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Tag: Yellowstone River

Montana Snow Pack Update 2012

Posted on by Eric Adams
Montana Snow Pack Update 2012

Why should you care about the 2012 Montana Snow Pack? Well, it directly relates to the amount of water we’ll have in the rivers this summer. So as you can imagine our most common question this time of year is “How’s the fishing going to be this Summer”? It is the million dollar question, and here’s our most educated guess for you broken down by drainage.

Yellowstone Drainage:
Our Upper Yellowstone snowpack is at about 70% of normal with our precipitation at 100% of normal. Translation = get your gear ready to fish the Yellowstone River by about the 25th of June and make sure to have some Salmonflies tied up. The fishing in late June, July and August should be good with near normal water levels. Late August and September will depend on the weather conditions, but current long-range forecasts have a normal temperature and precipitation projections.

Madison & Gallatin Drainages:
These 2 drainages have about 50% of normal snowpack and near 100% precipitation levels. Translation = should be great early season fishing, but keep your eye on rising water temperatures by late July.

Missouri River Drainage:
Missouri is a tailwater (dam regulated river) so the snowpack levels are important, but it is somewhat insulated. Snowpack is at nearly 70% and precipitation is over 100%. Translation = dust off your dry fly rod and get ready for some epic topwater action this June and July. The Caddis and PMD hatches with the lower water conditions should be prime. We’ll be back up on the Missouri River at the start of June and can’t wait to see big fish sipping our dries.

That’s the current summary for our local waters, but if you want to stay up to date make sure to check out the Montana Snow Pack
website.

Yellowstone River Mother’s Day Caddis Report – 05/04/12

Posted on by Eric Adams
Yellowstone River Mother’s Day Caddis Report 05-04-12

Mother’s Day Caddis are here (again). We had a spectacular day on the Yellowstone River between Emigrant and Mallards Rest.  The fishing was virtually nonexistent before 1 pm, but once the water temperature warmed up to that magic 50 degrees mark the Caddis came off in mass.

In the late afternoon, we lost count of the number of trout we landed but we estimated it at minimum 30.  Needless to say, it was spectacular.

Our best technique was a small Convertible with a BH soft hackle as the short dropper.

Today is a much colder day but this should only extend the hatch into next week – so take some days off work and get out there!

Yellowstone River Fishing Report – 04/21/12

Posted on by Eric Adams
Yellowstone River Fishing Report – 04-21-12

Fishing/Weather/Water Conditions:

Today I had the rare opportunity to fish with my lovely girlfriend Chelsea on the Yellowstone River.  The weather was 65 degrees and sunny with a 10 – 15 mph upstream wind, which made things cooler than the temperature would suggest.  However, the MOTHER’S DAY CADDIS HATCH is ON!  We put on the water about 12 PM and by about 3 PM the caddis started.  Now, this isn’t the full-blown caddis hatch, but just the beginning trickle.  Today Chels caught several nice fish up to 16″ and we expect the hatch to build the next couple days and the larger fish to start taking notice.  Tomorrow it should climb to 77 degrees with a light west wind so we predict full-blown caddis by 2 or 3 PM tomorrow afternoon.  GET OUT THERE!

Hatches:

CADDIS! There are also some March Browns, Baetis (on the cloudy days) and midges.  There should be caddis tomorrow so concentrate on emergers and pupae before the hatch.

Fishing Techniques:

Don’t worry about hitting the water too early in the day, 11 AM is plenty early.  Concentrate on caddis pupae/larva in the early part of the day and by Noon-ish make sure you have a caddis emerger on at least one of your flies.  By 2 or 3 PM you should start seeing some adults, but the trout will probably still take the emerger quite well.

Yellowstone River Fishing Report – 04/20/12

Posted on by Eric Adams
Yellowstone River Fishing Report – 04-20-12

Fishing/Weather/Water Conditions:

Another great Spring fishing day on the Yellowstone River.  We had the great fortune of fishing with a couple from Texas yesterday.  We landed about 30 trout during the day.  While most of the trout were between 12 – 15 inches we did land several nice Rainbows in the 16+ inch class.  The weather was cloudy with light wind.  Water visibility was a good 2 to 3 feet with good greenish clarity.

Hatches:

Baetis and midges were present throughout the day.  By 3 PM we had a prolific Baetis hatch which lasted about an hour.  During this time we saw trout feeding on emergers and duns (dries).  We also saw a few March Brown’s, but not enough to be significant.

Fishing Techniques:

We are definitely still doing best with our short leash nymph rig, where the flies are 2 to 4 feet below the small indicator.  There are however starting to be more rising trout, so having a rigged dry fly rod handy would be a good idea.