BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 140: Far Bank's Simon Gawesworth on public access to public waters…worldwide

Simon Gawesworth is a second-generation master flycasting instructor and world casting champion, author of three books on Spey casting, and currently works as the education and engagement manager for Far Bank. A native Brit, he has been working in the flyfishing industry in the U.S. for the past 25 years and fishing the fresh and saltwater globe from Tierra del Fuego to Montana to Christmas Island. Hal and Simon range far on this interview: through Simon's work with Far Bank (which includes Sage, RIO, Redington and other brands dedicated to flyfishing education and conservation) to the near-total lack of public access to waters in Europe and Argentina. The talk is fly tackle for small streams in the southern U.S., leaders for topwater bass fishing, the highly specialized culture of competitive "coarse fishing" in the United Kingdom, and the fact that American anglers, whether they are wading the Madison for big browns, Spey casting for Oregon steelhead or rollcasting a 2-weight switch rod on a Mississippi creek for shellcrackers, seem utterly unaware of how good we have it, and how quickly it could all go…Euro on us. Join us.    

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 139: Kyle Lybarger, Native Habitat Project

Kyle Lybarger, a 29-year-old consulting forester, father, deer-hunter, small creek addict and self-proclaimed "native plant nerd" of Hartselle, Alabama, is a major part of a new and wonderful current sweeping America. Kyle's Native Habitat Project videos – simple, one-minute vignettes of obscure native plants, remnant grasslands and wildlife-vibrant native plant landscapes – have been downloaded millions of times. The Native Habitat Project is bizarre insects and forgotten plants, science from the heart and soul, love of place, sense of wonder, mostly right under our noses (some of Kyle's most intact ancient grassland remnants were discovered by the local Dollar Store). For a nation exhausted by abstraction and thirsting for the irrefutably real, Kyle Lybarger's life work is a tin cup of cold water from a deeper well. 

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 138: Mississippi forester Alex Harvey

Come with Hal to southern Mississippi to talk with Alex Harvey, a registered professional forester in Mississippi and Alabama and a land management consultant, wildlife biologist and multi-generational conservationist, hunter and fisherman. Harvey is carrying on the outdoor traditions passed on to him from generations of his family, ranging from herbalism and foraging to rabbit, squirrel and deer hunting, cattle ranching, gardening, cooking and living a full and thriving life in the Southern outdoors. Alex is also the founder of Legacy Land Management, "forestry from the ground up," helping private landowners, many of them Black, make the most of their properties for wildlife, timber and ecological resilience. 

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 137: Marine Veteran and Storyteller Russell Worth Parker

Russell Worth Parker, known as Worth, is a retired Marine and a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan. After 27 years in the Corps, he is home in Wilmington, North Carolina, hunting and fishing and being a husband and father – and has, as he puts it, "fallen backwards into a writing career." Parker's work has been published in The New York Times, Garden & Gun, The Bitter Southerner, Backcountry Journal, Shooting Sportsman, Salt Magazine and military websites such as SOFLETE.com. Join us for a full-tilt conversation that ranges from BHA's Armed Forces Initiative to the Drive-by Truckers, Cormac McCarthy, veterans hunting Texas turkeys, traumatic brain injury and war. We also discuss the 80s classic film Red Dawn.

Striped bass are arguably the most important fish – culturally and economically – on the Atlantic seaboard. And right now, anglers are spearheading a push to conserve and rebuild striper populations, which have suffered in recent decades because of overfishing and poor habitat. What's the future of this iconic Eastern species, and what opportunities can we create to ensure our continued ability to fish for striped bass? Hal talks with Mike Woods, chair of BHA's New England chapter, recipient of BHA's Jim Posewitz award and resident of Rhode Island, and Chris Borgatti, BHA's New York and New England chapter coordinator who hails from Massachusetts, about the past, present and achievable future of striped bass fisheries in the eastern United States. As Chris says, "New England might not have as much public land as in the West, but what's there is vital to the huge population centers in the East. And it makes the fight for conservation, habitat, access and opportunity even more important." Join them for a far-reaching conversation that hits on all aspects of the outdoor lifestyle along the New England coast.

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 135: Rue Mapp, founder and CEO, Outdoor Afro

Rue Mapp transformed her kitchen table blog into a national nature business and movement. Today, Mapp is founder and CEO of Outdoor Afro. For more than a decade, the nonprofit has continued to celebrate and inspire Black connections and leadership in nature across the United States. Mapp also is an award-winning and inspirational leader, speaker, public lands champion and author. Her first national book, Nature Swagger: Stories and Visions of Black Joy in the Outdoors, will be released in the fall. Mapp is a National Geographic 2019 fellow, Heinz Awards honoree and National Wildlife Federation communication award recipient as well. Her work has earned international media attention from Oprah Winfrey, The New York Times, Good Morning America, NPR, NBC's TODAY, Forbes and MeatEater. Be inspired by her wide-ranging conversation with Hal Herring, and follow her adventures @RueMapp.

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 134: Snake River Dams

We are teetering on the brink of what could be the greatest conservation success story of the past 50 years. The removal of four outdated and failing dams on the lower Snake River will restore the passage of millions of salmon and steelhead upstream into 5500 square miles of the most intact, coldwater spawning and rearing habitat in North America (almost all of it public land). If the dams are left in place, these same salmon and steelhead face inevitable extinction. It is a simple choice between vibrant, resilient life abounding, with all that entails – a resurrection of fisheries, economics, and the health of forests and wildlife that evolved with these fish – or a descent into the darkness of extinction and collapse. Which will we choose? Join Hal as he meets with Eric Crawford, North Idaho field coordinator for Trout Unlimited; Sam Mace, a fisheries expert who has worked with Save Our Wild Salmon; and Josh Mills, BHA development coordinator and board member of the Wild Steelhead Coalition, in this podcast recorded live at the BHA North American Rendezvous in May 2022.

If you live in Idaho, Oregon or Washington, take action now! Urge your elected leaders to support a science-based approach to conserving fisheries and supporting the economic health of communities that depend on them.

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 133: BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning

For Americans who live or venture west of the Mississippi River or north to Alaska, no public lands are more important, more abundant or more accessible than those managed by the Bureau of Land Management. We are talking about 247.3 million acres of public land (70 million of them in Alaska). In the Lower 48, this means elk hunting in the Missouri Breaks of Montana, Wyoming's best pronghorn and mule deer country, quail hunting in the borderlands of New Mexico, and black bear or even bison hunting in the high desert mountains of Utah. The BLM manages the National Conservation Lands system, which includes millions of acres of America's finest hiking, camping, wandering, canyoneering, rafting and access to rivers. The agency administers 18,000 grazing permits and is responsible for 700 million subsurface acres of publicly owned minerals. If it seems like an impossible task…well, sometimes it is. Today on the podcast we talk with BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning about the present and future of these lands – and how we can create a future in which politics is no longer the major obstacle to keeping these irreplaceable lands in public hands.    

BHA Podcast & Blast, Ep. 132, Corner Crossing in Wyoming with Ryan Callaghan, Liz Lynch and Jared Oakleaf

Most of us have been following the case: four hunters from Missouri who used a homemade ladder to cross from one section of public land to the next without setting foot on private land…and the hard-fought court cases that ensued in Carbon County, Wyoming. It's a case that may define public access to public lands for decades to come. Yet it is more than that. It's about the resurgence of privatization of public assets in America, a harsh echo from the Gilded Age. It's a reminder that plutocracy never sleeps, that the public trust is never truly safe and that, as Frederick Douglass said best, "Power concedes nothing without a demand." Come listen to this discussion, recorded live at BHA's 11th annual North American Rendezvous with MeatEater's Ryan Callaghan and Liz Lynch and Jared Oakleaf of the Wyoming chapter of BHA: It's a deep dive into the Wyoming corner crossing case, 200 years in the making. It's a story of old range wars, land giveaways and ancient doctrines of law. Explore with us the possibilities that "bruising someone's airspace with the points of one's hips or shoulders" can be an offense worthy of full-bore prosecution…at least in the eyes of some folks.

BHA Podcast & Blast, Bonus Ep. 131, Sen. Jon Tester and the Blackfoot Clearwater Stewardship Act

To those outside of Montana, the Blackfoot River is the "Big Blackfoot" featured in Norman Maclean's lyrical and tragic novel A River Runs Through It. For Montanans and generations of visitors, the Blackfoot is a state of being all its own, a big rowdy river of native cutthroats and bull trout, its waters born of both high-altitude wilderness snows and the tannin-stained, unfathomably rich chain of wetlands and lakes of the Clearwater drainage. It is a huge, complex and vibrant watershed, and as healthy as it is now, it was not always this way. Join us for an interview with Montana's Sen. Jon Tester on why he is a die-hard supporter of the Blackfoot Clearwater Stewardship Act, supported by three-quarters of Montanans – hunters, anglers, bikers, loggers, ranchers and others – and which will guide the management and ensure the long-term health of this irreplaceable part of our public lands and waters legacy.

Learn more and take action in support of the Blackfoot Clearwater Stewardship Act right now.