Grandpa Beacham had just caught a 16-inch trout, which was flopping on the bank, when he keeled over and died. Not a bad way to go.
Photos & story by Phaedra Greenwood
Van Beacham is a fourth-generation angler in New Mexico with a lifetime passion for fishing. His great grandfather, William Beacham, an avid fly fisherman, migrated from New England to New Mexico in 1908. “His family was from England,” Van says, “so he knew about fly fishing. He brought fly fishing to New Mexico. Nobody was doing it back then.”
William Beacham established a hardware store in Santa Fe where he sold not only hardware but fishing gear. It was the only place you could find fly fishing gear for many years.
At the same time, Van’s other great grandfather, Arthur Bengard, was superintendent of hatcheries for the Colorado Division of Wildlife. He studied to be a biologist but also worked for the railroad, traveled around and discovered the beauty of New Mexico. After it became a state, he became the first superintendent of hatcheries for its new Department of Game and Fish. He designed and helped build the Lisboa Springs Trout Hatchery near Pecos, which, in the 1920s, was the state’s largest.
“My great-grandfather Beacham had the store; my great-grandfather Bengard ran the hatchery. The store guy’s son, Arthur Beacham, met the hatchery guy’s daughter, Gladdis Bengard, and that’s how my dad came to be,” Van Beacham says with a smile.
“Grandpa Beacham fished every day he possibly could until he died of a stroke at the age of 62—he smoked like a fiend,” Van adds. “He happened to be fishing that day down by Pilar. He had just caught a 16-inch trout, which was flopping on the bank, when he keeled over and died. Not a bad way to go.”
The Passion Was Handed Down
After four generations of experience, Van Beacham is passionate about fishing. He writes books on the topic and runs a guide service from his hometown of Taos. But, most of all, he fishes. He has a few tips for other fishermen, too.
He recommends fishing along the bank upstream rather than downstream. “If you were to fish downstream it would be difficult to keep every fish in the stream from seeing you through the crystal-clear water. If you were to wade it would muddy up the water downstream, alerting trout to your presence.”
And he says, “No matter what technique you use to hook trout on small streams and creeks, you should avoid using your reel to land the fish. Instead, try to get in the habit of stripping your line in to land the fish ... . If you get a strike, don’t jerk, just twitch your wrist up. With a short, tight line, that’s all it takes to hook a trout.”
New Mexico, the author says, is the second driest state in the country and is rich in angling diversity. Every region offers excellent fly fishing year round for coldwater and warmwater species from high-mountain lakes and streams to remote desert canyons and gorges. When it’s too hot in the gorge, it’s just right in the mountains. Hatches occur year-round. Most western fly fishing water is in the form of small streams and creeks that start high in the Rockies as snow-melt and are supplemented by underground springs. “Yet about 80 percent of the anglers I meet are fishing on the big rivers, usually floating, and rarely getting out of the boat,” Beacham says. “Gone are the days when you are the only angler on the river.” He admits he used to get upset if he saw even one other angler on a five-mile stretch in Pilar.
Van’s great grandfather Beacham, who once wrote for the New Mexico Highway Journal (now New Mexico Magazine), is quoted as saying, “There are a hundred fishermen on the river for every one when I came here.” In his day, around 1932, there were a lot more fish per angler, too: the bag limit was 64 fish per day and 128 in possession.
Getting Away from It All
Beacham’s guide business in Taos specializes in “quality fly fishing without the crowds.” A solitary experience involves moving away from the big tailwaters to a more natural experience. “This new angling population is concerned less with how many fish they catch or how big they are. If they can wade in a stream in a natural setting without too many people and catch a few wild trout on a fly they’re happier than floating a famous river and catching big fish with a bunch of other people.” He says the next up and coming fly fishing enthusiasts are women. With fly fishing you don’t have to bait the hook. “You don’t even have to touch the fish.”
Beacham leases private waters from landowners who allow him to control and manage fishing. These streams include Culebra Creek and the Cimarron River but he also has access to Forbes Ranch, the Lodge at Chama, the Río de Los Brazos and the Río Peñasco as well as other waters. His Solitary Angling Club has 50 members who pay an annual fee to fish for rainbow and brown trout in all the private waters.
“Most of them are from Texas, Amarillo, Albuquerque, Santa Fe,” he says. “They get a whole section to themselves. The stream has a 50 percent rest requirement, two days rest minimum per week per section. We also catch and release. It’s fly fishing only with a single barbless hook. I do stream and habitat improvement and patrol it to make sure poachers don’t get in and raid the fish.”
He stocks small rainbows of 10 to 12 inches and lets them grow. All the brown trout are wild and self-sustaining. “The Culebra Creek offers the most interesting fishing in the whole region,” he says with a note of pride. “In rich, small water they grow very rapidly. It’s common to catch a fish from 16 to 20 inches long on the Culebra.”
But it’s not just about catching big fish. Solitude is an important element in achieving a connection to nature in its purest form, Beacham says. If the water has already been disturbed that week, day, or hour by another angler it can lessen the power of the experience.
The irony of it is, “I realized early on that the quality of fishing I was promoting to get business was declining as a result of my business, especially on small streams like the Cimarron. Even my own brother complained that I ruined the Cimarron. I explained to him that it would have happened whether I existed or not, which is true, but the Cimarron will never be the way it was when we were kids.”
Development, Drought and Climate Change
Beacham is concerned about development and global warming. “Development is my number one concern,” he says. “Combined with drought, it’s placing a lot of strain on all rivers in New Mexico today. Wells and aquifers are drying up. Glaciers everywhere are melting. Temperatures are spiking and we’re losing run-off in the middle of winter. With warmer temperatures and more algae growth, I believe we’re going to lose a third of our trout streams in the next 100 years. ... We should buy more green energy, make a demand for it,” he says.
He would like to see a one-trout limit on the entire Río Grande.
“There also needs to be a special trout water area restricted to ‘artificials only’,” he says. “In the Red River there are 20-inch trout that are about 14 years old. When you catch one of those and don’t release it, you’ve just killed 14 years of growth. If too many people snag too many of these big fish, it reduces the genetic stock,” Beacham says.
“I’m considered an extremist by some people but I’m actually a realist,” he says. “I believe in working with people and working together, but I don’t believe in denial. Clean water and air are good for all of us, not just anglers and environmentalists,” he concludes.
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From the Book:
The San Juan is rated as one of the top five rivers in the country, so crowds are common on weekends and during the peak season (May through October). [It] offers perhaps the best winter fishery for trophy-sized trout in the entire country. The water released below the dam remains a bone-chilling 42 degrees year-round. The 4-mile section from the dam ... was designated Special Trout Waters and holds an unbelievable 5,000 to 15,000 fish per mile. The average fish is between 15 and 20 inches and weighs 1 1/2 to 4 pounds. Fish over 10 pounds are caught every year.
In a desert region that has very little in the way of coldwater trout streams, the Río Peñasco stands out like a shining oasis. In fact, it’s one of the finest fly fishing streams in the state and the majority of it flows through private property, yet it can be accessed in a variety of ways.
I swear there are holes over 15 feet deep and channels between watercress beds over 10 feet deep... . The river is 5 to 20 feet wide and has a bottom that varies from gravel, watercress, and weeds to small rock and silt. But there is also a hell of a lot of horrible, sticky, slimy, nasty clay; wade wet, but avoid the nasty clay stuff. I’ve seen cows so badly stuck ... they had to be pulled out with a tractor.
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