The Adipose: Recent Episodes
Wild Steelhead Coalition
Welcome to the Adipose, the voice of the Wild Steelhead Coalition. In the 21st Century, a steelheader must be an angler, conservationist, and advocate. The Adipose is a place for the important, authentic conversations that educate and inspire anglers, members of the public, and the fishing industry to take action on behalf of wild steelhead and their home waters. Join us as we share the stories of the passionate community of steelheaders fighting to help ensure these incredible fish thrive long into the future.
February on the Skagit means a four a.m. alarm, a spey rod, and a long drive north into the rain to swing flies for a fish you probably won't touch. This episode follows a week on one of the last rivers in the lower 48, where wild winter steelhead still return, the jade-green water, the eagles in the cottonwoods, three seconds of something alive on a foggy Wednesday.
The Adipose is the voice of the Wild Steelhead Coalition. Learn more at wildsteelheadcoalition.org.
What does it mean to love something wild? What does it cost for the things we pursue in the name of reverence and sport?
These aren't comfortable questions. But they're the questions that matter most when we talk about wild steelhead, a fish that has become so rare that simply encountering one has become the stuff of legend. The fish of a thousand casts. A living artifact. An angler's holy grail.
But what if the very act of seeking them, of loving them the way we've been taught to love them, is part of what's pushing them toward the edge?
Today on Adipose, we're going to do something different. We're going to let a wild steelhead speak for itself. This letter came to us from somewhere between the ghost streams and the warming currents, from the dwindling runs and the last best places we haven't yet destroyed. It's addressed to all of us, anglers, managers, advocates, anyone who's ever stood in a river hoping for that silver flash.
It's not an easy listen. But it's an honest one.
This episode of The Adipose explores our complicated, emotional, and increasingly urgent relationship with the Pacific Northwest’s most iconic fish. Through a reflective letter written after a rare encounter with a wild steelhead, the story traces the species’ extraordinary life cycle, their legendary strength, and the sobering decline that has pushed many runs to the brink.
This is a meditation on why these fish matter, what they reveal about the health of our watersheds, and what we stand to lose, or save, in the years ahead.
What if the key to saving wild steelhead isn’t just about spawning adults, but tiny fry that barely move an inch their first summer? In this episode of The Adipose, we explore research by Nick Chambers, funded in part by the Wild Steelhead Coalition, that reveals how density and dispersal during the fry stage may determine whether a population thrives or collapses. Focused on the Upper Skagit River, this work shows how clustered redds can lead to overcrowding and death rather than dispersal, limiting recruitment and potentially causing managers to underestimate habitat capacity and escapement needs. It’s a story with massive implications not just for the Skagit, but for steelhead rivers everywhere.
In this episode, we explore the deep connections between anglers and the fish that shape their lives. Today's story comes from Jenny O’Brien, whose journey to chase steelhead became something more profound, a meditation on friendship, love, loss, and what it means to belong somewhere.
Our story begins on a familiar drive, one that thousands of steelhead anglers know by heart...
In this episode of The Adipose, we continue exploring transformative fishing moments. Building on our premiere episode, we again invited anglers to share their first and last steelhead encounters—bookends to their ongoing journey on the water.
Chasing and encountering a wild steelhead is the spark that started most of us on our journey as anglers and advocates, and keeps us motivated to do the work. In this new episode, we've gathered fresh perspectives from our community, sharing those pivotal moments when steel met line and changed lives forever. These stories capture the essence of why we fish and why we fight to protect these magnificent creatures and their waters.
In this storytelling episode, we share the connections between friendship, fly fishing, and the wild steelhead of British Columbia. This story blends humor and heartbreak and captures the emotions of chasing these legendary fish while coming to grips with the changes that time can bring.
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Lynda Mapes is an award-winning writer who, during her 27-year tenure as a reporter at The Seattle Times, has written numerous stories about natural history, the environment, and Native American tribes. In addition to her newspaper career, she is the author of numerous books, including the 2022 Washington State Book Award Winner Orca: Shared Waters Shared Home.
Lynda has written an investigative article for the Seattle Times exploring the complexity surrounding Washington’s state fish, the wild steelhead, and we’re fortunate to have her as a guest on this episode of The Adipose.
We’re excited to bring you a brand-new episode of The Adipose podcast. This time, we sit down with Steve Duda, a celebrated writer, editor, and producer who has significantly influenced the voice of fly fishing for over three decades. You might know Steve as the former editor of The Flyfish Journal or from his standout appearances on Writers on the Fly.
In this episode, Steve takes us through his new book, River Songs. Steering clear of the usual fly fishing clichés—romanticized tales, heroic battles with nature, and stories of triumph—River Songs offers something different. It delves into authentic lived experiences, embraces vulnerability, and gives a fresh perspective on what it means to enjoy “a long run with a tight crew.” Don’t miss this deep dive into the real heart of fly fishing with one of its most influential voices.
For steelheaders of this era, there is no doubt we have reached a major juncture. in the journey. One option is to surrender to the grim circumstances. We can go out in a blaze of glory, Thelma and Louise style, and fish our way to extinction and then move on to other species once wild steelhead are gone. The other fork in the road is to fight and build a robust army of steelhead champions who work as hard to restore wild steelhead as they do to catch them.
Fly Fishermen began catching steelhead on flies up and down the Pacific Coast from BC to Northern California in the early 20th Century. As stories of the beauty and power of wild steelhead appeared in print publications, a bevy of steelhead anglers perfected their craft and became the first generation of wild steelhead conservationists.
In this first episode of our series, Fly Fishing Pioneers & Legends of the Northwest Wild Steelhead Coalition Board Chair Ed Sozinho sat down with writer, historian, and former Wild Steelhead Coalition President and trustee Jack Berryman to talk about the history and pioneers of steelhead fishing and the role anglers have played in preserving and restoring wild steelhead along the Pacific Coast.
Can you imagine what it would be like to wake up in Seattle on a misty March morning and struggle to decide which of Puget Sound’s prolific 49 wild steelhead rivers and streams to fish that day? Can you imagine what it would be like to catch two wild steelhead and be disappointed by how slow the day was? And can you imagine what it would feel like to wade waist-deep into the Snohomish River knowing that 225,000 wild steelhead were swimming around in those same waters?
It is a now-or-never moment for the wild steelhead. The decisions we make, the actions we take, and the conservation efforts we support today will determine whether the legacy of "Steelhead Country" endures or fades away.
Imagine arriving at a party just as the last song is playing, and everyone is headed home.
Enjoy this audio edition of WSC Board member David Conrad's piece, "Late to the Steelhead Party," which he wrote for the 2023 Swing The Fly Anthology.
In many watersheds, most wild steelhead returning each season will be caught and handled by anglers, some more than once. Regardless of our best intentions, some fish will die, and many will endure sublethal short and/or long-term impacts, such as reduced spawning success.
Dr. Andy Danylchuk and his teams have researched the impacts of catch-and-release fishing on various recreational fisheries around the globe.
In this episode of The Adipose, Andy shares the results of his study to evaluate the factors that influence C&R outcomes in wild steelhead on the Bulkley River in British Columbia and how improvements in catch-and-release survival can influence a population’s ability to sustain or even grow, their numbers.
Most anglers listening to this podcast likely understand that the species Oncorhynchus mykiss exhibits a complex of reproductive behaviors that generally involve summer-run steelhead, winter-run steelhead, and resident rainbow trout that all can spawn in the same river. But is it a case that ‘never the twain shall meet’?
Listen to Wild Steelhead Coalition Science Advisor Guy Fleischer on what differentiates young steelhead from resident rainbow trout in such river systems.
In fish conservation, it isn’t always about the big wins, success often comes in small steps and underestimated sources, and even small steps can help create a movement. Sometimes it’s simply about seeing a need, taking personal initiative, and having the courage to advocate for unpopular solutions. In this episode of The Adipose, we share the background behind Sparky’s Rule and how it helped kickstart a new era in how we handle wild fish.
In 2007 writer and Wild Steelhead Coalition Trustee Dylan Tomine published State Of The Steelhead, an essay you can now find in his new book Headwaters. The essay was a warning and a call for steelhead anglers to step up and fight for these incredible fish.
The lessons are just as relevant today as when Tomine penned that essay over a decade ago, but one thing has remained constant: his commitment to protecting wild steelhead and their habitat.
We hope you enjoy this episode of The Adipose Podcast, where we share Geoff Mueller's interview with Tomine as part of our ongoing Wild Steelhead: Now or Never campaign.
Last year, only 70 steelhead returned to the iconic Thompson River. For decades, the runs of Interior Fraser River steelhead in Southern British Columbia have been allowed to completely collapse.
Restoration plans have not been enacted, and a previous emergency attempt to provide critical protections under Canada's Species at Risk Act (SARA) has been derailed by managing agencies. Today a new effort is underway to protect and rebuild these wild steelhead populations before they are lost completely.
To help understand the tragic situation, the next steps required, and the lessons and warnings for wild steelhead anglers everywhere, we reached out to Aaron Hill of Watershed Watch Salmon Society and Jesse Zeman of the BC Wildlife Federation for this episode of the Adipose podcast.
In October of 2021, the Wild Steelhead Coalition released “Wild Steelhead: Now or Never,” a campaign to provide a status report on the current state of wild steelhead populations, educate anglers on the causes of declines, and the investments required to restore their populations.
As a part of that project, board member Ed Sozinho and the writer Geoff Mueller hit the road to visit anglers, scientists, and conservationists and hear about their work and home waters.
For this the second episode of the Adipose, we catch up with Jake Crawford to talk about his work, time on the water, and the community of anglers working to protect the wild steelhead rivers of Southern Oregon.
For our first episode of The Adipose, we thought it made sense to start with some fishing stories. After all, chasing and encountering a wild steelhead is the common spark that started most of us on our journey as anglers and advocates, and keeps us motivated to do the work.
Every steelheader knows: Wild steelhead can change lives. We want to share some of our favorite stories of the first steelhead caught, and even a few great ones about the last wild steelhead anglers were lucky enough to cross paths with.