New Product, a winner for the winter

Fished Spring Creek last week, tried a new product, Patagonia R-1 gloves- WOW they work. I saw the wright up in a few mags and decided to get a pair, they arrived in good order, I tried them on, a bit tight, I used a Large size but OK let's try them. I used them all morning and you can feel the rod handle and strip line from the reel, maybe if your using a bit bigger tippet material than 5x you could tie a fly on but the real test was landing and releasing fish, absolutely no cold hands! With this product they got it right, retail is $39.00 @ pair but if you consider all the other gloves you have used and still had cold hands not expensive.
  The fly of the day was a size #16 med brown/olive scud, this is the go to fly in the winter and most any other time of the year, I did use a #14 heavy chez style caddis to get the fly down. All the fish came in dead slack water or the soft seams along the dead water. Nothing big but just a nice day.
  On my way home I stopped at the Sipping Pool and decided to fish it, what a waste of time, first wading across is a great way to get gassed, every time you move the smell is enough to make you go back but I waded on, getting to the North bank I stood and watched for 1 hour, all the while a terrific midge and #24 BWO hatch was taking place- 2 rises that's all, tried to get to them but the bottom is so soft that I was sinking in over my knees to get close to them, had my 8' #2 Winston and the casts are not intended to be long. I just do not see the fish like we used to but the insects are there, I guess the Fish Comm. has a great excuse for it but not sure that I want to hear it, the area below Tylersville is sick and needs to be dealt with. Don't even bother to stop and try it.

Happy New Year

Happy 2013, I trust your celebration was safe and that your looking for a more eventful year as far as trout fishing is concerned, at least when your fishing you don't have to think about the idiots in Washington! Hope that the Winter blues have not hit you yet, with the Holiday season it is hard to break away and fish but that is behind us now, if your still inside looking out the widow try any of these sites to get you moving:
www.headhuntersflyshop.com a wonderful daily dialogue on the Missouri River in Montana, I read it every day and just love their commentary of fishing and life.
http://globalflyfishers.com/video a great collection of videos of fishing and fly tying,good learning site.
www.worleybuggerflyco.com is the parent company of Natures Sprit fly tying material- I saw them in Montana and they have some really nice stuff and are pleasant to do business with.
www.riplipsfishing.com is a wonderful place to purchase all your tungsten beads, at $13.00 @ 100 it is the best deal in town- check them out- their name sucks but what the heck.
  Looking to tie tube flies for Fall stream fishing here in the East and need to learn as much as I can, check out http://oregonflyfishingblog.com "how to tie tube flies", this should get me going. Any of you guys know how to do it, give me a gingle jhepner@ptd.net and tell me what to buy.
Check the following site to get you warm- http://solidadventures.com and find "Jurassic Lake" if that does not get you warm your dead. Going fishing because the sun is out and the scuds will be active when it shines. It is also midge time, look for the soft seams and back water for the small dimples. Penns has a few truly great midge pools and just below Stan's bridge is one of them- not easy at all but has rising fish.

Penns Creek and the Bale Eagle

Fished Penns Creek last week and was treated to a companion who was just watching me, a mature Bald Eagle sat in a stream side tree and observed me all the while bitching at me, only when I moved upstream did it leave. I fished below Coburn, just above Stan's bridge using #12 Chez nymphs and a #18 Pheasant Tail nymph as a trailer, took fish on both and neither seemed to out fish the other. Moved upstream to the next soft riffle and it became apparent that this was sucker heaven. None of the fish were in bad post spawn shape and seemed to be on a moderate feed, more typical of mid December.
  I did forget to mention last week that Spring Creek is filled with wood debris from Sandy which will help the survival of our juvenile trout for the winter. The amount of wood that is held in the stream as been shown to greatly effect small trout over the winter season, this gives them somewhere to hide and feed in peace, not worry about what flies or swims and has them on the menu. Looking at Penns I see the same debris and hope that we do not have a blow out to move this material out, the next time your out take a look at this and observe the amount of small fish using the cover. I need to take a look at Cherry Run but feel this also has received a good amount of storm debris.
  I did notice that most of the Penns browns were in the softer seams and not in the mid riffle lies that we normally find them, this is a normal winter pattern and will become more of a factor as the water cools. For now lets leave them alone and have a good holiday season with our families.

Dec 2012 Post Spawn not quite yet

State College 68 degrees on Dec 4th, Spring Creek @ 51.8 degrees and the fish are still spawning. Looks as if the 2012 spawn has been a very good one by the number of redds you can see and the pairs still going strong.Did not see any really big pairs but enough of the 12 thru 15" class fish that makes it worth going. At 10:00 AM the midges and olives were going strong and the fish also. Not the typical winter olive hatch but they were eating them, midges seemed to be less important. If you floated it to them they would eat not any really nice fish but still for Dec 4 not bad at all. I used one dry fly a #24 loop wing olive emerger, did not have any refusals! I do not think that the trout have taken their typical winter lies at this time but it also does not appear that they are on the post spawn feed. I did take a few skinny males that really needed some extra calories! Did not bother to fish scuds, too dam many people in the good nymph water- just too nice! I'm looking for a nice drizzle or soft snow fall to bring the olives in mass before the Jan/Feb turn off occurs.
  Heard a few reports that Cherry Run was full of really nice 12-16" sized browns from the new Cherry Run bridge to the new bridge at Ole Mingle, we had a good flow of water that allowed them to ascend and spawn. I hope none of the locals took any of them, they are our future!

Nov.2012 The Spawn?

Fished Spring Creek Wed. & Thursday of this week, Olives were the name of the game not strong but they ate everyone that passed them by even moving a few inches to intercept them. I used a #20 1/2 loop emerger in olive, if I got the float right they ate it, not big numbers but just the same they made me smile. Did see quite a few tan caddis around and also noticed a few big rises to Oct. caddis, all in all a nice few days. Checked the known spawning locations for redds but did not see them, looks as if they are just starting to dig a few but not the numbers that Spring Creek usually has, maybe a week to 10 days will be about right. Normally around Thanksgiving is the perfect time unless we have a real early flush and cold snap?
  Resisted the urge to fish streamers, just to dam much work, might try Penns this weekend with a large purple bunny pattern.

East vs. West Fly Shops

It's easy to compare the East and West from a customer view point of fly shops. The West has much more to offer, Headhunter tippet, leaders and a wide varity of other leader material. Craig, MT is home to "3" fly shops, The Orvis shop is typical of the company, rods made in American and everything else made in China, one word shooty. Headhunters is a new comer to the scene but their web site is wonderful, filled with a very candid snapshot of current fishing conditions, they speak the truth. The coffee is always on as is the Yeti cooler on the front porch filled with beer, nice touch. This shop has girls in the store and they can fish, not here in the East. The Trout Shop also in Craig is large it has almost everyting that you could want or need, Patagonia, Simms, Headhunter, Rio to name a few. The Trout Shop also has a small deli that serves a wonderful selection of made on the spot sandwiches, try the "cuban" (had 3 of them in the 10 days), they offer Starbucks coffee- who knew. Moving up the river to Wolf Creek you'll find MRO, a full service shop with motel and cabin rentals, Tim is still there and will go out of his way to help. All of these shops give good solid advice but never oversell the river or the trout and they never insult customers with boasting of their skills?
  We did the 5 shops in Bozeman and found they offered the same type of laid back underselling of the resource, each shop had it's nitch but they all got along, a far cry from the shops in our area who seem to enjoy bickering about one another, to the point of vengence.
  Stopped in Ennis at the shop and found the same wide selection and wonderful service. West Yellowstone offers 3 shops Arrick's know for matedrials, Montana River Outfitter had a great guy in the shop, Chris Daniels the brother of TCO manager George Daniels, Chris has some of the best photography that I have ever seen, innovation seems to run in the family. Stopped in at Blue Ribbon a wonderful shop, just to stand in front of the deer and elk hair bins and pick the perfect piece for your tying needs is wonderful.
  The last shop was George Andersen's in Livingston, same wonderful service and wide selection, makes we want to stay in the West.
  Our local shops have limited selections and seem to want to tell everyone about how well the do and not give a shit about their potential customer, out West the set the customerrs expectitations lower and deliver far more in the end. If you want to tell everyone how great you are don't do it to customers and don't oversell the resource.
  When was the last time you saw the wide product offering in our area, we do have the anglers but not the single store to serve them

Montana October 2012

Time for my annual trip to Montana in October in hopes of a strong Baetis hatch on the Missouri, well that did not happen the first two days, normal Pesudo's- those little devils! On the Missouri the fish will take a bigger imitation if you present it well on the first float, they did. I fished with Arti Newman from Sunbury who now lives in Craig, MT "Trout Town USA", we used a drift boat and really could not get in position to work the pods of rising fish, still did well. Had reservations on two spring creeks, took off for Bozeman. A good friend of mine from FL and I tried Milesnick's Benhardt Spring Creek (3 miles of heaven) in Belgrade, MT, 406-388-7001 but the first day we had winds of 45 MPH not good for casting or for that matter getting out of a portapotty! We took off South and fished Three Dollar Bridge and Slide in area of the Madison and did very well- still not the Missouri.rainbows. We tried Milesnick's the next day arriving with Mary saying "You two are certainly determined" go ahead and try it and come back and pay if it's ok. We did well but with the winds at only 30 MPH we could not stand it more that an hour, we'll be back in the future. Wed. I had reservations for Nelson's Spring Creek, Paradise Valley, MT 406-222-6560, arrived at 9:00 AM,walked the entire 1.5 miles of the stream and took a few browns before a truly wonderful Pesudo hatch took place, the entire stream was alive with rising trout from 10 to 20+", just what we wanted! We noticed when signing the guest book no one was there since mid Sept., we had steady rising trout till 5:00 PM, truly heaven. Give either of these spring creeks a try at least once in your life, the video below is from Nelson's.

  Back to the Missouri, fished 2 more days in the drift boat and could not get any steady rising fish due to the winds gusts, this was the week for WIND! Took fish but I really do not like indicator or streamer fishing from a boat. Saturday came and I was determined to wade fish the old way. Drove to one of my favorite spots and just watched the river, saw fish working the tail out off a gravel bar, they never broke the surface but were eating. Used the same rig that has worked well the last 20 years in the fall, a #16 soft hackle wet, biot body, fur collar and med dun soft hackle. They ate it but I had a heck of a time keeping them on, hook ups only lasted 15-30 seconds, finally I had a break off and tied another one on using 4X, same crap happened but this time I looked at my hook- the gap had opened. Did not take long to determine that Tiemco 2487's we not the answer, quickly knotted on a 2457 #16 and landed 16 big rainbows, still had the typical MO break offs, at take and run and break off. A truly wonderful morning, gos to show you if some thing worked before don't be stupid do it again till the fish tell you otherwise. The picture is of one of the 16 that morning, 20+" , heavy with no marks in her mouth.