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Spring Fly Fishing

Spring Fly Fishing

We’ve had some great Spring fly fishing so far in #Montana, with plenty more coming up. The Missouri River, Yellowstone River and Madison River have all been good at time this season.  The Baetis hatches on the #MissouriRiver have been superb this season.

Always good to fish with our friends from @GraniteSportsMedicine!

Upper Madison Fishing Report 5/24/2012

Upper Madison Fishing Report 5-24-2012

It’s become an annual tradition of mine to head to the Upper Madison River for opening weekend. Opening weekend on the Madison occurs on the 3rd Saturday of May every year allowing access to certain sections that close for crucial spawning habitat during late winter. It can be an exciting and frustrating time up there, battling the crowd on Saturday is more entertaining to watch from the parking lot with a cool beer than standing in water with anxious anglers pounding every piece of good water. I tend to wait out the crowd and start fishing late in the day when the fish have had time to settle down.

The real fishing starts on Sunday and Monday when most of the excitement of the opening day has passed. Large sections of un-fished water lay ahead and big, hungry trout move in tight to the banks and start feeding on whatever happens to be around. I’ve always had good success with Stones, San Juan’s, and variety of smaller flashy nymphs depending on whats been hatching recently.

This year was no different than the last few, a large crowd on Saturday had me retreating for the cooler and lawn chair to sleep off the hangover from the night before. Once the parking lot cleared out it was time to head to my favorite holes and fish till dark. This year some big browns were found in shallow water eating small streamers (Buggers, Bow Rivers, Stoneflies). I’m not sure if it was the cool weather or the water clarity that kept the crowds small, but Sunday and Monday we basically had the river to ourselves. The standard flies were the ticket and much large fish were landed and released. It was another great opening weekend in the books.

If you’re considering heading up there don’t let the water clarity fool you. This river can fish great in the off color water you just have to keep fishing different types of water and change up flies till something works. Shouldn’t be too long before we start seeing Salmonflies and Goldenstones up here. Here at MFG were excited that summer is finally here so give us a call at 406.223.2488 to book your trip. Check out our great guide staff at https://www.montanaflyfishingguides.com/montana-fly-fishing-guides.htm

 

Montana Spring Fishing Report – 05/21/12

Montana Spring Fishing Report – 05-21-12

Spring fishing in Montana is always pretty exciting with unpredictable weather each new day is an adventure.  This Spring has been particularly good fishing as the weather actually feels like Spring with warm air temperatures and very few spring snow storms.  The Yellowstone River fished quite well with the Mother’s Day Caddis Hatch making it’s best showing in the past few years.  We had a number of anglers take advantage of our 25% off Spring Discount.  These anglers were not disappointed as we routinely landed 30 to 40 fish a day with a few gems including Mac’s 22″ Yellowstone River Brown trout (pictured here).

As is typical with any Montana Spring fishing season the inevitable Spring run-off is upon us.  Run-off is our annual event where the mountain snows melt with the warm weather and flood the rivers and make them unfishable for about 4 to 6 weeks.  This doesn’t mean there isn’t any good fishing to be had.  The local spring creeks of Armstrong, DePuy, and Nelson start to fish well and the Missouri River is currently on fire – at least on the nymphing side of things.  In fact, one of our guides Jeff Pavlovich has been on Missouri for the last week and reports good to excellent nymphing with bright caddis pupa and emergers, along with the ever-present scuds and sow bugs.  The caddis on Missouri are nearly ready to explode so the dry fly fishing is certainly within days of getting really good.

We’ll continue to keep you posted so stay tuned…