Summary:
It’s been just a stellar week here in Craig, Montana on the Missouri River working with Headhunters Fly Shop. The fishing has been good to great overall this week even with the lack of dry flies. We’ve got another 2 days up here and then it’s off to the Yellowstone River where the reports we are getting is that its about to start happening!
Hatches:
PMDs in the morning and some caddis in the afternoon – although the hatch was pretty weak yesterday.
Weather & Water Conditions:
As we mentioned the weather has been pretty much perfect. If you’ve been following the blog at all you’ve probably seen that the river has dropped to 16,000 cfs, which is still big and there have been several sunken boats over the past 7 days! If you come up be very careful of the strong eddie lines.
Best Technique:
There is really no dry fly action so its all nymphing. Your rig should be about 7 to 9 ft to the 3/0 split shot (big). You have to find the softer water which is on the insides or backs of the islands or the inside bend of the river.
Best Bugs:
You should be running the Brain Buster wire worm all day. In the morning our best trailer fly was the Hot Head Scud or the Hot Head PMD nymph in a 14 or 16 size. In the afternoon our best trailer was the same, but we also had luck on the beaded diving caddis.
Summary:
It was probably the prettiest day in Montana this season and we were fortunate to guide with Headhunters Fly Shop in Craig, Montana. Fishing was great though the dry fly action was lacking.
Hatches:
PMDs in the morning and some caddis in the afternoon.
Weather & Water Conditions:
As we mentioned the weather was perfect. If you’ve been following the blog at all you’ve probably seen that the river is at 18,000 cfs, which is HUGE! If you come up be very careful of the strong eddie lines.
Best Technique:
There is really no dry fly action so its all nymphing. Your rig should be 10-13 ft to the 3/0 split shot (big). Oh yeah you better have a long handled net if you want to land any of the fish you hook!
Best Bugs:
You should be running the Brain Buster wire worm all day. In the morning our best trailer fly was the Hot Head Scud or the Hot Head PMD nymph. In the afternoon our best trailer was the Humpback Scud or the Cat Puke caddis emerger.
Those of you planning an early July trip might just be in luck this year. The
Yellowstone River is dropping fast and starting to show signs of clearing up. The bottom appears to have dropped out of the
Lamar River which is currently running at 2,750 cfs and is one of the major sources of mud for the Yellowstone. The river in Livingston is running at 11,500 cfs, and the water is just starting to change from a dirty brown to a green hugh with about 4-6 inches of visibility. If this trend continues it has the makings for some good clear water
salmon fly action! Keep you fingers crossed and we’ll keep you updated.
Pat Green Concert
Yellowstone Valley Lodge, Paradise Valley Grill and Montana Fly Fishing Guides are happy to announce that Pat Green will be playing at Yellowstone Valley Lodge Saturday, July 31st. Did we mention he’ll be playing for FREE !
Gates will open at 6:00 PM and music will start around 7:00 PM
To hear some of Pat Green’s music stop by his website at www.PatGreen.com.
We will get you more details in the next couple weeks so stay tuned!
We just found a great new wind speed map that might be useful to those of you who spend most of your summer days outside.
Current wind speeds for Montana
A few years ago I remember driving with one of our core guides, Russel Elwell. We were mid conversation while I was parking the truck, then without a hesitation in our dialog I spun the truck around to park facing into the gale force wind. Russell looked at me and said, “Do you realize how much time we (referring to Livingston locals) spend thinking about the wind.” I didn’t even mention why I was re-parking the truck, but he already knew that I didn’t want my doors ripped off by the gusts.
He was right about how much we think of the wind around here. While this map won’t deter us from being in Montana fly fishing, hunting, skiing, hiking or any of the other 100 great things to do – it might just give us a heads up.
River around Livingston, Montana
“What’s your favorite river to fish?” – probably the question we hear the most when guiding. You wanna know? Here you go:
- Yellowstone River – obviously, it’s our home river. We guide 120 miles of the longest freestone (un-dammed) river in the lower 48 States, how could you not love fishing that?
- Boulder River – this small rafting stream is a half raft trip half fishing adventure.
- Soda Butte Creek – this small little gem in Yellowstone National Park has huge Cutthroat that eat dry flies.
- Armstrong Spring Creek – one of the best sight fishing for big trout spring creek anywhere in the world!
- Smith River – walk/wading through the upper stretches of this small stream can produce some big brown trout.
- Lower Madison – OK we know it can be a bit weird to fish and it’s mostly nymphing or streamers, but this is the river where you’ve truly got a chance to catch a Montana trophy.
- Stillwater River – it’s a bit of a drive, but it’s a bigger version of the Boulder River and stays floatable through out the season.
- DePuy Spring Creek – with over 3 miles of spring creek and predictable hatches it’s another Paradise Valley gem.
- East Gallatin – we might get in trouble for this one with some of the locals, but it’s true. This tiny stream right by the Gallatin Airfield holds some huge trout which might be eating Trico’s in the morning and Hoppers in the afternoon.
- Missouri River – Alright it’s not really that close to Livingston, but we head up there every June for about a month and it’s one of our favorites because it doesn’t experience the major run-off like the majority of the rivers in our area. Oh yeah did we mention the huge trout.
What are your favorite Montana Rivers?
