Tom and I met on our first day of grad school back in 1982. We were both broke and stressed, and we both loved the outdoors, so I decided that an affordable way to relieve some of that stress might be to learn how to fly-fish. We had learned to fish with our dads when we were very small, but it was bait fishing, and we wanted to try something new.
After a few casting lessons and some local camping and fishing trips, we both fell in love with the sport—Tom so deeply that it soon became clear we would need to find ways to take it to the next level.
Fast-forward a couple of years. When we finally graduated and started making a little bit of money (though with student loans and everything that comes with starting a new career, we were still mostly broke), I decided to get him a guided fishing trip on the Henry’s Fork for his birthday. He had dreamed of fishing it ever since a trip we took to Yellowstone a few years earlier. Luck paired him with the extraordinary guide Bob Lamm, and he spent the day floating Box Canyon and fishing the Ranch. It was 1987.
At the end of the day, the boat wasn’t the only thing that floated. When Tom returned from that trip, he was about three feet off the ground, waxing about what was obviously one of the best days of his life. On the drive home to Northern California, I suggested that our next trip might be the Bow River in Alberta, which he had also dreamed of fishing. It would be expensive, so I suggested that maybe we should do it right and make it our honeymoon. I’m pretty sure his response was something like, “Yeah, we could do that.” I was also fairly sure that the dreamy look in his eyes as we discussed it was the prospect of another float trip on a great river.
I was reminded of all this when, in early September of 2025, Tom was able to fish with Bob Lamm again. Almost 40 years later and (mostly) retired, he still fishes the Henry’s Fork every chance he gets. These days I still fish too, though I often pursue other interests—like photography or reading—while he’s on the water. But we both still deeply love the river and the surrounding country, and for each of us it will always be one of the most special places on earth.
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Our Aquatic Ecology Program Manager, Dr. Jack McLaren, joined Idaho Falls city and FIPS-Mouche leadership at the opening ceremony parade along the Snake River Greenbelt to welcome competitors to the watershed and to make sure conservation was front and center.
Drone photo of Island Park Dam taken on September 9, 2026 Looking Back on September September brought lows and highs to Island Park. Island Park Reservoir started September at 29% full and quickly fell to a low of 12% full on September 19. The rapid drawdown of the reservoir was the result of managers needing to move water downstream to American Falls (to irrigate farms in the Magic Valley with senior water rights). Such low
This story was written by Audrey Hunter (2026 intern) and was originally published in the Fall 2026 Newsletter. It’s no secret that late summers on Island Park Reservoir haven’t been in perfect conditions in recent years. Warm, turbid, algae-filled water plague reservoir recreationists while diminishing water quality downstream. Cyclical algal blooms decrease water clarity and create less-than-ideal circumstances for the reservoir’s flora and fauna. What’s the solution? HFF’s DIRTT Plan. In-Reservoir Oxygenation Nutrients released from
Drone photo taken on September 9, 2026 The Henry’s Fork Drought Management Planning Committee met on Wednesday, September 16 2026 to develop an updated reservoir management strategy. Downstream of the Henry’s Fork watershed, lower-valley irrigation demand over the rest of the season is anticipated to be slightly lower than projected last week, so Island Park Reservoir and Grassy Lake (in the Fall River drainage) do not need to deliver any more water out of the
