Sedges have edges

Photo of traveling sedge

The annual and usually predictable traveling sedge hatch on Georgetown Lake, Montana has been anemic this year, to say the least.  After 3 weeks of heartbreak, I think it's time to move on the some of the year's best carping.

To be fair, the fishing is still good up at the lake.  There are daily spinnerfalls of callibaetis and the damsels get going around noon.  The fish will eat a damselfly nymph slow stripped or fished below a dry or bobber.  The sight fishing on sunny days in the shallow flats has been really fun and many of these fish are eating dries as well as your perfectly cast damsel nymph or small leech.  I did see the sedges.  Each day I saw more and more.  Right at dusk, you will see quite a few and if you've never seen the hatch at full bore, you might think it looks ok.  But, it's not.  There should be more bugs, the fish should be so keyed in on them that they eat the dry all day, and it should definitely be going strong by now.  The lake has been full and we had a nice normal wet spring.  Maybe it's still coming; I don't know.

Anyway, it's hot in Montana and so is the fishing.  It's also prime time for giving the trout a break from the summer crowds and exploring all over Montana's carp country.

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.

LaFontaine's Buzzball - A Step by Step Guide

LaFontaine's Buzzballs!

In the book Trout Flies: Proven Patterns by Gary LaFontaine, he sates that he developed this fly for the great winter midge hatches on the Missouri River here in MT.  I have found that this simple and effective little fly does a great job mimicking midge clusters wherever they are found.

In recent years, the Buzzball has had a huge resurgence in popularity with the credit mostly going to Mark Raisler of Headhunters Fly Shop in Craig, MT.  He has found that the Buzzball also works great in the summertime on the MO when there are a ton of dead bug parts on the surface.  I, as well as everyone else he's turned onto this fly (I actually think Sara R. gave me my first one), have had amazing success with it.

It doesn't end there.  Being the endless experimenter that I am, I've taken the Buzzball all over Montana and used in on a variety of waters.  I've tested it on everything from the freestone rivers and Georgetown Lake, to stocked borrow pits and high alpine lakes.  I've also experimented with the recipe.  The variable here is the orange hackle used in the original pattern.  If you use brown or black instead of the orange, you can cover a variety of lighting and hatch situations.  I've also found that substituting a cream colored hackle for the orange is extremely effective for the spruce moth which occur on the west-side, freestone streams.

The Buzzball is ridiculously simple to tie, easy to see on the water, and extremely effective in a variety of situations.  In my book, that is what makes a good fly!  Here's the recipe for the original and step-by-step instruction.

Hook:  Size 18-12 dry fly hook (16 is my favorite)
Thread:  8/0 burnt orange
Hackle:  1 grizzly hackle in the appropriate size (approx. 1 1/2 gap length); 1 light dun hackle (smaller, but size doesn't matter); 1 orange hackle (smaller, but size doesn't matter) 


Step 1:

Wrap the hook shank thoroughly and evenly.


Step 2:

Tie in the grizzly hackle in a size appropriate to the hook.

Step 3:

Tie in the orange hackle (size is not important because this is going to get cut).


Step 4:

Tie in the light dun hackle (again, size in not important because this going to be cut) and the advance thread to front of the hook.


Step 5:

Palmer both the orange and light dun hackles to the front of the hook.

Step 6:

Cut the orange and light dun hackles to about hook gap length all around the hook so that it resembles a bottle brush.

Step 7:

Palmer the grizzly hackle forward and then whip finish.

Step 8:

Cut the grizzly hackle flush to the orange and light dun on the top and bottom of the fly only.  Your done!

Missoula area fishing report - July

They're here 

Clark Fork:  The CF is still big but clear and fishing great!  You'll want a boat and someone who can row or hit your safe high-er water spots.  I saw a lot of summer weekender fishers struggling this weekend with the current conditions.  So, maybe this report will be more effective if I write about what not to do.  First off, it's summer and fishing on a bright sunny day at 3 in the afternoon is about the worst time ever.  Yet, for some reason, it seems that a lot of people wait all year to go fishing and then go at that time.  You need to get up early or get out at dusk.  As you can see from above, the tube hatch is in full swing.  A good rule of thumb: If there's tubes on the water, you should not be.  Also, if you'r not catching fish, move on.  I saw about 10 people fishing the Double Tree hole last night like they were on the Salmon River in NY with a guy skipping stones in between them all.  I mean, give yourself a chance people.  There are tons of rising trout less than 1/4 mile up or downstream and all these people were in the wrong spot and all over each other.  Weird. 

In the early morning there are tons of PMDs and huge Clark Fork trout gorging on them until about 11.  There is some mid-day fishing to be had but it tapers off hard in the afternoon.  Then, at about 7:30 +/-, the PMD spinners and swarms of caddis cover the water, and it is on all over again.  I caught some great fish on caddis dries this last weekend.  Finally!!

The Blackfoot:  I try to stay away from the shit show of guides, dudes, and tubers that take over the best reaches of the Blackfoot for the summer time.  Can anyone say “river permits are on their way?”  However, just like on any other body of water, the Blackfoot has its secrets.  If you actually spend the time to do your homework, you can have the best of the fishing and the whole place to yourself.

For instance, there are miles and miles of Blackfoot and some fantastic tribs up around the Lincoln area.  See my Mike Horse Mine post to understand why the fish numbers are lower up here than on the lower river.  However, when you consider people per fish per mile (something that should always be considered), you’re in the money. Instead of other fisherpeople and tubers, the only thing you’re going to run into up here is bears and moose.

Streamers are great in the morning and there are some great brown trout up here mixed in with the cutthroat. My best brown was caught dipping a Prince Nymph into a root wad hole.  In the evening, there is a massive rusty spinner fall and caddis are everywhere.  These fish don't see a lot of artificial flies and will destroy your Elk Hair Caddis without thinking twice. 

Buy a map, some gas, some bear spray, and some elk hair caddis and get it done!

The Bitterroot:  I can't give a really accurate report here.  I haven’t been on the Root since before runoff.  I imagine it’s shaping up like nobody’s business.  The caddis and PMD spinners on the lower Root are great this time of year.  You’re still going to want a boat for a little while longer with the above average flows.

Rock Creek:  This stream is so much fun this time of year!  An attractor with a dropper is all you usually need unless you get into a specific hatch.  Instead of tubers, you’re going to have to deal with a bunch of dudes.  The thing that you have to remember and keep telling yourself is that the majority of them have no idea what the hell they are doing and they are not catching all the fish, by any means.  The best way to avoid them is to get up early, get off the paved road, cover some miles on foot, and you will catch more awesome fish than you ever thought possible.  Don’t drive up next to the hole, make 1,000 casts in the same lame spot 500 other fisherpeople have pounded on for the past 3 months.  Try to remember Montana’s stay-out-of-sight ethic and try as hard as possible to make it happen.  

For this time of year, I like to fish a smaller golden stone attractor with a short nymph dropper in the daytime. Fish the knee deep riffle water. If you can't get up early to avoid the other fisherpeople, you will get double rewarded right now by staying out late.  As I mentioned earlier, most people want to fish in the heart of the afternoon.  Most of them will go home right before some great evening caddis fishing starts to shape up. In the evening, your favorite caddis pattern or a rusty spinner will nail em. 

Area lakes and ponds:  The trout lakes are fishing great.  For the most part, the summertime rules of early morning and evening still apply here.  I'd love to be up at Georgetown right now as I'm sure the damsels have the big rainbows all worked up.  I'll be fishing the Seeley-Swan region in the coming days and will have an expanded report on that.  The little stocker ponds are not the place to go right now.  They get fished out and hot and filled with swimmers etc.

So in a nutshell, avoid tubers, stale water, the middle of the day, and you'll have some really great, classic Montana, summertime fishing.

Clark Fork fishing report and the Dude Rig

The fishing is completely back on in western Montana!!  The streams are still pretty big so your going to need a boat or know where the fish are safely accessible.  Here's some things I saw yesterday fishing right near Missoula:

• 2 adult salmonflies ovipositing (in town!!)
• Caddis all over the place
• Trout rising to dry flies
• 4' or so of visibility
• A cloud of PMD spinners
• Golden stones
• Lots of big healthy trout as well as some little guys

The Dude Rig for streamers

For the past couple of weeks, one of the most productive setups in western Montana has been the double streamer Dude Rig.  This is a rig that guides use for clients because in the hands of a beginner, it is dummy proof.  Dead drifting streamers is super effective on the down side of runoff and this rig makes it so anyone can nail em.  Got a friend new to fishing, who can't mend or maintain a good drift?  The dude rig is perfect!  Bad mends just jig the fly.  Dragging it also can trigger a strike.  Similarly, in the hands of an effective fisherperson, the dude rig should be illegal! 

The Dude Rig:

Your going to need the 1" Thingamabobber to float your 2 weighted streamers.  You'll be fishing this rig right up against the banks so your flies should not be too deep.  More than 4' to the first fly is usually too much.  You can use whatever two streamers you want but the JJ Special/ Big Hole Crawler has been the bee's knees for the past couple of weeks, on every stream I've fished.  You can also trade out the bottom fly for any nymph, say the worm.   

Wood's rose - Rosa woodsii

The wild roses have bloomed and the snow is off Snowbowl.  Get off your ass and go fishing!

The Flashback Purple Haze Soft Hackle

The Flashback Purple Haze Soft Hackle is a great fly pattern and is effective in all sizes but works best in sizes 22-16.

FB Purple Haze SH

HOOK: Size 22-6 (best in 22-16) - scud or nymph
THREAD: Purple 6/0
RIBBING: Black small diameter wire
FLASHBACK: Medium pearl tinsel
BODY: Thread in small sizes, purple dubbing for larger sizes
THORAX: Hand blend dubbing mix in natural or bright colors with some rabbit fur for texture
SOFT HACKLE: Partridge hackle tips for small sizes, palmered partridge for larger sizes

This fly (in the appropriate sizes) works great for midge, baetis, and caddis hatches. I love to fish soft hackles. When you are doing it right, it is as much fun and requires as much, if not more, skill than dry fly fishing.

Making something look alive with respect to its natural movements can be more challenging than making something look dead or still.