Fish Butte's Blacktail Creek

Blacktail Creek brook trout

Butte's Blacktail Creek flows out of the Highlands Mountains and right through town.  This little, urban gem is often overlooked by fly anglers.  Blacktail has tons of access right of the city trail system and has a great population of brook trout.

There are some signs of old Butte along the banks.  These old bottles were fun to sift through.

Blacktail is not your average Montana wilderness stream but it is a great option for a quicky after work or a good excuse to bring a rod when you go on that walk with your significant other or child.

Blacktail near the confluence of Silver Bow Cr with Big Butte in the background

While some sections go through beautiful parks and ranch lands, other sections are very urban.

Blacktail baby geese

Blacktail brook trout

You don't have to travel far to get that small stream fix when you live in Butte.  Check out Blacktail!

Rain, wind, movies, bighorns, and some trout

Bighorn sheep at Holter Dam

Had yet another epic weekend in Craiglandia, USA.  This weekend brought a movie festival, some new friends of the "true local" variety, first-trout-on-the-fly for 2 people, and enough rain and wind to chill you to the bone.  Next weekend will hopefully be a bit warmer as we stay in the neighborhood and stick some Big Hole pigs.

Montana Fly Fishing Film Festival

Some trout are more willing to get the whole, "getting caught" ordeal over with...

BB King - American Blues Legend - Leaves this world

It is a cold, rainy day in Butte, Montana and I've got the blues.  BB King, an American music legend died today.  I was lucky enough to get to see BB live in Missoula about 10 years ago.  The experience changed the way I played my guitar forever and it led me to discover the rest of the blues musicians which  have paved the way for modern country, rock, soul, and folk music.

America will not be the same without BB King!

"Trout Unlimited provides $34K in grants for western Montana fisheries projects"

Check out this article in today's Missoulian Newspaper to see where your Trout Unlimited membership and donations go to.

George Grant Chapter of TU's Annual Meeting

A great weekend on the MO

The Wolf Creek Bridge

Had another great weekend in Craiglandia!  There were some fun times with the locals at the Oasis in Wolf Creek, a great time sharing the world of fly fishing with a first-timer, and lot's of big fish caught.

Contrary to the picture above (which I took Friday night), it was a sunny, beautiful weekend.  The fishing around Craig was weirdly tough but some fish were caught.  The fishing from the canyon down was shit-hot with fish up and rising to march browns and caddis in the bright sun.  My friend, who was new to rowing a drift boat, got me into so many fish it was kind of unreal.

We also ran into this cool guy:

  


































Next week is the Caddis Festival and Drift Boat Drive in and I already can't wait to get back.  I'd rather take a bullet than live more than a couple hours drive from the trout capital of America!

Tinsel Body Mother's Day Caddis

The Upper Clark Fork and many other Montana rivers are experiencing great hatches of the Mother's Day caddis right now!  I recently had such an amazing day on the Upper Clark Fork catching huge, jumping browns with this easy-to-tie fly that I had to share.  Like all good patterns, this one can be tied to match any caddis hatch, it is durable, easy to tie, and very effective.  The body of this fly also rides in and below the water surface.  I have found over the years, that fly patterns that do this are usually more effective at fooling picky, wary, and educated trout.

Hook: Size 14 light wire scud hook
Thread:  6/0 Brown
Body: Medium pearl tinsel
Wing: Darker shade elk hair (for MD caddis)
Thorax: Dark colored CDC used as dubbing

Step 1:

Thread your hook and build a nice underbody.

Step 2: 

Tie in the tinsel (approx. 4 in or 10cm) right at the middle of the bend of the hook.  Advance your thread to the the front of the hook.  Then, wrap the tinsel forward creating a nice, smooth body.
(I forgot to take a picture showing just the body but I'm sure you get the idea.)

Step 3:

Stack some elk hair and tie in just behind the eye of the hook.  Cut off the waste and then, tie down the font of the elk hair bunch (unlike how you would for a standard elk hair caddis).

Step 4: 

Rip some CDC fibers from a CDC feather and dub them onto your thread.

Step 5:

Wrap a nice little thorax ball.

Step 6: 

Tie a small head in front of the thorax, whip finish, and your done!

You don't need to use floatant on this fly because of the CDC and elk hair.  After catching a fish, usually a false cast or two gets the fly floating great again.

Also, I'm sure this fly has a given name but I could not find it or info on who originally developed it. Leave a comment if you know either the name or creator.

The Upper Clark Fork is off the hook!

The Upper Clark Fork is off the hook right now!  The flow is perfect (for now), there are solid Mothers Day caddis hatches everyday, and the streamer fishing is ridiculous.  It is the time of year to throw big and yellow.  These mean browns were throwing themselves out of the water for my streamers and the big boys came out from every undercut bank with a vengeance.  I had a couple of them destroy my streamer right at the surface with a huge splash.

I wouldn't bullshit you... But this guy might!

2015 Drift Boat Drive-in and Caddis Festival

Looks like a solid weekend of fun in Trout Town, USA!!  See you there...