HAILEY, Idaho — It looked as if it was going to be a big weekend here in the Wood River Valley in Central Idaho. After all, fishermen were excited about a rare Brown Drake hatch, an ecological phenomenon that provides exceptional fishing as large trout rise on a few calm evenings in late spring to take the short-lived insects and more than a few dry flies.

Montana is braided with rivers formed as snowmelt from the upper reaches of the Rocky Mountains drains off the Continental Divide. Fished for thousands of years, these rivers have inspired writers and artists. And sometimes even business owners. When he was 15, K.C. Walsh spent a summer on one of those rivers, the Bitterroot near Missoula, fishing with his grandfather.

In Union Gap, Wash. ,—where apple and cherry orchards hug the banks of the Yakima River—Liberty Bottleworks is making aluminum water bottles in a factory that once produced RVs. Inside the plant, the company has repurposed a technology on its production line that’s normally used to make air-to-ground missiles.

In downtown Boise, Idaho, people pass by a venerable brick building without giving it much thought. But inside, Dave Wagers is making candy -- with names like Idaho Spud, Old Faithful and Chicken Bones -- much the same way they were crafted nearly 100 years ago when the factory was built. Dark chocolate is still mixed in copper kettles used for so long they are burnished and battered.

Abramovich, water supply specialist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service, was in search of some good news, knowing that much of Idaho is nervously anticipating another long, hot, dry summer, diminishing the Gem State's precious water supply. Abramovich had just led a group of the region's top water experts on Feb. 28 up to Mores Creek Summit, 54 miles from Boise but 6,100 feet above sea level.

Frank Janssens took a break on Feb. 25 during the Iditarod Trail Invitational in Alaska. New Endurance Records Set as Snow Vanishes From Iditarod Trail.

Photo Max Lohmeyer takes a night ride across winter trails on Discovery Hill, in Salmon, Idaho. Credit David Lingle for The New York Times. Snow has been so scant in Idaho this winter that bicycles started showing up in shop windows in the middle of January, and cyclists began booking ski huts during a season when it’s usually backcountry skiers who are seeking accommodations.

Snowpack, cloud seeding, hydropower, irrigation, recreation, historical meteorology. They were all hot topics of discussion at January's 77th annual gathering of the Idaho Water Users Association. But the "D" word lingered at the edge of most of the discussions of what's in store for 2014. Drought and talk of possible water allocation and/or curtailment were foremost in the minds of irrigators, hydropower engineers and skiers, as they pored over optimistic forecasts for the remainder of this winter, while looking at the latest measurements of Idaho's snowpacks.

The news about an Idaho town offering a big load of cash for a big dead wolf reached far beyond the Continental Divide. Salmon's so-called 1st Annual Predator Derby , held Dec. 28-29, 2013, attracted some 260 hunters, and more than its share of headlines across the globe. "Wolf and Coyote Derby Turns Small Idaho Town Into a Battleground," wrote Guardian Liberty Voice .

A week after opponents of coal-fired electricity flooded the chambers of the Idaho Public Utilities Commission, regulators have denied a bid by Idaho Power to charge its customers $130 million to help implement mandated pollution controls for two of four generators at the Jim Bridger coal plant near Rock Springs, Wyo., where the utility company is part owner.

At the Boise Airport July 1, air temperature reached 110 degrees Fahrenheit, just one degree shy of Boise's all-time, high-temperature record set in 1960. Under the sweltering conditions of the heat wave, Idaho Power, thanks in large part to its coal-fired power plants in Nevada, Oregon and Wyoming, pumped out record amounts of power to run air conditioning through hundreds of thousands of its customers' homes. A megawatt (MW) is 1,000 kilowatts (KW) or 1 million watts. Powering a 100-watt light bulb for four hours consumes 400 watt hours (WH) of energy. The average home in the Idaho Power service area consumes 1,050 kilowatt hours (KWH) per month or 12,600 KWH per year. In 2012 Idaho Power served 416,020 residential customers, 66,039 commercial and industrial customers, and 19,045 irrigation customers.

Hailey man’s prized collection on display at Ski and Heritage Museum. It may have come with some embarrassment to now retired Hailey attorney John Chapman, 75, when the man who provided his ticket to the 1956 Democratic National Convention in Chicago to be a page lost the nomination to presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson.

To discourage the killings of wolves in central Idaho, a four-year-old project invents strategies to keep the animals at bay in sheep territory.

"Never memorize anything you can look up," Washington D.C. sommelier Jackie Quillen said Sept. 22, at the Sun Valley Harvest Festival’s third annual gathering of foodies. The career wine expert’s sage advice to stay focused on what is in the glass encapsulated the tone of the afternoon's Demonstrations and Presentations series, which featured guest chefs and gastronomy experts.

An artistic footbridge in Hailey spanning the Big Wood River is in place. The latest link to the river will be introduced to the community at an unveiling planned for Saturday, Oct. 6. The bridge is already expanding appreciation for the town’s calming riparian area as curious visitors to the site watch the gradual installation of numerous finishing touches, including bronze bowstring loops, yet to be installed.

Whether the right to fly the U.S. flag can trump homeowners' association rules is the main question in a debate stirring at a Hailey condominium complex. Representatives of the Copper Ranch Homeowners' Association have notified owners of four units in the Woodside development that residents may not put anything in the common space of the property.