John H. Daniels Fellow, Samuel Snyder, Ph.D., on "Fly Fishing’s Contribution to Coldwater Conservation"

In America alone, there are an estimated 50-60 million anglers , of which roughly 5-6 million fly fish. For their numbers, anglers, and particularly fly fishers, significantly influence fisheries policy. Thus, it is not surprising that a 2008 issue of the Journal of Conservation Biology touted recreational anglers, and highlighted fly fishers in particular, as “instrumental in successful fisheries conservation through active involvement in, or initiation of, conservation projects to reduce both direct and external stressors contributing to fishery declines.” In this talk, Samuel Snyder will detail a few historical and contemporary efforts led by fly fishers and their grassroots initiatives to protect or restore America’s coldwater streams. He will focus on the rise of fish hatcheries as a solution to rapidly declining fish stocks. In the end, he will discuss the failures of those programs and the work being done by contemporary anglers to remedy those failings.

The John H. Daniels Fellowship, founded in 2007 in memory of Library supporter and former Board of Director, John H. Daniels (1920-2006), provides stipends and housing to scholars and researchers working on projects related to the Library’s collections on horse and field sports.

Due to low attendance, the talk scheduled for April 3, 2010 was cancelled.

Visit Sam’s blog, Headwaters: Musings on fly fishing history: www.headwatersofhistory.com

Sam Snyder's bio:

Sam Snyder was raised in West Texas, although always considers New Mexico his home. He learned to fly fish in New Mexico for trout and on Texas lakes for bass with his father. He attended college at Bucknell University, in Central Pennsylvania. After college he was a Peace Corps volunteer in the Dominican Republic, then lived in Snowmass Colorado, where he mowed lawns and fished as much as possible. He received his Masters in Religious Studies from Syracuse University and recently graduated with his PhD from the University of Florida’s Graduate Program on Religion and Nature – where he devoted his studies to American religious and environmental history, environmental policy and conflict resolution. His dissertation, entitled “Casting for Conservation: Religion, Popular Culture, and the Politics of River Restoration,” explored the role of religious and cultural values amidst multi-stakeholder politics of ecological restoration of rivers and native fish – his case studies included Brook trout restoration in the Smoky Mountain region and Rio Grande cutthroat trout restoration in New Mexico.

He recently moved to Anchorage, Alaska as his wife Liz teaches environmental health at the University of Alaska Anchorage.  In Alaska, in addition to working with Trout Unlimited, Alaska and the Renewable Resources Coalition, he currently collaborating with scholars at the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA) Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) to study the unique collaboration of sport anglers, commercial fishers, and indigenous, subsistence communities in the broader fight to protect Bristol Bay (one of the last remaining wild salmon ecosystems) from the proposed Pebble Mine.

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