It's Coming

The picture sums it up, winter is rearing it's ugly head.  Monday, fall was in all it's glory with leaves of gold, orange, and red.  After two hard frosts since then most of the leaves are off the trees or brown.  Snow isn't falling yet but yesterday my guides were iced up for the first couple hours of fishing, even though I didn't get on the water until 11:00am. 

Fishing was good with several Browns in the 14-18" range landed and one Hog Johnson broken off.  I got a good look at it and it probably would have gone 4-5lbs....that one hurt.  The fish below were two of the better fish landed for the day.

Bass Boatin'

On Wednesday I got an offer to join a friend of a friend on his bass boat for the last trip of the year to one of his favorite fishin holes.  I've never fished from a bass boat, let alone fly fished for native Cutthroats and non native Lake trout,  from one so I figured what the heck. 

The day started with meeting at 6:00am to try and be on the water by 9:30am.  I was warned to bring plenty of warm clothes as the wind chill is pretty intense zipping across a lake of 42F water at 30mph with ambient temps in the 30s.  I complied and piled on layer after layer, including snow pants and my winter parka as we headed out on the lake. 

My host had been given a tip by an old timer as to where we could find spawning Lake trout.  These fish get very large...30lbs would not be out of the question if we could find them.  Unfortunately the area he pointed us to was devoid of all life and all necessary elements to host much life.  No rocks, no weeds, no contour to the bottom of the lake, no fish.  We trolled around the area for a couple of hours, landing one random Cutthroat before neither of us could stand it any longer. 

My host took me to a cove that often has plenty of fish in shallow and clear water that provides for exciting sight fishing.  We found a few and were able to get some to play.  We worked our way around his usual loop and caught quite a few Cutts like this one in the 2.5-3lb range. 

We worked pretty hard to try and find fish and ended up landing perhaps 25 total between the two of us with a few better fish in the 4bl-4.5lb range like this one.

As we headed back to the marina the chop on the water got pretty intense and the corresponding spray resulting in me being bathed in 42F water.  It was much like I would imagine a Disney ride from hell.  All in all it was a good time and fun to experience something different. 

The juxtaposition of the sparkly bass boat on trout lake at over 8000ft is priceless. 

Fishing is Heating up as the Weather Cools Down

While I haven't yet got the big fall Brown trout that I'm looking for, I keep getting 20" fish from water that I've never got one that big from before.  Yesterday I took plenty of fish between 15-18" like these two.

All the fish were taken on streamers, these two were taken on the Mr. T starter set flies.  I've been tying articulated streamers lately and I'm pretty sure I saw Mr. T wear earrings that looked just like these flies in Rocky III.  As hackle feathers have become a fashion accessory of late in women's hair, perhaps I can make a killing bringing Mr. T earrings back in fashion....hmmm.

Had I just got lots of Browns and a handful of Rainbows in this range it would have been a great day.  However I was lucky enough to have finally corralled a legit 20 incher on this small fishery.  The pictures don't really show just how magnificent this fish was, but you get the idea. 

It Finally Happened

Today it finally happened.  No, I didn't run into a grizzly, that will eventually happen but not today.  Today, fishing the switch rod was exactly what I had hoped it would be when I picked it up. 

It was cool and raining at my place this morning so I headed out with the intention of hitting a big river that I normally don't fish very often and swinging streamers.  This was the exact scenario I envisioned when I picked up the switch rod.  Autumn weather, overcast, rain, big river...I started my day a little lower in the valley than I had originally planned and fished for a couple of hours, getting an ok Rainbow and a Whitefish before heading further upstream. 

I headed up to spot that I've fished before, having never hooked into any good fish.  It wasn't long before I landed this 20" Brown on the swing.

Energized after landing a good Brown, I pressed on.  I actually ended up getting the grand slam, several Cutts, a Rainbow, and a few Whitefish.  The second Brown was a good fish as well.  I didn't measure it so I'll call it 19". 

A Good Ending to a Rough Week

The past week has seen fall show up to Southwest Montana with a significant amount of snow falling on the mountains and nights starting to dip below freezing. 

I fished hard all week, sometimes in rain, sometimes in heavy winds, and for the first time in months was actually cold a few times.  I fished large rivers, a huge tailwater, a tiny tailwater, a freestone, a famous river that is supposed to be full of lake run fish right now.  Basically I put in a lot of hours hoping that the change of weather would put fish in an aggressive mood. 

Magazine articles and book chapters all speak of fall in Southwest Montana as being the time to get big fish and the time to see huge fish rush streamers.  As I've never really given myself to fishing streamers in the past I decided this year I would get serious about it.  For the most part I spent my week fishing streamers, both with my new spey set up and my 4 wt.  I picked up the spey rod with two goals in mind.  The first is to force myself to start at ground zero learning new skills.  Casting and fishing a two handed rod is a completely different animal than anything I've done before and I am, for the most part, enjoying the learning process.  The second goal in picking up the two handed rod was to be able to fish bigger water more effectively, particularly with streamers with the ultimate goal of getting some bigger fish.  Over the past week the two handed rod was a bust, producing very few fish and none of them being impressive in the least.  I'm beginning to feel like a true steelheader...that is a guy that spends all day casting with no fish to show for it.

On the other hand, the best fish of the week were actually taken with the 4 wt.  Yesterday I fished one of my favorite winter fisheries, a small tailwater that has been nearly unfishable all summer.  It still looks terrible with less than 8 inches of visibility and tons of floating moss to contend with.  However, I convinced myself that it would still be good fun if I could force myself to stick with fishing streamers all day.  Fortunately, I was correct and caught many fish.  The fish still aren't as aggressive as one would think with fall setting in and their time to spawn coming within weeks but enough ate the streamers that it kept it fun.  I landed a couple that exceeded 18", one Brown and one Rainbow.  I did see some larger Browns follow the streamer but wouldn't commit.  Theoretically, this will change in the coming days as the big fish become super territorial and start to actively chase space invaders.  We'll see..

Nice Brown

Fall Is Here

We're starting to see rainy, overcast days with the forecast for perhaps some snow accumulation later this week overnight.  While I do hate to see winter start to show up as it will be a long 6 months, I'm excited at the prospect of potentially finding some big, nasty browns on streamers and quality fish sipping tiny Baetis mayflies. 

This one went 20".  I hope to get some considerably bigger than this before winter sets in but this was the first time I've caught a legit 20incher from this freestone river so I was pretty excited.

This fish did not sign the waiver to reveal its identity, hence the obscuring of his face