Women Anglers Gain Increased Prominence

They’ve come a long way, baby.

Women anglers, that is.

They’ve contributed to anglers’ knowledge ever since Dame Juliana, a British nun, was credited with writing a treatise on fishing four years after Columbus discovered America

But they haven’t been particularly visible until the last few years. Fishing has always been considered a man’s sport, especially by men. Yet there have been superb women guides, fly tiers, casters, fishing instructors, outdoors writers and authors for more than a century.

These days, women are everywhere there are fish to catch. They guide anglers on Montana’s blue-ribbon trout streams, cast for salmon along Alaska’s rivers, wade the bonefish flats of Belize and Christmas Island, work spinner baits at bass-filled lakes and wade North Idaho’s cutthroat streams.

They no longer have to wear bulky waders designed for men or cast rods with handles too thick for their smaller fingers. Manufacturers finally are producing tackle and accessories just for them.

And now they have their own quarterly newspaper, the Women’s Reel News, edited and published by Lyla Foggia in Welches, Ore. Foggia, author of Reel Women, considered one of the best books on fishing in 1995, says in the premiere issue, distributed last week that “it is certainly time for a publication devoted exclusively to women for whom fishing has become either a recreational passion or career.”

Men still outnumber women on the nation’s lakes and streams by a wide margin. However, women have become highly visible everywhere there are fish to be caught.

Scores of Inland Northwest women not only are passionate about fishing, but many have made reputations as outstanding fly tiers, guides and fishing instructors. A high percentage of women anglers have been and still are fly fishers.

Virginia Splawn and her late husband, Terry Bryant, started tying and selling flies more than a half century ago and she’s still tying flies despite eye problems. She and current husband Ray operate Terry Tyed Flies, the oldest continuously operated fly tying firm in the Inland Northwest.

Old-timers among the region’s fly fishers still talk about Alice Sperry and Lucille Nelson, who fly fished Hauser and other North Idaho lakes more than 50 years ago. Both died several years ago.

Sperry was a superb fly tier who created several patterns, including the Duchess, a fly designed for spinyrayed fish. Nelson and her husband operated a resort at Hauser, and she was considered an expert on fishing the lake.

Alice Deaver, who has tied flies at Federation of Fly Fishers meetings in recent years, also fly fished Idaho lakes during the time Sperry and Nelson were active. She still fishes the region’s lakes and can hold her own with any fly fisher in the Northwest.

Many women anglers became fly fishers because their husbands fly fished, but many others decided on their own. Some are married to men who don’t fish, and others are single.

Several of the region’s top women fly fishers are members of the Spokane Fly Fishers. Betty Lambert, club president, is one of the best tiers in the club. Judy Kauffman has fished throughout the Northwest and in Alaska.

Two of the most proficient women fly fishers are Jean Huber and Dana Duzan, Sacred Heart Hospital medical technicians. Superb casters and wise in the ways of trout, they’re so good that few men would want to compete against them.

Julie Balek’s husband, Walt, a physician, is one of the region’s top fly fishers, but she’s also proficient with a fly. An excellent caster, she has fished for trout throughout the Northwest and for steelhead and salmon in the Northwest and Alaska.

Although Monique Viren is a relatively new fly fisher, she has become so enthusiastic about the sport that she’s ready to fish anywhere in the country whenever her husband, Fred, also a physician, can break free of his office.

North Idaho’s best known fly tier is Virginia Sturgis, who originated the Frisky Jenny, now the most popular trolling fly on Pend Oreille and Coeur d’Alene lakes.

Washington state’s first lady of fly fishing is Lisa Pelly, chairman of the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission. A Bainbridge Island resident, Pelly founded and served as president of the Northwest Women Flyfishers. She is a member of the Clark-Skamania Fly Fishers and the Federation of Fly Fishers.

Not all women anglers and guides have been or are fly fishers.

For several years, Peggy Mehs, now retired, was one of the most knowledgeable guides on Idaho’s Priest Lake. Her clients nearly always returned home with mackinaw trout.

Some men anglers have always resented the presence of women on the Northwest’s lakes and streams, but the numbers have dwindled to only a few. Nearly all men fishermen now accept women as equals where fish are biting.

You can contact Fenton Roskelley by voice mail at 459-5577, extension 3814.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Fenton Roskelley The Spokesman-Review