It’s finally Friday! We have a big holiday weekend kicking off today which should send a lot of recreational floaters out to the Craig area. Usually this weekend marks the end of the Missouri River bikini hatch and the start of our late summer/fall fishing season. As the waxing and waining hatch of bikini sums up an otherwise productive season of entertainment we should start looking forward to BWO’s, streamers, and October Caddis.
Flows have remained in the low 3,000’s and water temps are on the continual trend of warming up. This morning we are at 65F at Holter Dam. The weather is supposed to be sunny and hot for the next few days, good for some fun in the sun but bad for the fishing. The good news is we have a nice cooling trend to look forward to in the 10 day forecast. We should start to see highs in the lower 80’s and 70’s by the end of next week.
The fishing has been pretty steady for the past few days. I would rate it as hit or miss for dry flies and pretty good for nymphing. The streamer fishing is taking a few fish as well. The most consistent angling would be with a nymph rig up near the dam. You can count on a few Trico hours in the morning as well. Spinner fall is now peaking around 8:30 a.m.
The hopper bite is hit or miss throughout the river. If you stick with it, you will get some fish. It may be a handful of nice ones or it could be just a few eats all day long. Overall, our hopper fishing has improved greatly since early August. There is potential for a great day on the hopper, just don’t expect it to be every day. They seem to like the big foamy ones. They also like purple ones, whatever.
If you are seeing some little bugs hatching randomly throughout the day, you probably are. Don’t clean off your glasses and scratch your head trying to figure these guys out. The are Pseudos. This is a tough game to play on The MO. Harder then the Trico’s and harder then finding a girl to take home in Craig. The best way to get a fish that’s on Pseudos is to toss a terrestrial at them. An ant will work best, but if you are rigged up with a hopper that will do the trick as well. You know they are looking up, they will see your fly.
Happy fishing! It’s hard to believe we are knocking on the door of September.
