Education
The Heart of America Fly Fishers supports several different educational activities.
Meetings – The club has meetings on the 3rd Monday of each month, except December. Each meeting has a program about fly fishing, or some other topic of interest to fly fishers.
Fly tying – Before most club meetings, a club member will demonstrate their favorite patterns. Also, once or twice a year, the meeting program will consist of several different club members tying flies or sharing other types of fly fishing knowledge.
Fly casting – In the summer, when the weather is warm, fly casting demonstrations are presented before club meetings instead of fly tying.
The club sponsors several outings each year. At these outings, the more experienced club members often share the techniques that they use to catch fish with a fly rod.
Watershed Festivals – Club volunteers demonstrate fly fishing, fly casting, fly tying, and watershed conservation at several events each year, such as the Olathe Aquafest and the Lenexa Waterfest. In 2011, club volunteers participated in the KCRiverfest at Berkley Park in Kansas City. This event lasted over 9 hours a day on the Saturday and Sunday before the 4th of July.
Don’t forget about first aid and physical therapy on the stream – following are several different topics of interest to fly fishers.
Upper Extremity Joint Problems
Library – The club maintains a fly fishing library for members. The list of publications in the library is available at the Members Area of the club website. The library includes book about fly tying, fly fishing, casting, fly fishing location guide books. The library also contains numerous videos about different fly fishing topics and fly fishing locations.
Entomology – The University of Wisconsin Extension in cooperation with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has created a very nice guide to the bugs (link here)that live in streams, rivers, and lakes.