Archive for category: Latest

Late May can be a tough time to find fishy water around Jackson Hole. Temperatures have been warm and snow melt has made most of our favorite trout waters high and unfishable. Time to get out the extra spools of sinking fly line and boxes of leeches and wooly buggers.

I had some fun friends join me last week for a few days of lake fly fishing. We headed south, taking the drift boat out and targeted cruising browns, rainbows and lake trout. While we didn’t catch tons of fish, we did hook up enough to stay interested and managed a handful of pretty nice size trout. Olive, black and brown beadhead leech patterns worked best (great spring lake flies!) but we also threw some streamers with a little more flash and got some aggressive takes too. Each day ended with beer, whiskey and grilled meat. Not a bad way to enjoy spring. The guys got out of town just in time for more rain and snow; the makings of which made it easier to hunker down and replumb the fishing cabin.

Seth B with a nice brown trout

Raph with one of his chunky rainbows

In the coming days, i have a few fishing trips on the books. We’ll most likely continue to target still waters with leech patterns.

Mid March always hints at warmer weather to come. All of a sudden days are longer and precipitation in the Jackson valley can just as easily be rain as snow. This past weekend gave us two glorious days of sunshine and relatively warm temperatures. Naturally the best thing to do was go fishing!

Jamie, Lulu and I loaded into the truck and headed south into the Snake River canyon. We donned snowshoes, allowing us to walk over snow and access a nice piece of water that has treated us well in the past. This was part fishing trip, park dog training expedition and all around family fun day. We were hoping to fish to rising cutthroat trout but they never materialized. I think that despite the air temperature, cold water prevented aggressive surface feeding. Instead we tied on nymphs and streamers and brought a few fish to hand.

Overall Lulu did well. As some of you know, Lulu’s retriever instincts kick into overdrive when fish are involved. While she did get excited, I think she did noticeably better. When we got home, we realized how great it was to get out together in the sun and on the water! Can’t wait for more days like it to come.

After what seemed like an eternity, I finally got out fishing! Really, it’d only been a month or so, but if felt like forever. I used a new Orvis Recon 10′ 4wt that I got a while back specifically for nymph fishing on the Wind. Being so busy guiding this past year though, I hadn’t broke it out yet. The temperature was in the mid 40s, the sun was shinning and midges were all over the water. After easing into things and and experimenting with some fly patterns, I hooked a nice brown trout who decided to run me down river and eventually popped off. At least he jumped a few times and i got a good look at him. Up river I continued, hooking up with some rainbows and browns. I finally turned back for the truck when my right leg became too numb from the ice cold water that filled up my waders- turns out I had a pretty good hole in the leg and from the minute i got in the river, water began soaking my foot and leg. Got to say it was great to get out, especially in some mild weather conditions!

First fish land on the new rod. The first fish hooked on the new rod was a wiley brown that jumped a few times and took off down river…. I laughed and appluded his efforts

A nice looking piece of Wyoming trout water..

Had to be at least one fish there right? That’s mr. brown trout

Overall I was pretty happy with the 10′ Recon rod. I had it matched with a new Battenkill reel (I think these are FANTASTIC trout reels) and a floating Orvis nymphing line. Even though the rod was a 4wt, it seemed pretty stiff (not surprising though since it seems like everyone is obsessed with fast action rods). It cast nice and felt good fighting fish. I threw a streamer a little bit with it and it had PLENTY of power to send that thing whereever I wanted. Fishing with some weight and nymphs, it cast accurately in close with just a foot or so of fly line out and also at longer distances. I guess the one benifit of the stiffer tip is that I could set the hook quickly… I am curious to try the 3wt version; maybe the tip will be a little softer..? Still though, I feel like this is a good setup for nymph fishing our bigger freestone rivers in Wyoming.