Back Cast: John McPhee and his Favorite Fish
The Orvis Fly-Fishing Podcast
James Hathaway
4.8 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 9 March 2026
⏱️ 66 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This episode was originally published on August 19th, 2021.
This week's podcast guest is especially exciting to me as he is one of my literary heroes. John McPhee [24:10] is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author (Annals of the Former World), and in his numerous other books he has written about such diverse topics as nuclear energy, the merchant marine, basketball, Alaska, bark canoes, oranges, continental drift, flood control, tennis, farmer's markets, and many other eclectic topics. Whether or not you are interested in a subject, you can be sure you will be when you finish reading one of his books you will be fascinated. John has also been a staff writer for The New Yorker since the 1960s. In our interview, he talks about his two favorite fish to catch on the fly rod--the American shad (which he wrote an entire book about, The Founding Fish), and the chain pickerel, which he did not write a book about but did pen a short essay on in his collection of stories The Patch. (I doubt is anyone in the world who would count those two fish in combination as their favorites--but he is never conventional.) I hope you enjoy the interview as much as I enjoyed talking to him.
In the Fly Box this week, we have some great questions and tips:
A reminder from a listener that I wrote an encyclopedia of fly fishing.
Some great tips from a listener on using tippet rings.
A question about what constitutes a watershed when concerned about transporting aquatic invasives.
A suggestion from a listener on ways to offset your carbon footprint when taking fishing trips.
Which is a better rod for fishing the surf and jetties--a traditional 9-foot 9-weight rod or a two-handed rod?
Do you always recommend using a net?
A listener calls me on the carpet for my flippant remark about manhandling carp.
A great thought from a listener that sometimes taking photos of fish hinders the moment.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, and welcome to the Orvis Fly Fishing Podcast. |
| 0:11.3 | This is your host, Tom Rosenbauer. |
| 0:13.2 | And in this week's podcast, I have, I always say I have a special guest, but I have a really special guest, one that I'm honored to have on the podcast and very excited to have on the podcast. |
| 0:25.6 | John McPhee has been my literary hero for many, many, many years. |
| 0:36.3 | And although John doesn't write much about fly fishing, John is a fly fisher. |
| 0:42.3 | And if you haven't read any of John McPhee, either in The New Yorker where he's a regular contributor or one of his many books. |
| 0:51.4 | And, you know, here, here are just some of his books, survival of the bark canoe, |
| 0:56.4 | pieces of the frame, the deltoid pumpkin seed, encounters with the arch druid, uncommon carriers, |
| 1:03.6 | the founding fish. And one of my very favorites, rising from the plains, in suspect terrain terrain and basin and range. Those three were a |
| 1:15.0 | series of books about geology. Anyways, John writes about all kinds of subjects. And even when he writes |
| 1:21.0 | about lacrosse or basketball or tennis, things that I am not even remotely interested in, |
| 1:26.6 | I read him because he's just so good. |
| 1:29.1 | So it's a real honor to have John on the podcast today, and he's going to be talking about |
| 1:35.9 | his two favorite fish, which you wouldn't be able to guess, well, unless you've read his stuff. |
| 1:41.4 | His two favorite fish are chain pickerel and American Chad. And we're going to |
| 1:47.0 | talk about fishing for those guys on a fly. But we could be talking about fishing for brown |
| 1:53.5 | bullheads on a fly because it's John McPhee. So anyway, I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as I did interviewing John. |
| 2:05.2 | But first, we're going to do the flybox, and I'm going to try to answer some questions, |
| 2:10.7 | and I'm going to read you some tips from other listeners. |
| 2:14.1 | And if you have a question or a comment or a tip or a complaint for the podcast, |
| 2:19.0 | you can send it to me at podcast at orvis.com. You can just type your question in your email |
| 2:26.5 | or you can attach a voice file and maybe I'll read it on the air. The first email is from |
... |
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