Apparently we're not the ones obsessed with mayflies...

About a week ago, as I was making my morning browse through the popular fishing blogs over a cup of Shenandoah Joe, I practically shot coffee out my nose when I read Singlebarbed's post about the EPA's decision to ask companies that strip mine in southwestern Virginia to show how they're going to protect the mayfly from the effects of their mining before they can receive renewed permits.

Did I read that right?  The mayfly?  The innocent little mayfly?  The elegant and regal Ephemeroptera?  So not only does this tiny insect have the ability to make men spend hundreds of dollars on overpriced colored fuzz, genetically superior rooster hackles, spools of 6x tippet, bamboo rods and and 4 wheel drive SUVs but apparently it also has the ability to move mountains.... or rather, to keep mountains from moving?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fauxto_dkp/ / CC BY 2.0

Whether you agree with the EPA's decision or not, the notion that the EPA would go after the strip mining companies because of mayflies is pretty awesome. (FYI, I'm not trying to make any political statements here, we just care about whether you debarb hooks and practice catch and release... okay that was a joke. but seriously, catch and release...)

The question is, would the EPA have tried to protect the mayfly if it wasn't for fly fishing fanatics like ourselves?

There are quite a lot of us out there nowadays so maybe we did have a role in the matter. According to the Regional Boating & Fishing Foundation's recent report, 17.2% of the American population actively participate in some form of fishing.  Of course the percent that fly fish is much less, at 2.1% of the population, but that's still 5.9 million people!

This will be something that we'll be keeping an eye on.  We'll keep you updated if anything interesting arises.  Who knows, maybe that pollution could cause an evolutionary change in the mayflies creating super huge size 4 mayflies?  I'd be okay with that if it meant that our brook trout also grew substantially.

On a side note: Rich and I are almost done with exams and are almost 7/8 of the way done with the classroom portion of medical school.  Hopefully after we take our board examinations in April, we'll be back on the water on a more regular basis.  In the meantime, I fully expect Scott to make some reports out of Blacksburg seeing as he should have soooo much more time than us only being in his first year of school down there.

Also, look out for some new updates from another contributor, Dr. Strayer who has also had a lot of experience fly fishing in central Virginia.

And I'll leave you with a shot of the snowfall outside of the UVA health sciences library: