Episode 2 | Talk Derby To Me

Melissa sits down with Meadow Riedel and Laurie Prax to talk cancer, community, and competition. Meadow, a Fairbanks woman who beat a rare form of breast cancer, shares her experience and her message to other women about the importance of mammograms and self checks. She and her close friends formed the Talk Derby to Me posse, turning that fighting spirit into a celebration of life at the Valdez Women’s Silver Salmon Derby.

Laurie Prax from the Valdez Fish Derbies volunteer committee talks about what makes the Women’s Derby special and what’s coming up this year. Together the three cover friendship, resilience, and why the Valdez Women’s Silver Salmon Derby has become so much more than a fishing competition. Read the full story in the April 2026 issue of Fish Alaska magazine.

Episode 1 |Cooper Landing Then & Now with Alaska Wildland Team

In the first episode of the Fish Alaska Podcast, we sit down with Kirk Hoessle, President and CEO of Alaska Wildland Adventures, retired founder Bill Wright, and fishing program manager Dave Maternowski for a then-and-now look at Cooper Landing and the upper Kenai River. Bill started Alaska Wildland Adventures in 1977, and together these three bring decades of history, hard-won wisdom, and great fishing stories from one of Alaska’s most beloved stretches of river. From what drew them to Alaska in the first place to the conservation-minded work that keeps the Kenai healthy and beautiful for generations to come, this is a conversation about the land, the fish, and the people who have dedicated their lives to both.