In the summer of 1979 I had a summer job teaching fly fishing and fly tying for Mammoth Sporting Goods, now the location of Rick’s Sports Center. I also worked in the shop interacting with the anglers who fished throughout the Eastern Sierra.
I learned a few things from the customers that summer.
The Sierra bright dot fly pattern that Sierra Bright Dot Fly Fishing Guide Service is named after.
Anglers coming in to fish backcountry lakes and streams bought three flies. The Adams parachute, California mosquito and the Sierra bright dot. The Sierra bright dot was the fly of choice when targeting golden trout.
The golden trout is the state fish of California and a trout associated with the Eastern Sierra backcountry.
Golden trout have always been high on my list of trout to catch. They are indigenous to the Kern Plateau and have been planted in a vast number of backcountry streams and lakes. For information on waters with golden trout check out this interpretive site of Eastern Sierra backcountry lakes and streams: https://www.fs.usda.gov/Internet/FSE_DOCUMENTS/stelprdb5410679.pdf. They generally require a day or two of hiking to access them, keeping fly fishing pressure down. Goldens are in my opinion the prettiest trout I catch each season. Golden trout are only accessible in the summer months after ice out.
I had tied lots of Sierra bright dots in my budding fly tying career and knew it was a regional Eastern Sierra backcountry fly. I thought it represented fly fishing for trout in the Eastern Sierra. The golden trout was a symbolic Eastern Sierra trout to me so I incorporated into my logo.
In the winter of 1981-1982 Sierra Bright Dot the fly fishing guide service was born. Sometime during the summer of 1982 Laura Patterson designed the first Sierra Bright Dot logo. She is in the process of updating my logo.