Thursday April 5th.
As the snow fell last night I was wondering if I was going to have another early spring trip cancel due to the weather. I was confirmed for a full day wade/float trip through the Yellowstone Angler and I was sure that the Bozeman Pass would be a hair raising experience with the new snow on the ground. As it is in the spring the pass was slushy and trecherous due to semi drivers that drive to fast and act like assholes. The pass was slushy and one semi did pull a dipshit manuever passing several of us on slushy roads doing well over 75 mph in a full size semi. I stopped at the store and picked up the makings of the Hot Lunch that the clients would enjoy half way through their day. The clients were Jack and John and they were from Maine and Massachutes. Jack runs a non profit in Maine and John oversees a large bank in the Boston area. They were both experienced anglers who could handle themselves on the creeks just fine, but they enjoyed getting a guide once in a while to get a few pointers and pickup a few new tricks. We headed to Armstrongs with a selection of Baetis nymphs and dry patterns with hopes of having a good baetis hatch later in the day. When we arrived at the creek Peter was there with his two clients and they were heading into the diagonal riffle to give it a try. We suited up every piece of warm weather gear we had and headed for the holes upstream of Peter and his husband and wife team from New Mexico. The air temperature at 9 am on the creek was hovering around 28 degrees and the wind was blowing at a fairly consistent pace of 5 to 10 miles per hour, it was a little on the chilly side. Jack is 63 years old and he has had a few knee surgeries that require him to use a wading staff and a little patience in getting from spot to spot. I scurried John down the hill in the riffle above Peter and gave him his fly setup, which consisted of a Solitude Baetis nymph # 16 trailed with a # 18 Johnny Cash and a # 2 Split shot ahead of the two flies. Off he went to fish the deeper water and I headed Jack up to a spot where we could get down the bank. We got in the creek 50 yards above John and waded across to fish the Big Rock run. The stream work they did a month ago has helped concentrate the fish a bit since there is some deeper water that the fish can congregate in. There were about 9 fish in the lower end of the run and most of them appeared to be rainbows that were close to getting their game on. They were not sitting close to any reds but they most likely were either on the shallow water 25 yards below or heading to some above the long run. As I suspected Jack hooked into one on the third or fourth drift and it was a 14 inch bow that was turning black and getting ready for some romance. Jack had on a # 16 Sawyer trailed with a # 20 Red Heathen about 4 feet below a pinch on. The first fish took the heathen and put up a good fight. The next two fish that Jack hooked were close to the mouth but a little short of the corner of the mouth. Since I had Jack into a few fish I gave him some suggestions about how the proceed up the run and headed down to try and get John into a few fish to start off the day. He was fast to move up to the very head of the riffle and I arrived to him fishing in very shallow and fast water that the fish like in July. I moved him back down to the heart of the run and had him run some cast in the slower water. His fly setup was not producing from and area that I know has some fish in it. I changed up the Johnny cash for a # 18 pinkie and had him swing it down through the gut. On his second cast through the hole he hooked up to a smaller rainbow that we were able to land. After another ten minutes of going fishless we reeled up and headed for the run above Jack. I stopped by on the way to help Jack move up in the run a bit and sent John up the creek with my suggestions on where to stand. Jack hooked another fish and then I moved up to get John in the right postion. John made many good drifts through the deepest part of the hole and came up with one nice brown trout around 17 inches. He had changed up or lost the back fly and replaced it with a grey midge larvae. I showed him the inside of the seam, which he was not fishing and on his first cast he was onto another fish. After two more fish on the small fly he tied on the fly had been turned in little more than a hook with black thread. I changed him out to a # 20 Grey WD-50 and he took a fish on the first cast. I headed back down to Jack to change him up to a Grey Larvae and when I arrived at the head of the run there were some fish starting to sip something on the back side of the rock. We ran a couple of more nymphs through the hole and Jack hooked one nice rainbow that jumped and broke off. By then there were a couple of fish rising consistently enough to justify taking apart the nymph rig and putting on a dry. I put on a Black # 20 Cripple Thor and we decided to leave on the pinch on to help jack see the fly. His second or third cast had a take and he landed a nice rainbow on the dry. He was excited to get a fish on the surface and it helped to keep the cold wind and steam from making us ask ourselves what are we doing out here in the first place. It appeared the fish were eating midges but we were also getting close to the time that the baetis had been getting started on the creek for the past week. After several more misses and landing another fish the fish slowed to the offering of the Cripple Thor. I switched up to one of Zach's CDC emergers and we had a couple of takes right off the bat. During this dry fly frenzy John was steadily pulling in fish from the run above. Jack landed another fish and we decided it was time for some hot lunch. It was 1:30 when we hit the shack for Lunch and Peter was in the clients vehicle eating lunch and trying to warm up from the balmy 31 degree temperature at 1 pm. I got the hot Ham and Cheese on Sourdough going along with the soup that would help warm some cold feet, faces and hands. We ate a quick bite and John and Jack retired to the car for some time with the heater. After I got cleaned up and the gear packed in the truck I headed up to see if anyone was fishing the very upper end of the creek. When I got to the colvert there was a guy fishing from the new island and I headed back to fish below the hut on the lower end of the creek. As we headed for the lower end the sun burst from behind the clouds. I put John in the first run and headed Jack for the deep corner by the house. When we arrived there was a nice brown feeding on the surface between the downed tree and the bush near the middle of the hole. Jack had a # 20 Harrop Sparkle dun on and I had him through it at the fish. The baetis were starting to trickle down the creek and the fish was steadfastly feeding on the surface. It was a difficult down and across presentation that required a very accurate cast into the gap between the dead branches on the fallen tree and the bush. The cast was made tougher by a gust breeze that ranged between 5 and 15 mph. As the baetis started to pop I head for John so that I could have him fish the lower end of the run. Jack shouted out as he hooked and had a quick schooling from the brown under the bush. I rerigged John with a Comparadun and set him in place just above the fast water in the run below. There were 5 different fish feeding on the surface and I worked with John on the finer points of making a Winston IM6 perform a better more accurate cast. He managed to get several eats but was not able to put the steel to any of the fish. The hatch lasted for about an hour and then as soon as they started they were done. I gave them both new nymph rigs and put on Balloons for their indicators. They both liked them but we quickly began making bubba bass comments in regards to the silliness of using a balloon for an indicator. Jack hooked into the fish of the day in the deep hole and it was a nice rainbow that bull dogged Jack in the bottom of the hole for several minutes. Finally the fish turned down out of the hole and headed for Depuy's. I thought we were in business when the fish finally turned from the deep water but the fish went straight downstream and soon was far enough out that I was certain it was going to come unbuttoned. Sure enough it did and plenty of heckling came from John, especially when I was looking at Jack's setup and John hooked a fish that he joked was the one that Jack lost. The sawyer PT was the fly of the hour in the deep water for the next 45 minutes and then we decided to try and fish the upper end of the creek to finish off the day. I put jack in the new hole that comes off the log on the island and waded John across at the bottom of the island to fish the top end. John landed a couple of fish from the top of the island and Jack got bored and moved into the slough and stripped a bugger. The bugger took 4 fish from the slough and Jack was pretty wiped out for the day. John and I waded out into the muck below the island to run a spring creek scud and a Midge through the new dug out that bends back toward the culvert. The wading is mucky but it paid off with the biggest fish of the day comming on the scud. A nice 19 inch brown took fast and we had a couple of other smaller rainbows come to hand before the sun started to get low and the air temps dropped fast. It was a great day on the creek even with the artic weather.
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