halibut disqualifies the fish for world-record status.

Trout How-To

One small book can make a big difference in a fly-fishing trip to Alberta’s top trout streams.

Trout Streams of Alberta, by Jim McLennan, provides insightful descriptions and useful maps of the Oldman, Bow, Red Deer, Athabasca and Peace river systems.

Each chapter is accompanied by a hatch chart. Detailed tying instructions are given for any patterns that are new or specific to a location.

McLennan has 30 years of experience fly-fishing and teaching the sport in Alberta. His advice can prevent wasted days.

In Alpine Angler: A Fly-Fisher’s Guide to Western Wilderness, John Shewey takes information that might otherwise be found only in backpacking books and tailors it to the needs of fly-fishers who have hesitated to probe the rewards of backcountry angling.

If you want to get technical about a tiny fly-fishing niche, try Small Fly Adventures in the West. Montana guide and author Neal Streeks tells you in studious detail why fishing tiny insect patterns is worth the cost of bifocals.

And if you want to wade through the basics of fly-fishing with an international expert, buy John Goddard’s Trout-Fishing Techniques. The author presents universal truths from his experience in fishing around the world.

Trout art and history

The most valuable gems of fishing literature rarely deal entirely with the techniques of catching fish.

These books often are local and elusive but have powerful or lasting significance.

Ribbons of Blue: The Life & Lore of the “‘Old Pro” Pat Barnes is a big one you don’t want to get away.

The book features the life and fishing know-how of Barnes, a native Montanan who found his niche among the state’s great fly-fishing pioneers.

Quieter and therefore less hallowed than Dan Bailey and Bud Lily, Barnes made his mark as one of the early fly guides based in West Yellowstone. His story was put in a book, thanks to the alertness of Dave Shors, a distinguished Montana journalist.

“I’d been at Trout Unlimited meetings, where Pat read from his streamside notes, and I realized something should be done to pull this all together,” Shors said.

Barnes is 88 and not in the best health at his home in Helena. But the book is timeless.

Shors and Barnes weave delicious anecdotes and fishing wisdom with the history of a man whose grandparents built the first tourist hotel in Yellowstone’s Firehole River region in 1881.

“Dan Bailey was a magnet,” Shors said. “Everyone loved to go to his shop. Every writer who passed through Yellowstone wrote about him. He had the ties with the East. But he didn’t have the historical ties Pat Barnes had to Montana.”

Trout Country, by Michael Furtman is a coffee-table book that goes beyond the effort of presenting lively art.

Furtman also provides significant information and background about the fish that owns the fly-fisher’s heart.

Anglers intrigued by the natural art of fish should take note of Trout: An Illustrated History. More than 70 color reproductions of the artist’s vibrant and accurate watercolors catalogue North America’s trout in one volume.

The original watercolors and the concise text appear to be the culmination of a great artist’s life-long work. The surprise is that the artist, James Prosek, is a fishing fanatic, just 21 years old, and still an undergraduate at Yale University.

Meat fishing

Some great authors and most big publishers neglect the practice of fishing for a good meal. The prose doesn’t always rank as literary genius, but the subject certainly has mass appeal.

Rising toward the top of the heap, Ken Shultz has recently revised his highly instructional book, The Art of Trolling, making it a book of immediate value to anglers in virtually any part of the country.

Hooking bass

The 30 million anglers who relish the chance to hook a largemouth bass have demanded better books on fishing for this popular species. Your chance of finding the good books in Western trout country are slim, but the hunt would be worthwhile.

Two good books that cover basic-to-advanced techniques include Largemouth Bass by Bill Dance with Tim Tucker and Successful Bass Fishing by Ken Schultz.

Good reads

John Gierach could be the most dependably entertaining American author of fly-fishing stories. His latest book, Another Lousy Day in Paradise, is no exception to his rule of excellence.

You’ll learn something about fishing and life when you read this book. But even if you learned nothing, the reading time would be well spent.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: But the book Off-beat fishing books are difficult to find in fishing shops, much less bookstores. If you cannot find these books locally, they can be ordered from the publisher for an additional fee that usually ranges from $2-$6. Here’s a contact list for books covered in this story with the postpaid cost. “How to Catch Trophy Halibut,” by Christopher Batin and Terry Rudnick, $29.95 ppd., Alaska Angler Publications, P.O. Box 83550, Fairbanks, AK 99708-3550, telephone (907) 455-8000. “Successful Bass Fishing,” by Ken Schultz, $26.50 ppd., McGrawHill, P.O. Box 547, Blacklick, OH 43004, telephone (800) 262-4729. “The Art of Trolling,” (revised edition) by Ken Schultz, $24.25 ppd., McGraw-Hill, P.O. Box 547, Blacklick, OH 43004, telephone (800) 262-4729. “Largemouth Bass,” by Bill Dance with Tim Tucker, $14.95 ppd., Tim Tucker Outdoor Productions, Rt. 2, Box 177, Micanopy, FL 32667, telephone (800) 252-3474. “Trout Streams of Alberta,” by Jim McLennan, $19.95 ppd. (Canadian funds), Country Pleasures Fly Shop, #570, 10816 Macleod Trail S., Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2J 5N8, telephone (403) 271-1023. “Trout Country,” by Michael Furtman, $43 ppd., NorthWord Press, P.O. Box 1360, Minocqua, WI 54548, telephone (800) 336-6398. “Alpine Angler: A Fly Fisher’s Guide to the Western Wilderness,” by John Shewey, $27.95 ppd., Frank Amato Publications, P.O. Box 82112, Portland, OR 97282, telephone (503) 653-8108. “Small Fly Adventures in the West: Angling for Larger Trout,” by Neal Streeks, $25 ppd., Pruett Publishing, 2928 Pearl St., Boulder, CO 80301, telephone (800) 247-8224. “John Goddard’s Trout-Fishing Techniques,” by John Goddard, $39 ppd., Lyons & Burford, 31 W. 21 St., New York, NY 10010, telephone (212) 620-9580. “Another Lousy Day In Paradise,” By John Gierach, $23.50 ppd., Pruett Publishing, 2928 Pearl St., Boulder, CO 80301, telephone (800) 247-8224. “Ribbons of Blue: The Life & Lore of the ‘Old Pro’ Pat Barnes,” by Antrim ‘Pat’ Barnes with Dave Shors, $21.45 ppd., Independent Record, P.O. Box 4249, Helena, MT 59604-4249, telephone (406) 447-4000. “Trout: An illustrated History,” by James Prosek, $27 plus $6 KnopfRandom House, 400 Hahn Rd., Westminster MD 21157, telephone (800) 726-0600.