Sunday’s float was Lyon’s Bridge to Palisades; fishing was fair. Fish were chasing Zonkers, weighted with a small bead, late in the morning. Closer to noon, the fish were starting to key-in on stonefly nymphs, the Delektable™ Mega Prince Flashback and Pat’s Rubberlegs. It was a fairly even mix of brown trout and whitefish, with the occasional small rainbow. Most of the fish in the morning were found around rocks in the middle of the river and in the shallow gravelly runs. After lunch, we were finding fish closer to the banks and in the mid-depth runs close to the banks. The big nymphs slowed down a bit about after lunch, and the #14 Lil Red Spanker and the #16 Pheasant Tail Lil Spanker were the “go to” bugs until we took out around 4 in the afternoon.
I floated from Storey Ditch to 8-Mile yesterday and had okay luck fishing streamers. The water was green. Got a handful of good fish to the boat and had a good amount of unanswered tugs. I fished Olive in the morning and black in the afternoon; most of the takes were on the tight line/slow strip and came right off the bank. I couldn’t seem to get many fish to chase with a faster retrieve, so I would just cast slightly upstream, put my tip close to the water, bring in slack and just keep the line tight. The only exception was in obvious buckets, where I would put a mend in to let the fly sink into the bucket and then use my rod tip to twitch the fly downstream. My partner in crime threw nymphs a little bit and found fish in the same place (tight to the bank) using a white legged, black body, girdle bug with a sz.14 Red Copper John.
C.P.G.
Guiding on Monday was wet and chilly, with slow soaking rain and occasional heavy squalls falling on us the entire float. The fishing, however, was HOT.
We started our float at Ruby Creek, and the fish started biting immediately. I barely had the oars in the water and I was reaching for the landing net. It was just a taste of what was to come, as fishing was consistent for the entire float, which ended at Varney Bridge.
In the first stretch of the float, there were some decent trout, but the bulk of the rapid-fire bites were smaller trout and really big whitefish. As we traveled downriver, the numbers of whitefish and smaller trout dropped, and the numbers of bigger trout increased. Our best run of trout, size and numbers, came in the latter part of the float, with some of the best fish coming practically in sight of the landing.
The sun also came out in earnest, for the first time of the day, about 300 yards from the landing.
The water was flowing fairly quickly, and we were scoring with basic high-water techniques; behind rocks and islands, tight to the bank, and any and every slower run.
The fish took a combination of #6 and #8 Delektable Hurless in Olive and Grey, #6 and #8 Delektable Flashback Mega Prince, #16 Delektable Lil Spankers in Red and Blue, #16 Delektable Rootbeer Serengold, and #10 Pat’s Rubberlegs in Brown and Tan/Brown.
Another great day on the river. Get out and go fishing!
Marty “The Montajun” Authement
