Neue Montana Angelberichte

The Lower Clark Fork north of Missoula is fishing great with dries and dry/dropper rigs. We’re seeing multiple hatches on any given day. PMDs , Brown and Gray drakes. BWOs. The fish are looking up late mornings into early the afternoon. Dry/dropper has been deadly with large Chubbys and a tungsten jig head nymphs are your best all around producers.

Pre runoff conditions are keeping the water in great shape with perfect visibility. The rainbow spawn is about wrapped up but most of thise fish are still hanging around. Nymphing a two fly indicator rig is your best bet. A dark color Pats stone and a red #8-14 San Juan worm are tough to beat. Have some egg patterns and midges as well. We’re seeing BWOs early afternoon so have some patterns on hand. The streamer bite is picking up especially if you get a cloudy day. Go with muted or dark colors rather than bright ones in #4-8.

The Clark Fork’s spring fishing is heating up with Skwalas, March Browns and BWOs getting the fish looking up! Dry fly season is here! Nymphing is also producing well when the dry bite isnt up to par.

The evening temps have been on the chilly side in SW Montana, triggering the fall pre spawn streamer season. The Madison is giving up some really nice browns on streamers. Some on the strip and pause and some using an upstream cast and a little more dead drift with a good pump and a pause. Look for the usual targets. Hard banks, shelves and faster water. Fly color can make a difference as will size. If fish are following a stripped fly but wont commit will often smash a smaller fly. White is my go to color especially on brighter days but olive, copper, black and combos are must haves. Get in touch to book your fall streamer trip today!

The Yellowstone River is all anout the grasshoppers now that most of the big summer hatches are over. Aftetnoon temps are still in the high 80’s and thats keeping those hoppers happy and hoppering! Plop your hopper tight to the bank fishing fast seams , grassy banks and large downed cottonwoods. Make your hopper hot the water with a splashy plop as its one of the triggers for hopper hungry trout. Put some twitches in yoyr drift for the same reason. We like a mid to large hopper in tan , peach, purple so we can hang a dropper of the bend of the hook. Panty Dropper, CFO Ant, Skippy hopper, Streambank hopper im sizes # 6-10. Some productive droppers have been Psycho may in brown, Two Bit Hooker, Beadhead pheasant tail. So Get your fly tight to the banl and twitch it! Hang on!

The Yellowstone is fishing great even with the high summer temperatures. We’re starting to see the first hopper grabs but its not quite there. The Stoneflies are done and the hopper fishing is just getting going but we expect that to change soon. Right now our best fishing has been drifting streamers under an indicator with a small nymph behind it. Using some downstream mends and twitches to keep the streamer swimming with some drag on it. Big browns fall victim to this tactic regularly being the carnivores they are. Rabbit sculpins in natural and olive with a #16-20 beadhead nymph running 15” behind has been the hot ticket. Soft hackles are a great nymph patterns along with pheasant tails and caddis.