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Born in Victoria on August 20, 1950, Mark Hume has specialized in environmental journalism for which he has received a National Newspaper Award, a Michener citation, several B.C. journalism awards, a Haig-Brown Award from the American Fisheries Society, a Canadian Science Writers Award and two B.C. Book Prizes. When the former Vancouver Sun journalist received the Roderick Haig-Brown Prize in 1999 for River of the Angry Moon, Seasons of the Bella Coola (Greystone, 1998), co-written with Harvey Thommasen, he said, "I want to thank Harvey Thommasen, who couldn't be here tonight, but who provided the scientific foundation for this book. It took him seven years. If you've read that book, you'll see there's a lot of details in there about biodiversity. None of that information about the Bella Coola was known until Harvey Thommasen did it... I don't really know how to thank someone who's dead, but I do feel I should mention his name tonight: Ted Hughes, a poet-laureate of Great Britain. He used to slip into British Columbia every few years and fish the rivers for steelhead. He gave me a great deal of encouragement for this book. He was inspirational to me shortly before he died. He knew that the rivers of British Columbia are not to be taken lightly." In 2005, Mark Hume became a co-recipient of the BC Booksellers' Choice Award in Honour of Bill Duthie for Birds of the Raincoast: Habits and Habitat (Harbour, 2004), co-written with Harvey Thomassen, Kevin Hutchings and R. Wayne Campbell. In his acceptance speech he acknowledged the roles of the staff of Harbour Publishing and the integral support of the University of North British Columbia. His preceding books are The Run of the River: Portraits of Eleven British Columbia Rivers (New Star, 1992) and Adam's River: The Mystery of the Adam's River Sockeye (New Star, 1994).
Review of the author's work by BC Studies:
River of the Angry Moon: Seasons on the Bella Coola
BOOKS:
The Run of the River: Portraits of Eleven British Columbia Rivers (New Star, 1992).
Adam's River: The Mystery of the Adam's River Sockeye (New Star, 1994).
River of the Angry Moon, Seasons of the Bella Coola (Greystone, 1998), co-written with Harvey Thommasen.
Birds of the Raincoast: Habits and Habitat (Harbour, 2004), co-written with Harvey Thomassen, Kevin Hutchings and R. Wayne Campbell.
Hume, Mark, with Mo Bradley. Trout School: Lessons from a Fly-Fishing Master (Greystone Books, 2019) (pbk) $22.95 224 pages 9781771644167
Reading the Water: Fly Fishing, Fatherhood, and Finding Strength in Nature (Greystone Books, 2022) $34.95 978-1771645690
[BCBW 2022] "Natural History"
*
Review by Mark Forsythe (BCBW 2019)
Kamloops trout. Some fishermen go weak in the knees at the mere mention. People have been coming from around the world to fish this feisty strain of trout for over 100 years.
I am of the fair-weather fly-fishing school and cast a line a few times a year. Mark Hume however, is an avid fly-fisher having logged thousands of hours over 50 years fishing for trout and new knowledge. The veteran journalist and BC Book Award-winning author of River of the Angry Moon (Greystone 1992) has crafted a book sure to capture experienced fly-fishers and newcomers alike.
What makes Trout School: Lessons from a Fly-Fishing Master most engrossing are the wisdom and stories gleaned from his long-time mentor, Mo Bradley. Where else can you learn to use ear wax to keep a leader from sinking too far below the surface? Or wash your hands in the lake to remove scent, gasoline or garlic sausage from your fingers. (And keep some dried lake weed in your fly box.) Hume’s own knowledge about the arcane world of fly-fishing is deep but, coupled with Mo’s experience, in no time this book will reel you in.
B.C.’s waters are famous in the fly-fishing world (world championships have been held here). A fly-fishing culture has existed in the province since at least the 19th century, and creels of knowledge have been passed down. Royal engineers and railway workers were among the first to fly-fish and sometimes the catches were absurd— Dr. T.W. Lambert and a friend caught 1,500 fish on Lac Le Juene in just three days in 1897.
B.C. fly-fishing pioneers include artist and conservationist Tommy Brayshaw, an important figure in the 1920s and 30s whose fly imitations have landed on Canada Post stamps. Bill Nation, a legendary guide made lakes in the Kamloops region famous and guaranteed 100 fish a week to his customers. Nation taught a few things to our most famous fly-fisher and conservationist, Roderick Haig-Brown. He in turn inspired thousands of fly-fishers through his books, including The Western Angler (1939). Barney Rushton helped advance the sport with specialized flies and new fishing techniques. Each was a keen observer of water, insects and their environment.
Mark Hume stumbled across Mo Bradley via an introductory pamphlet he had written called, From Off Ice…to Ice On. Bradley claimed that 13 different flies were all you needed, if you knew how to fish them. Hume tested Bradley’s flies and theories and found them to be more than accurate. The 13 flies are, “simple and are effective and have been proven over decades.” (Hume includes descriptions of each fly and instructions on how to tie them in Trout School. The buggy line-up includes bloodworm, damsels, dragonflies, chironomid, mayfly nymph, sedges, leeches, shrimp and the all-purpose Doc Spratley.)
Born in the East Midlands of England, Mo Bradley fished its ponds and canals as a child and joined a club that fished for coarse fish. But he was always dreaming of trout. “The Ripley and District Angling Club members revered the coarse fish they caught and taught Mo to do the same. And they talked with awe about trout, a coveted game fish that could only be found in exclusive private waters, which for blue-collar workers were prohibitively expensive to access.”
Like his father and his seven brothers, Bradley worked below in the coal mines and developed silicosis (lung damage). After a close friend was killed in an accident, he opted for a different life above ground: he gravitated to painting cars and auto-body work.
As a young man, Mo Bradley also read Field & Stream and other magazines to discover that you could fish for Kamloops trout in public waters. It was enough motivation for him and his wife Evelyn to immigrate to Canada aboard a Cunard liner in 1965. They eventually stepped off the train at Kamloops. “Running right through the heart of town was the Thompson River — a blue-water trout river that anyone could fish.”
Carrying a glowing letter of recommendation from his former employer, he was soon working in a Kamloops auto-body shop, exploring the area’s lakes and learning how to fly-fish. Before long, he met Ralph Shaw, another man working in the auto-body business who was a veteran fisherman. They teamed up to study the trout’s favourite menu item: insects.
Both men had aquariums in their basements, filled with bugs and weeds so they could study the various stages of aquatic life. “We’d go for supper and his wife (Shaw’s) made the best steak and kidney pie you’d ever eaten. Then we’d have some apple pie and a glass of scotch downstairs and talk about flies. We’d look at the tank and tie flies.”
They developed and tested their own patterns that were tied, “to match the hatch.” They became famous for their realistic flies and techniques, and shared their enthusiasm and knowledge through fly-tying classes. Church of the Chironomid was born—the tiny midges that Kamloops trout devour. Over time, Bradley and Shaw changed people’s understanding of the Kamloops trout environment—and ultimately, the way people fished.
There are lessons in Trout School about slowing down in every sense of the word. Slow down your fly line retrieval, slow your brain to observe the natural world around you and stay alert to swooping swallows. They’re targeting bugs that are lifting off the water during a hatch which can send trout into a feeding frenzy. I applied this bit of advice while recently fishing a favourite South Cariboo Lake. I caught, released (and lost) fish for two days, but a handful made it to the camp smoker. I’ll be tasting the lake and its memories for a while yet.
Mo Bradley is now 82. His sight is failing, but he can still tie his favourite flies and shares a life’s worth of knowledge to anyone who will ask, and listen. Mark Hume listened and came away a wiser fisherman. He is well on the way to being a fly-fishing master himself.
978-1771644167
Mark Forsythe is former host of CBC radio’s Almanac. He co-authored The Trail of 1858: British Columbia’s Gold Rush Past (Harbour, 2007) with Greg Dixon.
Review of the author's work by BC Studies:
River of the Angry Moon: Seasons on the Bella Coola
BOOKS:
The Run of the River: Portraits of Eleven British Columbia Rivers (New Star, 1992).
Adam's River: The Mystery of the Adam's River Sockeye (New Star, 1994).
River of the Angry Moon, Seasons of the Bella Coola (Greystone, 1998), co-written with Harvey Thommasen.
Birds of the Raincoast: Habits and Habitat (Harbour, 2004), co-written with Harvey Thomassen, Kevin Hutchings and R. Wayne Campbell.
Hume, Mark, with Mo Bradley. Trout School: Lessons from a Fly-Fishing Master (Greystone Books, 2019) (pbk) $22.95 224 pages 9781771644167
Reading the Water: Fly Fishing, Fatherhood, and Finding Strength in Nature (Greystone Books, 2022) $34.95 978-1771645690
[BCBW 2022] "Natural History"
*
REVIEW
Trout School: Lessons from a Fly-Fishing Master
by Mark Hume with Mo Bradley (Greystone Books $22.95)
Review by Mark Forsythe (BCBW 2019)
Kamloops trout. Some fishermen go weak in the knees at the mere mention. People have been coming from around the world to fish this feisty strain of trout for over 100 years.
I am of the fair-weather fly-fishing school and cast a line a few times a year. Mark Hume however, is an avid fly-fisher having logged thousands of hours over 50 years fishing for trout and new knowledge. The veteran journalist and BC Book Award-winning author of River of the Angry Moon (Greystone 1992) has crafted a book sure to capture experienced fly-fishers and newcomers alike.
What makes Trout School: Lessons from a Fly-Fishing Master most engrossing are the wisdom and stories gleaned from his long-time mentor, Mo Bradley. Where else can you learn to use ear wax to keep a leader from sinking too far below the surface? Or wash your hands in the lake to remove scent, gasoline or garlic sausage from your fingers. (And keep some dried lake weed in your fly box.) Hume’s own knowledge about the arcane world of fly-fishing is deep but, coupled with Mo’s experience, in no time this book will reel you in.
B.C.’s waters are famous in the fly-fishing world (world championships have been held here). A fly-fishing culture has existed in the province since at least the 19th century, and creels of knowledge have been passed down. Royal engineers and railway workers were among the first to fly-fish and sometimes the catches were absurd— Dr. T.W. Lambert and a friend caught 1,500 fish on Lac Le Juene in just three days in 1897.
B.C. fly-fishing pioneers include artist and conservationist Tommy Brayshaw, an important figure in the 1920s and 30s whose fly imitations have landed on Canada Post stamps. Bill Nation, a legendary guide made lakes in the Kamloops region famous and guaranteed 100 fish a week to his customers. Nation taught a few things to our most famous fly-fisher and conservationist, Roderick Haig-Brown. He in turn inspired thousands of fly-fishers through his books, including The Western Angler (1939). Barney Rushton helped advance the sport with specialized flies and new fishing techniques. Each was a keen observer of water, insects and their environment.
Mark Hume stumbled across Mo Bradley via an introductory pamphlet he had written called, From Off Ice…to Ice On. Bradley claimed that 13 different flies were all you needed, if you knew how to fish them. Hume tested Bradley’s flies and theories and found them to be more than accurate. The 13 flies are, “simple and are effective and have been proven over decades.” (Hume includes descriptions of each fly and instructions on how to tie them in Trout School. The buggy line-up includes bloodworm, damsels, dragonflies, chironomid, mayfly nymph, sedges, leeches, shrimp and the all-purpose Doc Spratley.)
Born in the East Midlands of England, Mo Bradley fished its ponds and canals as a child and joined a club that fished for coarse fish. But he was always dreaming of trout. “The Ripley and District Angling Club members revered the coarse fish they caught and taught Mo to do the same. And they talked with awe about trout, a coveted game fish that could only be found in exclusive private waters, which for blue-collar workers were prohibitively expensive to access.”
Like his father and his seven brothers, Bradley worked below in the coal mines and developed silicosis (lung damage). After a close friend was killed in an accident, he opted for a different life above ground: he gravitated to painting cars and auto-body work.
As a young man, Mo Bradley also read Field & Stream and other magazines to discover that you could fish for Kamloops trout in public waters. It was enough motivation for him and his wife Evelyn to immigrate to Canada aboard a Cunard liner in 1965. They eventually stepped off the train at Kamloops. “Running right through the heart of town was the Thompson River — a blue-water trout river that anyone could fish.”
Carrying a glowing letter of recommendation from his former employer, he was soon working in a Kamloops auto-body shop, exploring the area’s lakes and learning how to fly-fish. Before long, he met Ralph Shaw, another man working in the auto-body business who was a veteran fisherman. They teamed up to study the trout’s favourite menu item: insects.
Both men had aquariums in their basements, filled with bugs and weeds so they could study the various stages of aquatic life. “We’d go for supper and his wife (Shaw’s) made the best steak and kidney pie you’d ever eaten. Then we’d have some apple pie and a glass of scotch downstairs and talk about flies. We’d look at the tank and tie flies.”
They developed and tested their own patterns that were tied, “to match the hatch.” They became famous for their realistic flies and techniques, and shared their enthusiasm and knowledge through fly-tying classes. Church of the Chironomid was born—the tiny midges that Kamloops trout devour. Over time, Bradley and Shaw changed people’s understanding of the Kamloops trout environment—and ultimately, the way people fished.
There are lessons in Trout School about slowing down in every sense of the word. Slow down your fly line retrieval, slow your brain to observe the natural world around you and stay alert to swooping swallows. They’re targeting bugs that are lifting off the water during a hatch which can send trout into a feeding frenzy. I applied this bit of advice while recently fishing a favourite South Cariboo Lake. I caught, released (and lost) fish for two days, but a handful made it to the camp smoker. I’ll be tasting the lake and its memories for a while yet.
Mo Bradley is now 82. His sight is failing, but he can still tie his favourite flies and shares a life’s worth of knowledge to anyone who will ask, and listen. Mark Hume listened and came away a wiser fisherman. He is well on the way to being a fly-fishing master himself.
978-1771644167
Mark Forsythe is former host of CBC radio’s Almanac. He co-authored The Trail of 1858: British Columbia’s Gold Rush Past (Harbour, 2007) with Greg Dixon.
Articles: 1 Article for this author
River of the Angry Moon (Greystone $26.95)
Review
Descending Highway 20 into the Bella Coola Valley is like experiencing free fall without leaving ground. Locals may scoff, but the nearly vertical 'Big Hill' warrants a five star white knuckle rating.
The road links dry, grassy Chilcotin plateau with a rainforest so rich and verdant it reaches out to embrace you. Separating them is the mile-high Coast Mountain Range, a barrier so steep and rugged that the provincial government refused to spend money on a road. Residents of Bella Coola and Anahim Lake built a road themselves in the early '50s.
The Bella Coola River and its tributaries, tumbling from the same mountains, are revered for unsurpassed fishing: steelhead, cutthroat, coho and chinook. But the pulse of the river grows ever fainter. A ban on steelhead fishing-the most treasured of sportsfish-was recently imposed.
"Nature is resilient and salmon are incredibly fecund,"; says Mark Hume in River of the Angry Moon (Greystone $26.95). "The waters should abound with fish. When they do not, it's a sign of terrible mismanagement, not by fisheries bureaucrats, but by society as a whole.";
Born in Victoria in 1950, Hume is a veteran reporter who's covered B.C. for the Vancouver Sun and now the National Post. One of five boys, he was the only one to catch the fishing bug as a child in Penticton.
"It's almost like a fishing gene you inherit";, he muses.
As a young teen he stumbled across the writings of Roderick Haig-Brown in a Victoria library. He eventually decided he wanted to fly-fish and write like the Campbell River lay magistrate.
The seeds of a strong conservation ethic were planted. In both of his previous books, The Run of the River and Adam's River, Hume argue for better stewardship of rivers and more responsible fishing.
Hume gravitated to the Bella Coola River after friend and physician Harvey Thommasen moved to Bella Coola. Thommasen, who wrote River of the Angry Moon with Hume, previously compiled and edited two bestsellers about the life and times of Clayton Mack, Grizzlies & White Guys and Bella Coola Man.
Hume and Thommasen spent many hours walking, talking and casting into
its pools and riffles. Over the years Thommasen catalogued much of the ecosystem's flora and fauna and collected stories from elders about the way it used to be. He realized the Bella Coola and its tributaries were under siege; a meat fish mentality in the sports fishery and a relentless commercial fleet were wiping out the most valued runs. As well, some Nuxalt natives used river nets, targeting the weakest stocks. Silt oozing from clearcuts choked the finest spawning streams.
Hume and Thommasen resolved to write a book that would alert people to the river's plight and counter a local belief the fish "would always come back."; River of the Angry Moon, subtitled Seasons on the Bella Coola, is part lament for what was, yet it also celebrates what remains and what could be again. There is an undercurrent of optimism throughout.
The wild Bella Coola River carves a mesmerizing path through each chapter, linked to the moons of the Native Nuxalt calendar. In spring, yellow stone flies dance off its surface, in winter silvery steelhead rest in deep pools conserving energy for the spawn. We catch the husky scent of skunk cabbage, hear the woof of an agitated grizzly and watch light caress rainforest. Hume captures the river's own poetry.
"The river is fed by the sky. It runs over a bed of shattered mountains, through the dreams of a great forest
and into the mouths of ancient fishes. It starts in clouds as grey and heavy as the sea and ends in a
windswept estuary haunted by ghosts. It is a place where white swans dance on dark mud flats and salmon lay fragile eggs in nests of stone.";
Fly-fishers will appreciate Hume's delight at reading seams and currents, casting the perfect fly imitation - rewarded by the electric surge of fish on line. The two men pull on scuba masks to float the river in neoprene sailboarding suits encountering ghostly columns of dark chinook and rainbows feeding in rapids. Hume seems to become the river itself.
"Hanging listless, drifting where the current takes me, I lose touch with my body and start to melt into the green light. Only the sound of my lungs brings me back.";
Old timers' memories and newspaper accounts reveal how overfishing on the Bella Coola was a significant problem even 75 years ago. On one fishing excursion, three men killed 732 fish. By the mid 1990's what appeared to be a limitless bounty was virtually exhausted - steelhead stocks reduced from 10,000 to a mere handful. Chinook and coho stocks are also in crisis, the same sombre story played out on river systems from Alaska to Oregon.
Hume reminds us that wildlife managers in the last century outlawed commercial hunting of animals to save them from extinction; he says nature can't keep up with today's industrial harvesting and similiar action is required for at-risk fish stocks.
Writing the book was a welcome change from newspaper reporting. "It allowed me to put myself in the story,"; he says, "tap into my feelings and express myself. As a reporter I can't do that.";
The late British Poet Laureate Ted Hughes also provided unexpected inspiration. Hughes had written about fishing B.C's famous Dean River and while attending a Steelhead Society fund raiser he was interviewed by Hume. The poet remarked how much he had enjoyed Mark's first book The Run of the River. Shortly before his death, Hughes sent a letter encouraging Hume to complete the Bella Coola book.
Hume paid tribute to Hughes at this year's B.C. Book Prizes when he accepted the Roderick Haig-Brown Regional Prize awarded to the book that best contributes to the understanding and appreciation of B.C. 1-55054-660-0
--By Mark Forsythe
[BCBW SUMMER 1999]
