smokey sunset on the Big Hole
Big Hole River 230 cfs—Maidenrock Despite no rain the river continues to hold it’s flow and even bumped up a little.Dry fly action is still good with tricos in late morning. Yesterday the action did not start until almost noon and then it was great. After the trico action was over we tried different hopper patterns with little luck. Then the chubby chernoble kicked in late afternoon and produced very well. Day before on the Beaverhead was a mixed bag of flies. We got an 18 inch brown on a streamer right at the launch site. Then we got a 16 inch brown on the far side of the river on a hopper. It turned out to be the kiss of death for those flies as those were the only fish we got all day on those patterns. The rest was a mix of caddis, chubbys, nymph droppers. The trick on the chubby’s was to skate them or strip them fairly fast. They wouldn’t touch it dead drifting. Every day we are having smokey conditions from the fires in Idaho and western Montana. It does make for some pretty sunsets but I for one have had about enough of it. Streamer action on both these rivers is picking up.