Printable View
Glad we finally got out SFB. I will for sure be calling you to go again. My non mag buddy is still gushing about his fish. As you can tell by his death grip he is pretty new to the whole fishing scene. SFB is a great teacher, much more patient and instructive than I ever will be. Blue wings and sculpins makes for a VERY tasty day.
Well with the forecasted warm temps this past weekend me and a buddy headed to the Mo. spent thursday-sunday fishing and spent a lot of time harassing the crowds below the dam. BWO's and midges everywhere, the usual tailwater suspects fished real well below also. Being hot as hell we ended up drinking beer all day and doing the put in at 4, get off at 10 thing. Met some jackson folks and some guy bumming around from whitefish and ended up floating with them on sunday. Good times with some new people. Heard they are prob gonna bump flows soon to make room for runoff but as of monday it was good. Also might have heard of some caddis on the madison, gonna go check it out tomorrow. oh and most everything else is blown around here.
here's a crappy cell phone pic of me about to drop a fish
http://a1.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphot...23460447_n.jpg
Fishing was great. Light top action, but the nymphing was as good as I have seen it. B section was reportedly good to red creek and then turned off. Amazing number of people for a Monday this early.
It is like mid to late may fishing up there right now. Get it before they open it up for the annual flush.
ski4trees (he posted footy here a few times and moved on loooking for a bigger audience, works for trouthunter) is putting up video of salmonfly nymphs staging in the shallows on the lower HF and fat fish eating rubberlegs. Any mags anticipating the big bug on the HF should make plans. The hatch will happen soon (it has happened as early as mid-May during drought years) and word is already out and being spread with enthusiasm. Colder weather in the forecast though, might slow it down a bit (the bug hatch, not the boat hatch). SF will probably have ample elbow room as the HF gets "hot". Water color still good on SF.
Teton river was fishing ok through the weekend but picked up a bit too much color yesterday. One 16" and then the visability got bad. Level barely bumped; might have been silt from an irrigation canal network being opened.
It looks like the Teton area river systems will not have a prolonged high water event this year. A lot of upper elevation snow has evaporated. Soil moisture was rather dry last year and, thus far, a substantial amount of the snowmelt is being absorbed by the ground and not making it into the creeks in a big muddy rush, like recent seasons. I anticipate one or two big spikes in levels once we get some warm evenings, but I don't think we are going to see rivers jumping their banks this year, and because of the absorbtion and evaporation, we are looking at a below average water year, as far as hatch timing goes. Perhaps lower water than our snowpack totals indicated a month ago.
fkna... deluge on the s. platte... up to 207 cfs, almost triple what it was 10 days ago. Playing field just got much bigger. Executive decision: think I'm gonna put the 3wt to work tomorrow whipping caddis.
btw that was meant to be an open ended invite to anyone willing and able to join. I've got private water right below wigwam... which is to say my own private cheesman canyon. Someone, please come with me.
Haven't done any fishing for awhile? Waiting for runoff to end? South Fork was ok (slow) last week but black morels are popping in the lower elevation aspen forests so fuck the HF and all those salmonfly chasing dildos over there. I even found about 100 in my yard...well mostly the neighbors' yards...shhhhh. Been picking about two weeks. Averaging around 1lb in 2-3 hrs. One pound would cost around $30-40 in a store. Black naturals are prime around 6700' on west slopes but going over to spoilt/waterlogged below 6500'. Its been damn cold up high so morels are still absent or too small to bother with above 7000' (don't pick a flush of spikes, morels have almost no flavor when they are immature; mark the spot and wait at least a week). Been finding a few western yellows here and there but haven't really been working the riparian cottonwood forest much. More private property, more competition and, in my opinion, yellows are less predictable morels....blacks are easier to find once you know what to look for and are plentiful on public land. (no permit required in Targhee national forest; $20 forest products permit required in Bridger-Teton national forest; huge fines for picking in a national park). If you like to fish, you'll probably enjoy foraging. Shrimp and morels in a madeira and sour cream sauce for dinner. Decadent. Oh yeah, ursus horriblis likes to eat morels too so you'd be a total fool to go foraging around here without a can of spray. Unlike bears, people will get sick if they eat raw morels so cook them thoroughly. Know the difference between a true and false morel as they often grow together. Its obvious, you'd have to be stupid or blind to confuse them.
update 6/4: morels popping @ 7000'-7500', mostly over below 6700' on west slopes and couldn't even find a spike @ 8000' thanks to the recent cold up high. Stumbled across a fresh (I mean red and still wet) deer carcass in the woods; first time I've ever found a recent lion kill. Got the fuck out of there...
update 6/9: north facing slopes starting to produce.
Anyone been on the Green recently? Looks like the flows are finally down. Guessing the dry fly action is heating back up? Heading up there for 4 days and hoping to get some Cicada love.
I was on flaming gorge over memorial day wknd. Went down to take a look. Flows were clear. Fly shop said it was on. Don't know what the flows were then and haven't looked. So, it was stable last wknd.... Looked damn sexy.
I fished the res at our camp due to kids, dogs etc... Picked on plenty of stocker bows with cicada patterns. Some bass. Streamer fishing was pretty good too when the wind came up.
Things are dropping around the Tetons. High but decent freestone fishing can be had if you are creative. Only about a week of warm weather before many of the local streams will be in shape.
I don't know if Utah counts (not technically the Rockies), but the Weber between Rockport and Echo (Coalville exit specifically) was really good this evening.
Looking to make a little road trip later this week.
The online reports that I've found are about 2 weeks old.
Anyone have more recent info on the Teton or South Fork?
Floated the South Fork this weekend. The best action was on little green bwo nymphs. Turd bugs were surprisingly ineffective. I didn't see any salmonfly adults, but it was insanely windy (35-40 mph) and I was more focused on getting to Byington than I was on fishing toward the end of the day.
Runoff will be mostly done on the Teton by next weekend. It is fishable now but a bit high and cold. Stoneflies and caddis should begin hatching. Streamers are producing fish in the valley. Big nymphs work in the canyon but the high water levels in the canyon make for very difficult access.
UPDATE 6/22, Teton: salmonflies, golden stones and yellow sallies hatching in canyon, fish starting to look up. Nymphing the bottom still producing bigger fish than dry/dropper rigs, which got lots of small fish attention yesterday. Fished 3 days with about 40-50 good fish to hand, some cutts but mostly bows and hybrids, and mostly taken on #6 turd worked along the bank in 2 to 5 feet of depth. Got a 22" cuttbow - hooray for stoneflies! Nights have been so cold that the remaining runoff slowed (color went from 2 to 4 foot vis in only 48 hrs) but probably going to jump back up again for the weekend. Strangely enough, the big fish were much more aggressive BEFORE the water cleared so don't let a little color discourage. Tue and wed, the 16"+ fish were chasing after flies swung or lifted. Yesterday, nope, the big fish mostly sulked under a very bright sun and the suddenly clearing water but the dinks were swarming on my thingamabobber or chubby chernobyl all damn day. I went back to an indicator just to get away from hooking the 6"-8"ers. Mayflies were starting to hatch in the lower canyon so I'm guessing the good dry fly action in the valley will start soon.
Generally speaking, when you can catch fish on dries in the Teton, pretty much every stream in east Idaho is fishable. Difficult to wade and to fish with the high water, perhaps, but fishable and that's what I mean when I say runoff is over. If its easy wading and clear water you are wanting, go to the HF.
BCC (Mill D area) was fishing well this morning. Mostly little fuckers, but I managed to land a nice (8ish") brookie this morning. The water is cold and super clear right now. Royal Wulf was working best for me, stimulators were pretty good too.
Spent an amazing 2 days floating the Salt. Day #1 was hot and calm, the fish were feeding in spurts and stimulators and gray drakes seemed to be the bugs of choice. We boated some quality fish and I hooked and fought a 22" plus pig that I fought for over 5 minutes before he broke off. I will see that in my dreams for a long time! Day 2 was a little windier but the fishing was nuts. Big foamy stuff thrown against the bank got the big guys out. If you wanted to hook little fish below the gravel banks were money. I love Salt Lake and all it has to offer, but man I miss Wyoming!
Sounds stellar, teleee.
Is it drift-boat-ready, or raft only?
Where were you putting in?
Thanks.
Hey Ignatius, we floated it in a drift boat, there are some shallows and narrow spots buts its all floatable. We put in just north of town (cant remember the name of the ramp.
Saturday. Floated 10 miles on the upper SF. Water looked great, mild wind, fishing sucked ass. 1 fish all day.
Sunday. Waded 1/2 a mile on Teton. Water barely 2ft vis, water high and wading a struggle, brutal 20-25mph cast crushing wind, but fishing was awesome. 25-30 fish to hand in only 4 hours.
Bugs, not conditions, made all the difference. Sallies, goldens and pmds on the water on Teton; salmonflies mostly done but still one or two around. Upper SF had a bare minimum of pmds and sallies.
and then went to the Fox Creek Fandango? What a great party!Quote:
Originally Posted by neckdeep
Fished Pacific creek for first time yday only for a couple minutes at the first turnout up the road from the main highway. Lots of size 16 bugs coming of that looked kinda like baetis, very slight, not sure what they were. No surface action, got a tiny cutt in big Chernobyl. Heading further up the road today for a couple hours.
On the backside of runoff, stonefly nymphs fished on the bottom along the bank will out produce just about everything else you could throw. Turds, kaufmann's rubberleg stones and tung head prince nymphs are my favorites. Use a single heavy nymph, no shot, short range cast w/ high stick drift and you will have a much easier time getting the fly down around structure without snagging. If the water is cloudy, get in real close. I mean point blank. We were catching fish within 5ft of our boot tips on Sunday. When you see multiple rising fish or a big fish chewing on your indicator, THEN its time to try a dry/dropper rig. Till then, you are better off with the depth adjustability of an indicator.
Water is clearing up pretty good, will give it a shot, thanks. Not sure I jabber bead head stones, may need to use a split tho. Will a size 12 prince do?
Sent from my DROID RAZR using TGR Forums
Yeah, sallies come in #10-16 (#14 seems to be the normal over here) and that prince is a great nymph dropper to a golden stone dry. One of my standard prospecting combos is #6 golden chubby chernobyl with #10-12 prince dropped 18 inches. The two bugs usually hatch together. I guess the big question is: are you seeing stonefly shucks, what kind and how old/far above the water line? Turn over some rocks and see if there are stoneflies migrating. Just about all Teton area streams with a rocky bottom, clean water and strong current have abundant golden stoneflies filling the niche that is occupied by crawfish elsewhere (they are the top invertebrate predator). Fish see them scrambling around in the rocks all year long. Hatches come and go. Turd patterns fished on the bottom in fast water may not be classic fly casting but it usually produces my best fish of the season every year and catches fish on those days when nothing seems to be happening. Teton and Fall basins are having their stonefly emergences now. SF is starting to see salmonflies and sallies. Tight lines.Quote:
Originally Posted by kokomas
Thanks for the info, a lot of wisdom there. I'm into catching fish, not a slave to the dries. I drove further up Pacific creek, about 3 miles further then the first turnoff. Beautiful braided channels and deep cuts. I didn't have the right nymphs to get that deep but I tried what I could with no luck. Saw some slate drakes, something looking like small red quills, and some very slight sulfur looking bugs although they were gray, not yellow.
I got some size 4 kaufmans rubber leg beadheads, some tungsten prince too and i'm gonna hit the hoback this afternoon for a couple hours, also bringing some salmon flies
kokomas, with the low runoff meaning that the water should be clear with the stoneflies out, you might find some very fun fishing on the GV a lot lower than anyone expects it to be good. might be a bit less of a drive and some very fun results in the deeper water and around structure. this area gets ignored by most people because the irrigation pulls so much water out of it later in the season when everything else is getting good. and, there's pavement around, it must be crowded!!
The Wind River Mountains are fishing well at the 11,000' range.
Attachment 117715
Attachment 117716
Attachment 117717
Quote:
Originally Posted by adipose
HOLY SHIT!! :eek:
:yourock:
I'm not even going to try to ask you where that is (a futile effort), but man, catching something anywhere near that size up there is one of my lifelong goals... Alas, getting a little farther away now that I'm working full time in the EC... still, something that I'm hoping to do one of these years when I likely burn out from the corporate bullshit.
So, do they fight as well as I hear they do??
Edit.. AND ON CANE? You're my hero.
Nice to see you're around and fishing, Adipose.
Keeeerist - that's a sweet fish!! I love the winds, even though they tried to kill me with a combo of record heat / then endless rain / berserk mosquito attacks. I agree that's a fish to remember...
So the Snake in JH is coming around. I floated the dam to pacific with the fam yesterday. Drake and stone hatches were on and about perfect for catching...not too overwhelming. We passed several guide boat with total hacks hooking up left and right. That stretch holds plenty of small fish but they get big up there too. The 3 times I anchored and tossed a line, turned into a fish, (or missed hook set), every cast. 10-1 and sunset are the key times up there. If you're here, float it in a 1 or 2 man and lap the quality fishing section a couple times. Take out at the beach above the oxbow.
The rest of the Snake is looking good for streamers and nymphing. The Green is still a much better option if you have the time.
No reports from my crew for the SF or Henry's fork.
Does he do anything else? ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by schwerty
Thanks for sharing Adipose.
Sent from my SPH-D710 using TGR Forums
Quote:
So, do they fight as well as I hear they do??
Everything you've heard about them is true...
The salmon flies on the Yellowstone are up in the park.
The stretch between Gardiner and Yankee Jim was still hot today, but with smaller bugs and primarily smaller fish -- serious caddis hatch, plus sallies etc.
Transmitted through the ether solely via will power.
That big Golden is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I want to kiss it.
Provo is fishing well, crackback and hatchback nymphs are most productive as usual. 7 hours of fishing for one fish, but so worth it.
http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphoto...22169410_n.jpg
I spent three days fishing Slough Creek last weekend, second and third meadows. Golden Stones and Grey Drakes were the ticket.Attachment 118260
Fishing on the Snake,while extremely crowded, was great this wknd. The larger cutts seem to have returned in strength. Smaller fish are taking foam shit and attractor nymphs. Larger cutts are being taken on yellow sallies and caddis in the evening. Double nymph rigs for larger fish through the middle of the day.
Looks like we are sliding into the doldrums. Seeing a real drop off in action on the hot sunny days. Floated six miles on the Teton in the valley yesterday and it was painfully slow. Pmds hatch almost nonexistent, fish sulking in the holes and only little dinks rising sporadically, when rising at all. We floated 10am to 4pm so it is probably best to start avoiding midday fishing on sunny days for the next few weeks. Hoppers coming on. First winged carpenter ant flight of the summer observed a few days ago. Saw a few trico spinners so that is starting up too. Fishing in the canyon sections is getting noticably slower too but nymphing for rainbows and hybrids is still very good on cloudy days and smaller fish are taking hopper patterns on top. Bitch Creek is still cold and fishing well if you hike away from the over fished access points.
I heard several first hand reports that fishing on the SF went from mediocre to epic to mediocre with the epic part occurring during the cooler days when it rained for a while. Heard it got stoopid crowded. Over 100 boats taking out at Byington some days. Sounds like too many dildos parked at the Irwin Slide and now, thanks to too many anglers shitting where they eat, that key access point below the Ditch is closing. Then there has been an issue with rigs overflowing into the road at Spring Creek ramp and deputies got involved and so now there's talk that too many shuttles are being blindly sent down there and something must be done. Till crowds abate, might be best to use Conant ramp instead. What a fucking circus....I can't imagine being a south fork guide.
Cloudy weather seems to be the ticket for now..
Fishing around the Yellowstone region has slowed in many of the area waters. A few days of lower temps helped last week but only for the duration and one of the nights dropped into the 30's around the southern jellystone region.
The Nat'l Park Service has placed some closures in the Park, so plan accordingly if you are headed in there. The higher sub alpine and alpine streams have apparently been good and held reasonable temps. Down lower....no good.
The SF of the Snake is running at 13.5k. High for summer flows but still has seen decent fishing. Fishing can be excellent one day and done the next. Crap shoot with tons of boats right now. If I were to float it I'd be on pre 7am.
The Green has become a morning and sunset deal. It's fucking hot over there!
The Snake through JH has been producing mainly sunrise to 11am and again 6:00 to dark, with most action in morning.
Many area tribes are reaching temps too high to fish by midday. Please leave small streams close to valley floors alone for. Bit!