There’s an old Chinese proverb often attributed to Confucious that goes something like this: If you enjoy what you do, you’ll never have to work a day in your life.

John Arway, who cited those words during a talk to the Susquehanna Chapter of Trout Unlimited, may understand them better than anyone.

For many years he served as executive director of the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, a job that had brought its share of administrative duties and policymaking decisions, but also put him on many of his beloved trout streams.

Arway recently spoke to Trout Unlimited about his career, but mostly about his fishing days.

“I’ve been very fortunate to fish with good friends,” he said.

Among them have been some of the giants of the fly-fishing fraternity: the late Lefty Kreh, Bob Clouser, and Joe Humphreys.

Perhaps his most memorable fishing partner was Jimmy Carter during one of the former President’s visits to Spruce Creek in Centre County.

Carter came there not just to fish one of Pennsylvania’s most famous trout streams but to do a public service commercial on clean water.

“I held cue cards for the President that day,” Arway said with a smile.

Arway’s love of fishing started as a boy catching blue gills at Cranberry Lake in Somerset County.

His uncles, he said, were avid outdoorsmen who taught him much about fishing and hunting.

A 1970 graduate of Norwin High School in Westmoreland County, Arway earned a degree in biology from the University of Pittsburgh before later picking up a master’s degree.

He worked for two years at the Loyalhanna Watershed Association before beginning his long career with the state Fish & Boat Commission.

He started a family and taught his kids and later grandkids to fish.

Arway’s message to the Trout Unlimited members concerned about the future of waterways and trout populations was this: “If you want change, speak out. Hold meetings.”

Arway said he always enjoyed getting out and talking to the public.

Among the concerns brought before Arway was the question of stocking streams that hold wild trout populations.

Dave Rothrock, of Jersey Shore, serves as Trout Committee Chair for Trout Unlimited of Pennsylvania. He is among the many trout anglers who oppose introducing hatchery fish into Class A Wild Brook or Brown Trout streams.

“We are turning away from protecting wild trout,” Rothrock told Arway. “They are at risk.”

Advocates of stocking wild trout streams with stocked fish have argued that it offers increased recreational opportunities for anglers and perhaps more dollars to state coffers.

“There’s no correlation,” Arway said, “to numbers of fish stocked and (fishing) licenses sold.”

“I know,” Rothrock said. “But that’s their story and they’re sticking to it.”

Hunter Shoemaker, Lycoming County Waterways Conservation Officers, announced that with the opening day of trout season in the state Saturday, April 5 stockings of selected streams in the county have begun.

A Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only section has been introduced along Muncy Creek between Hughesville and Picture Rocks, he noted.

Those specially designated areas of streams are restricted to artificial flies and lures.

The daily creel limit in those streams sections is three trout between June 15 and Labor Day. From the day after Labor Day until June 15, it is zero.