2009 Rockies Fishing Reports

[schwerty]

I just drifted the Madison near Ennis, Mt Yesterday and it was moving quick. We did handle a few god healty fish.

Maddy should be coming in soon.

[yonskion]

Middle Madison I would say it was fishing good.
All the Fish in the boat were really Big 18"-22"
Salmon Flies in Montana are smaller than around here, give it until next week and the fish will start looking up for them.

[igBand]

Yonskion - Lexi-Bell and I were on the Maddy above Ennis yesterday, too. We did Varney to Burnt Tree. I'm sure we leap-frogged each other at some point if you guys were on the same stretch.

[yonskion]

Maybe you did I fished Varney to Ennis with Reno Walsh and Ryan Turner.

[igBand]

^^ No kidding! I bought a top-off pump from Reno early this spring. Glad you guys had a productive day.

[yonskion]

^^^^ you guys get skunked? Ritter's boat did and they were with us.

[igBand]

I did. Tough day of fishing (balanced by a f'ing beautiful day to be on the water though). Seemed to be a real buffet of bugs flying about, and I was never able to dial into what they were eating. The only 2 fish I had on all day shook loose as they were approaching the boat.

Lexi-Bell definitely did not get skunked though...he worked the magic with a little mayfly emerger he ties and put a healthy amount of fish in his hands.

[neckdeep]

Its on on the Teton. The abundant yellow sallies skittering on the water are bringing up nice fish despite high water and 1-2 ft vis. Goldens are out, but not many observed. Midday pmd hatches are keeping the fish looking up and ready to intercept a nymph on the classic wet fly swing. Wading is tough, the skeeters are really bad in the meadows, but the fish aren't waiting for the water to drop. Look for fish feeding along the banks where there is less current. Streamers and stripping big rubberleg nymphs worked well too.

Of course, if eager fresh fish isn't your thing, it is multiple bug carpet hatches and super selective sippers in low water over on the lower Henry's. The heavy fishing pressure makes for some choosy fish compared to the ones in the tribs. The Fall has been on fire with the big bugs, but it is still a bit high for wade fishing.

[DeeAre]

^^dood, neckdeep, I love how you're always on point with the fishing report. keep it coming.

oh, and I heart Ennis. Madison River valley is truly God's country.

Good talk.

[schwerty]

Lower Flat Creek in JH is fishing well now. Much of the same shit as the Teton with a decent caddis hatch early evening on most days. Just started going good so the fish are eager and still a bit uneducated. The water is high and a little murky but plenty fishable. The snake backwaters behind the reserve still need a while...or the flows to be knocked down.
Lotsa fish up in there from the snake......

Pmd's of all life stages will be your staple. Cripple patterns were the ticket for me. x caddis and a standard elk hair with an emerging dropper for the caddis is about as fancy as you need to get. I saw a few goldens around but didn't bother... Heard reports this morning of a couple guys hitting 'em on golden patterns but it was sporadic.

Good fishin'

[neckdeep]

I think this season will be the best in a decade. I just went solo on my annual secret spot hike and, since I wasn't sharing water, I got a personal best. 1.5 miles, 125 fish, all 6-16 inches but for one 17 inch cutt. Loads of yellow sallies, a few goldens, numerous size #10, rusty colored sedge caddis(I've never seen it before), and plenty o' pmds. A couple fat, four foot long buzz worms enlivened the day. I never got more than 75 in that piece of water before, so I'm taking it as a sign that the three big snowpack years have grown us some ripe low hanging fruit. Two local guys caught up to me at the end of the day and they said they had caught around 100 fish in the water that I thought I had beat to death, not to mention walked right through.

July 4th Teton update - green drakes and salmonflies are now in the mix in the canyon; pmd/rusty spinner carpet hatches in the upper slough. Streamers and stripping big nymphs are also getting great results.

7/6 - High water makes for some brutal wading/scrambling/stumbling/falling down in the upper canyon but the rainbow action was excellent. Found 30 nice fish(12-18 inches) suspended in pockets along the bank willing to take just about any big nymph droppered 2ft below a Chubby Chernobyl. Barely 1 ft vis but the fish are feeding agressively subsurface. Can't even count the number of times I fell into thistles and stinging nettle, but it was worth the bushwacking.

[schwerty]

Nothin like running into a few buzz worms.

[schwerty]

For those familiar with the streams in the JH valley, lower flat creek is still fishing well. Plenty of good fish in there but they are getting schooled... Same tactics as I stated above. Took 2 photos with the iPhone a couple days ago. Sexy looking water, when it's not drawn down for irrigation.






As for the rest of our region, things are dropping all over! The freestones of the greater Yellowstone area have turned the corner. Some are fishing well. The flows on the Snake and South Fork are coming down. You can pick up some fish on the SF now. The Big Bugs have been out all over the river. I haven't heard of any reports of fish being all that interested though. Henry's seems to be fishing well too. Last I checked, flows were still low out of I.P.

Edit: 7/11 -- It's on!

[neckdeep]

Yup, runoff is just about done for the season. Bitch Creek is fairly clear now and that is pretty much the highest, coldest creek (with quality fishing) in the Tetons. The last piece of the puzzle, the South Fork, is back down to easy to row levels and every boat in the region seems to have made the shift over to catch the stonefly hatches. Been hiding out from my fellow anglers in the Teton canyon with mixed results; rainbow water has been great, cutthroat water has not lived up to past glory yet. Starting to wonder if the transition to rainbows is beginning to occur in the canyon sections of the Teton now, just like almost every where else.

[schwerty]

Fished the upper South Fork yesterday mostly due to time constraints and had good fishing. We must have launched earlier than most of the guide boats so traffic was not really an issue. Just a couple other boats around. No need to got through specific patterns for bank fishing. Stone hatches are in. Not too tough to figure out. Riffles are showing up du to the lower water now. Pink, as usual.....

[schwerty]

I generally leave the Teton Valley, ID and the Henry's area detail to Neckdeep but gotta chime in on the Teton. Been hitting some friends property on the Teton after work quite a bit as well as some public access staples. Took the boat out yesterday evening with mucho success as well. The water is holding well.....for now. Temps were lower than usual but will prolly hike up this week with 90's in the forecast. Excellent hatches of grey drakes, pmd's, goldens, and sporadic caddis. Emerging insects were the most popular but adult patterns were on too.

[neckdeep]

Why would I drive anywhere with a river like this just out the door? I just did four sections over four days(cache>harrops; rainey>cache; lower powerplant; spring hollow) and each fished very well. Mostly using streamers and sallies in the meadows and golden stones in the canyon. The primo fishing in the meadows is from 4pm till dark, mornings are slow but some trico action will be along soon to change that. Also expect to see callibaetis and flying ants in the mix soon. Winged cinnamon ant spinner falls bring up every trout in the river. If you are lucky to catch one, it will be an afternoon to remember.

Cold water...ha...I've been wet wading since early june....my waders wore out

[ColMan]

Blue N of Silverthorne is fishing very well. Have been hitting it every am for the past week. Landed a bunch of fish on dries above GM Res w/ GD nymphs and icebreakers bringing in a couple dozen closer to town. Took my sister-in-law out for her first time fly fishing and she landed a big brown on her 2nd cast.

[skifishbum]

Decided to try and avoid the utarded holiday weekend crowds and hit the upper Green river below Fontenelle.
Fontenelle makes Dutch John look like a resort town

The town dog welcomes you by pissing on your tire.
Good flows, all day caddis action Fri floating from Weeping rock cg to Dodge bottoms.
Sat. was overcast so the crayfish streamer was productive and enough caddis to keep the fish looking up. Floated Tailrace cg to Slate creek.
saw 2 boats, a group of 4 kick boaters and a 1/2 dozen wade fisherman.
Wanted to float lower on Sun but the skeeters were atrocious. When the wife is jogging to do your shuttles and rowing best not to push your luck Thank god for Wyoming winds as they kept the skeeters down during the afternoons.
One of the nice fatty browns

[schwerty]

That's a great stretch of water. Never hit it in the summer....always been a fall thing for me. Good to see it's fishin!

[neckdeep]

I'm hoping to get a trip in down there soon, but the logistics of getting it together ain't easy. Next time, give the Hay Farm>highway float a go, appx. 10 mi.. There are more pieces of water with current down there (and lots of long stretches of frog water to push through) and swifter water seems to have a much higher fish per mile. Four years ago I did 36 miles in the seedskadee WR without seeing another boat; we saw a few guys wade fishing around the bridges and that was it. Probably saw five times as many golden eagles as anglers. The fishing is more of a quality over quantity thing; we boated one really big brown and some nice 18-22 inchers in all species. The same group of guys could have probably caught 10 times as many fish running the 36 miles below Palisades dam on the S.Fork, but that isn't the only reason to go fishing. It certainly doesn't have the fish count of the famous sections of the Platte system, but hey, if it did, it would have two hundred Greenies beating it to death every saturday and it wouldn't be the same experience.

That whole area (between Rock Springs, Pinedale and Kemmerer), when I saw it eleven years ago, it was like the Serengetti desert, a big empty with wildlife. Sadly, the gas well boom has really had a huge impact already. It's starting to look more like the Texas panhandle in some places. Fuckers....

[neckdeep]

ID has yet another new state record trout. An old lady bagged a 20 lb rainbow in the Snake above American Falls reservoir, plunking worms, of course. That makes two new records in two years, both going to old fart bait fishers workin it around the inlet of a lake. Somebody get me some nightcrawlers and a lawn chair...

[schwerty]

There's some monsters over there! Too bad it wasn't on the fly!

[neckdeep]

From what I've heard, American Falls has produced two other bows this season that were 1-2 lbs shy of the record plus many more hogs. Probably from the first year class that began without any competition(remember the lake was mostly drained for three years during the worst of the 2000-2005 drought) and have grown fat eating their bretheren. Also the dry shores and flats built up vegetation that, no doubt, dramatically fertilized the nutrient load of the lake once they were innundated again. New reservoirs or ones that have been empty for years often have short lived periods of hyper-productivity as the flooded vegetation breaks down.

[skifishbum]

Got out for a few days on the Green below Flaming Gorge with my dad and furkid. Floated an A, B and 1/2 the C. Flows have improved with just one raise a day. The A fished well with big fat Alberts, Crickets and various droppers. A meager evening caddis hatch brought a few fish up in the evening. Thurs. on the B started well under cool cloudy conditions good action on the red eyed stoner sculpin and various ant patterns. Frontal passage shut things down and blew us off the river.. The best fishing was Fri morn from Taylor Flat to Pipeline. 800 cfs flows and pmd's led to a good 30 fish in the boat although 1/2 of those were dinks. Nice to see a strong population of young browns on the lower river. The winds and high water caught up to us ~ 1:00 pm.
My dad had some serious pulmanary embulisms back in July spent a few weeks in the hospital and gave us all a scare.
So I'm giving thanks and praises to Ebisu the buddist diety of fishing folk
for his improveing health and the opportunity to row my favorite dude downriver and enjoy camping on a special river.

Aside from the over exuberant dork dog cracking the damn high dollar Brodin net it was a fkna good trip.
I've got family in town this week and heading up to Yellowstone.
Not sure of our plans, my family hike up slough creek got vetoed, but will be camped @ Henrys Lake CG and will probably bring the boat. If any local mags want to float the south fork of the snake or henrys fri or sat or a quick box canyon Sun shoot me a pm.