By Tim Romano

How about a little entertainment today? Here are two videos I have to share.

Whether you've already seen them—they have been floating around around the web for a little bit now—or you're watching them for the first time, take a moment to enjoy these videos.

The video above is Marc Montocchio's "The Road to A Jericho." It's about a custom wooden boat. A really nice custom boat that's not a fishing boat, but an amazing work of art that I thought you all would love to see.   [ Read Full Post ]

By The Editors

Congratulations to Eric Sturos, who wins an unlocked iPhone 5 and an Otterbox phone case for posting the best photo to our Catchbook fishing app in October! And congrats to our runners up, James Carpenter, Chad Aldridge, and Kevin McDonough, who each won an Otterbox case. Check out their winning photos and see the rest of our picks for the 50 best shots posted in October by clicking through this gallery. [ Read Full Post ]

By Phil Bourjaily

Rather than run yet another picture of me holding a gun or dead thing in this space, today we have Field & Stream’s Kristyn Brady modeling a Carhartt Women’s Work-Dry Base Layer Quarter Zip Shirt and a live trout.

Kristyn and I, along with millions of others since 1889, love our Carhartts. I wear the basic brown dungarees in the field all the time because they are tough and comfortable, and because I hope they make people mistake me for somebody who actually works for a living. Besides, brown duck is a great camo pattern if you sit still--just ask your father and grandfather.

In a world where almost every garment you wear is made offshore it was a surprise to read “Made in the USA” on a pair of new brown duck bibs I picked up recently. (I was also happy to discover that sometime since I bought my last set of Carhartt bibs the button fly has been replaced by a zipper, which is progress if you drink a lot of coffee.)
[ Read Full Post ]

By Kirk Deeter

So much of fly rod marketing revolves around "how far," "how fast," and "how light" that I think one of the more important performance factors—the feel—gets lost in the shuffle.

When it comes to selecting a rod, sensitivity is priority number one for a lot of the bass and walleye fishermen I know. And yes, some of the newer-generation fly rods (especially those meant for Euro-style nymphing) are designed to optimize feel, but I sometimes think the market has out-engineered itself.  Some of the rod models from 15 or 20 years ago (or longer)—rods we'd call graphite classics now—do a pretty fine job of offering the whole performance package of distance, versatility, and feel.  I'm talking about rods like the Winston IM6, the original G Series from Scott, the Loomis GLX, and the Sage 590 RPL. If you have one, keep it. If you can grab one on eBay, do it. [ Read Full Post ]

Pop a Top to Stop Slip
Before you skin a fish fillet, open a bottle of beer and save the cap. Place your fillet skin side down and slice 1⁄2 inch of skin from the meat at the tail. Press the bottle-cap edge into the skin with your thumb to keep it taut while you slice the flesh away.

Ryan Hart, Cedar Park, Texas [ Read Full Post ]

By The Editors

Congratulations to Chad Aldridge and Kevin McDonough, who submitted these photos of a ling cod and a muskie, respectively. Their photos earned the first two weekly prizes in our October Catchbook Photo Contest. Chad and Kevin will each receive an OtterBox iPhone case.

So if you fish and you've got an iPhone, remember to check out our app, because the user who posts the best fishing photo on Catchbook during the month of October will win a 16GB iPhone 5 (MSRP: $649)—plus OtterBox Defender Series ($49.95) and Commuter Series ($34.95) cases to go with it. AND we still have two more OtterBox iPhone cases left to give away, so keep the photos coming.

[ Read Full Post ]