BETHEL — For the second year in a row, hosts of the Western Maine Fly Fishing Expo reeled in large crowds of anglers of all ages.

The traditional day to start open-water fishing was nine days away and it still felt like mid-winter. Wind chill temperatures outside The Bethel Inn Conference Center venue ranged from the 20s to the teens and snow showers raged around town.

However, that was largely forgotten inside where it was wall-to-wall people. It was easy to lose track of time while checking out exhibits, merchandise, art and fishing flies and socializing with fly-fishing enthusiasts.

The all-day event was hosted by the Mollyockett Chapter of Trout Unlimited and the Upper Andro Anglers Alliance.

“We’ve had a fabulous turnout,” said alliance President Scott Stone of Bethel. “As you can see from the crowds here, it’s just unbelievable the turnout we’ve had here.”

He added, “Everybody’s excited for spring and even though you can fish pretty much year round now in a lot of places in southern and western Maine, there’s still that special magic about April 1 that people are just champing at the bit and waiting to get going.”

The theme of the show was fly-fishing in Western Maine. Exhibitors included Maine and New Hampshire outfitters and guide services, sporting camps, wildlife artists and authors, the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, the University of Maine 4-H Camp & Learning Center, Casting for Recovery, Maine Volunteer Lake Monitoring Program and equipment manufacturers and retailers.

“We’re celebrating our heritage, we’re celebrating the legends of yesterday, and we’re celebrating the modern legends of today,” Stone said. “By and large, most of the people here are from Maine and it’s pretty impressive when you start looking around at the talent and the level of professionalism that is here at the show.”

There were also presentations on various types of fishing, including fly-fishing in the Rangeley region, Labrador and Chile, becoming a better fly-fishing angler and tying a Grey Ghost fly (Carrie Stevens style) without a vise.

Stone said the money that’s raised at the expo is put toward fishing initiatives in Western Maine. These includes building a veterans casting pier for wounded veterans on the Songo Locks, a culvert replacement project on Aziscohos in northern Oxford County, a boat launch in Gilead, children’s camps and fly-tying lessons to children.

Alliance and Mollyockett Chapter member Steve Wight said some guides at the expo take people all over the world to fly-fish.

“So, we’re really excited,” he said. “This is the second year that it was put on. The first year, it surprised us at how good it was, so we wanted to do it again.”

State fisheries biologist Francis Brautigam, who staffed the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife table, said expositions like Saturday’s in Bethel are great for the sport and for the state.

“It gets a lot of anglers excited about the fishing season and it’s great for the economy,” he said.

tkarkos@sunjournal.com

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