Our speaker for the May 7 meeting is Henry Garbowski from Midnight Sun Fly Casters in Fairbanks.  Henry will be speaking on their successes in teaching kids to fly fish.  He is the Past President of the club in Fairbanks and currently the Vice President and a heck of a nice guy. 

Each year, Midnight Sun Fly Casters hold a Fly Fishing Kids Camp at Twin Bear Lake at Mile 31 of Chena Hot Springs Road.  They have held the Kids Camp for 16 years.  Come Monday at 7:00 to the Millennium Hotel to hear of this successful, inspiring program.

June 3rd - Casting Clinic with George Cook at BP Building

June 4th - George Cook is the presenter at monthly meeting

July 9th - Les Gara and (hopefully) Deneki Outdoors

August 6th - Picnic at Mirror Lake

September 8th & 9th - Kenai River Clean Up 

Check the Alaska Fly Fishers website www.akflyfisher.net and upcoming newsletters for details.

Monday (tonight!) is your last chance to get tickets for the PHW raffle.  Ticket prices are $5 each or 5 for $20.  There are three chances to win on each ticket!

This month's Fish Talk from Bill Hauser is all about arrowtooth flounder.  The article begins "The arrowtooth flounder is an interesting character in our cast of Alaska commercial fishes.  It has had a history of playing the role of good cop-bad cop, or rather, good fish-bad fish."

Read this month's Fish Talk at this link.  Bill Hauser is the author of Letters From Alaska, The Inside to the Outside and the NEW book Fishes of the Last Frontier, Life Histories, Biology, Ecology and Management of Alaska Fishes.

For most Alaskan fly fishers spring brings melting snow and thoughts summer fishing, with (hopefully) sunshine and green things growing everywhere. But some of us have discovered we can have frys with our spring.

Salmon eggs laid last fall have been hatching under the ice, slowly developing into alevins (yoke sac fry). As ice pulls away from the spawning beds, the alevin, having used up their yoke sac, become fry. New fry swim to the surface, gulp some air to fill their air bladder, and begin free swimming and feeding. It's at this point in their young lives that fry become available to all the other fish that have been on minimum rations through winter.

As spring progresses, fry start to migrate downstream to either a lake (rearing habitat), or directly to the ocean, depending on species. Fry usually travel in the top layer and edges of the water column. Remember, these little guys are not great swimmers, so they need softer current. As fry migrate downstream they tend to bunch up in small schools.

Watch for birds working the water, terns especially; they also know the fry are on the move and they like them as much as the fish. As fry migrate downstream they tend to bunch up in small schools. At this point in their lives there is safety in numbers. This works both for and against the angler. As the schools move through the holding area of the fish they have a tendency to key in on the larger groups as opposed to just a few, or individual fry. So, as the fry are pushed up in the water column and the birds work the over from above, you can time when you've got your best shot at a prime presentation. Once the school of fry has passed, you're back to shotgun casting hoping that you can entice a fish into coming after a single offering.

Follow this link for smolt recipes for Alaskan waters - including a couple patterns by Keith Graham at Worldwide Angler.  

Women's Veterans Retreat will be May 12 and Laura Orr still needs some helpers.  This is a fun event to help with fly tying, knot tying and casting.  Contact Laura if you can spare three hours to give back to our women veterans.  littleeddy.orr@gmail.com

Casting For Recovery will hold its Southcentral retreat in early June.  Water helpers are needed for the morning of
June 3rd.  Contact Martha Peck at cfrmartha@gmail.com

if you would like more information or would like to volunteer.

The last session of the Spring Seminar is Monday, May 14 at the BP Main Building.  This is the casting session.  We'll begin with about 30 minutes of indoor instruction followed by hands-on casting on the BP lawn.  AFF members are encouraged to share their casting skills and mentor these new fly fishers.  Class begins at 6:30.