Fly Fishing with Bert Darrow

Bert Darrow has conducted fly fishing classes every year since 1978, teaching hundreds of students from ages 8 to 80, many of whom have gone on to become fly fishing instructors and licensed guides. He has also worked with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation's "Becoming An Outdoors-Woman" workshop in their fly fishing program.

His introduction to fly fishing was on the fabled Esopus Creek in the Catskills, fishing for its wild rainbow and brown trout. His other prized Catskill streams are the Beaverkill, Willowemoc, Schoharie, and the East Branch of the Delaware. He has sampled the treasures of Vermont's Battenkill, Mad River, White River, and the New Haven. Maine's Rangeley region acquainted him with landlocked salmon, while its coast initiated him to the challenge of catching large stripers on the fly. He has also enjoyed fly fishing Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania. The Yellowstone region has brought Bert back almost every year since the early 1980s. Montana's Yellowstone, Madison, and Gallatin Rivers are favorites of his along with the Henry's Fork in Idaho. He rarely misses a chance to angle Wyoming's Gibbon, Fire Hole, and Slough Creek. Since retiring as a manager with 29 years of service at NYNEX in 1995, he has expanded the number of classes he teaches. Bert's fly fishing instruction has been featured in publications such as Hudson Valley Magazine, New York Sportsman, Healthy Living, the Middletown (NY) Times Herald-Record, and Chronogram.

Bert is a Federation of Fly Fishers Certified Casting Instructor. He has been the president of the Catskill Mountains Chapter of Trout Unlimited which is the oldest in the State, formed in 1964, and also the Regional Vice President of the State Council of Trout Unlimited in Region 3. Bert has also been a guest on the ESPN2 show "In Search Of Fly Water", and has appeared on ABC's "Good Morning America", and "Good Day New York" on the FOX network.