If This Is It....Yeah it's it

As spring has sprung in the Rockies it seemed appropriate for my wife and I to take the dogs and go on a weekend road trip to see some new country.  We found a nice little cabin for rent in Western Montana and loaded up the dogs and our stuff and headed West on Saturday. 

While Saturday reached 70F along the way, Sunday ended up being cold, windy, and overcast with bouts of snow, sleet, and rain.  Nothing too uncomfortable to fish in, but nothing like the 70F of the previous day.  This spring has seen abnormally high temperatures all over Montana, which coupled with some rain of late has resulted in most rivers and streams being off color and near record highs for this time of year. 

Skawlas

I was hoping to fish the Bitterroot River as I'd never even seen it before, let alone fished it.  I gave it a shot, breaking out my newly arrived Sage One 5 wt rod.  The results were poor but I did get a chance to see my first Skawla stoneflies.  Unfortunately, the trout had a tougher time seeing them with the river rising rapidly and visibility diminished to 10" or so. 

Bitterroot

My enthusiasm for fishing an ice cold, muddy river waned as I watched an armada of half of Missoula begin floating by.  While I must have seen 8 rafts float by with anglers trying to find a willing fish I didn't see a fish caught.  Personally, I was the proud conqueror of one small Whitefish.  Now that I wasn't going to get skunked I decided I'd leave my waders on but drive up stream and see if I could find some more interesting water, perhaps a side channel or something.

I found another crossing a few miles away that actually had a side channel that looked interesting.  I stopped to ask a fellow angler who had just fished it how it went.  He informed me it was every bit as crappy as the rest of the river.  He did however give me some information for which I am extremely grateful.  He said that on a day like that, with the water so cold and stained, the only option around was a slough nearby.  Upon the mention of the name I said is that "the one" and he said it was.  Much has been written about a certain slough in the area over the past several years as certain well to do land owners, including Huey Lewis, have litigated over the issue of whether the recreational use of it should be public or not.  The gracious angler gave me directions to find it and said, "There are some real pigs in there."  That was all I needed to go give it a shot.

The directions lead me right where I needed to go and I noticed a couple of cars parked on the upstream side of the bridge.  Interestingly, there is a sign posted by Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks identifying that in order to access and fish the water you must enter the water, somehow manage to get yourself under two fences running across the stream, one of which with barbed wire on the bottom course, and then stay in the water the entire time.  I performed a modified limbo to get under the barbed fence, figuring my jacket was about to get a new hole in it.  Luckily I made it, although the fences alone undoubtedly keep many would be anglers from attempting to access the water as it is physically challenging. 

Now that I was in I decided I'd rig up a brand new sink tip line and only fish streamers for the day.  I figured if there were in fact pigs to be had I'd try to get deep and offer them a reasonable meal.  As I was fishing my way downstream I wasn't having any luck.  The slough is effectively a spring creek with lots of mud, which I was constantly stirring up as I was unable to lawful walk the banks.  Surely this wasn't helping my cause.  Of course, large spring creek fish are notoriously difficult to catch on a fly anyway so my goal was really just to get a fish. 

I switched to a pattern I recently tied up and had been working pretty well for nice Browns on a different fishery lately.  I didn't have high hopes but what I was fishing wasn't working so what the heck.  As I pumped it on the swing I finally felt a nice fish eat it.  The fish fought harder than any fish I've caught in a good while so I was excited to say the least.  I landed it and it ended up being a 19" Brown.

With a fish under my belt I was happy that I wasn't going to receive a complete ass kicking on what was clearly a challenging and potentially rewarding new piece of water.  I worked my way further downstream with zero success and decided I should probably start fishing back up.  As my fingers were frozen from the heavy winds and occasionally snow/sleet I was figuring I'd fish my way back towards my van, probably catch nothing, and head back to the cabin and lick my wounds of a tough first day in the Bitteroot Valley.  All the while trying not to sweat the sniper rifles fixed on me waiting to take my head off if I touched foot on the banks. 



As that fish ate as the fly rose through the water column I decided I needed to add another smaller fly behind the relatively large streamer I was fishing and raise my rod while swinging the flies, especially at the conclusion of the swing.  Within 10 minutes of this adjustment this heavy, 21" Brown was brought to the net after a tremendous fight that allowed me to get a feel for what my new rod was capable of as it was doubled over for several minutes fighting the fish.

By now my head is fully in the game and I could care less that my hands are completely numb.  I kept at it and and end up foul hooking another 20"+ fish that really pushed the rod to it's limits.  I move upstream just a bit and cast to the far bank.  As the flies start their swing a huge fish hammers one of them.  A Rainbow that was probably 7 lbs and 23-26" long flies out of the water.  The red stripe on this fish looked like it could have been 2.5" tall.  Needless to say I was thrilled and when it came unbuttoned I was crestfallen.  That could have been one of the largest Rainbows I've ever hooked and it hurt to lose it. 

At this point I know that fish isn't going to eat again and it wouldn't seem likely that there is going to be another particularly large fish in this immediate area.  That being said, losing a fish like that causes one to reflexively cast back into the area, even though common sense suggests that it is likely to be futile.  Within several minutes I hook up on a huge Brown that comes flying nearly 2' out of the water.  This fish is big but looks smaller than the Rainbow, at least in it's girth.  It gives me another jump and we fight it out for several minutes before it makes it to the net.  The picture doesn't really do the fish justice but if you look at the size of the tail verses my large arbor 5 wt. reel you get the idea that it was a very nice fish.  It measured 24" and probably weighed over 5lbs. 

I kept working this area hard and landed several 18-19" fish.  After releasing one of the fish, my line was wrapped around my rod and as I was wading back to the spot I wanted to cast from I was flicking the line off the rod.  A fish I never saw exploded on the larger streamer as it hit the water 10' from me.  It was hooked up and I tried to untangle my mess but it snapped both flies off.  In retrospect I'm lucky it did break off quickly as it could have easily broke my brand new rod...the first day I ever fished it no less. 

The last fish of the day was another 21" Brown. 

After I did my best contortionist impression to get back under the fences without filling my waders with water the local game warden stopped to check my license as I got out of my waders.  He provided some color on the local situation along with some additional useful fishing information.  It looks like I'm going to have to make the 3.5 hour drive back a few times over the next month or two as he informed me that while the big fish will rise to dries in the summer and fall, the slough becomes full of weeds and upon hooking a fish it promptly breaks off in the weeds.  Of course, I'll have to go try it for myself in the summer...but in the meantime I'm going to tie a bunch of streamers and plan my next trip to the Heart of Rock and Roll.