A few more days of Craig looking like a frozen wasteland then it looks like another nice break in the weather coming up for the Helena / Wolf Creek area. According to the weather man it’s looking up for the weekend and following week with highs hitting in the high 50s or even 60s! Weekend is looking like highs in the low fifties, still totally acceptable. Get off the couch, kick off the Netflix binge, and get after it. Remember that you need a new FWP Montana Fishing License for the 2015 season, don’t get caught fishing without it! Even with the normal tail end of winter weather in the last week fishing has picked up on the MO. Lots of fish moving around with a smattering of redds spotted below both Hauser and Holter Dam.
Remember to keep an eye out for the ladies sitting on their eggs and try to not disturb them. If you need another reminder about what to avoid check out our post from last year.
Chewy’s hand-tied Kreelex produces a nice Brown.
Fishing over the past few days has been excellent if you can find the right water. The right water being a combination of slow and deep. There is no run too slow, or too deep. Streamer fishing has been producing a good number of fish looking for a bigger meal lower down in the canyon. Guess where we were finding them; if you said slow, deep runs, pat yourself on the back. Get a bugger, humble suggestions below, at the top of the deep stuff and let it swing nice and that’s right, slow. I’ll stop beating this horse, I think you get the point. We had a few Browns chasing streamers from off shore too, its just an issue of putting fly in front of fish at that point with a nice steady retrieve.
Hot Streamers: Kreelex (Classic & Olive), Sparkle Minnows(Sculpin, Olive, & JJ), Krystal Buggers (Brown), Sculpzilla & Mini-Loop Sculpin
Impressive Nymphs: Firebead anything really. Ray Charles (Pink, Orange and Tan), Scuds, Rainbow Czechs, Zebra (Black & Purple), Brassies.
Great Dries: Midge Clusters, Hanging Midge, Hi-Vis Para Midge, Small Adams (#18-20) & Griffiths Gnats.
Shameless Shop Promo: If you haven’t heard that Hank Patterson will be in Helena on March 20th, you should probably get out more, or at the least start checking the blog out more often. We still have tickets for the Helena premiere of Hank’s Reel Montana Adventure at the Helena shop for $12 (CASH or CHECK). We’ll also be hosting a pre-party with Hank at the shop before the showing. Tickets for the show are available online too. If you can’t make it to the shop CLICK HERE to pay extra for the lack of effort.
Shameless Self Promotion: I didn’t draw a Smith Permit this year. So if any of you fine folks out in the blogosphere were lucky enough to win this year and are looking for an expert oarsman, mediocre fly fisherman and generally decent human being to join you (preferably in July) swing by the shop to see what we can work out!
~Cheers, Chewy
