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Well fortunately there are hatches most of the summer. But umm yeah for me no hatches pretty much means no trout fishing.
Fly Color? Black!
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ok how about people are less concerned these days with matching the hatch than they were back in the 1980s.
Last years number one salmonfly pattern? Purple chubby Chernobyl..
Last years number one parachute pattern purple haze.
If we had had a purple elk hair it would have been our best seller
Best selling bead head? Flashy lightning bugs. From a sales perspective i would have killed for purple copper johns.
Blue prince nymphs did well too.
I think Bozeman would be a pretty good place to judge what people are trout fishing with. Unless of course people were just buying them for show.
I drink a cold one and smoke a fine cigar...
Nah...it's the smell and the mess.
Especially, when ya forget to remove 'em from the tackle box.
Match the trigger, not the hatch. Every hatch has something that the fish notice and triggers them to go after it. If it is eggs, color may be the key, mayflies it might be silhouette, hoppers it might be the leg at the surface.
We often catch more fish by using flies with more of that trigger than the natural object. sort of like a giant goose decoy attracts more geese. A brighter orange egg. A darker mayfly, a really noisy hopper with many long rubber legs. Black is a good start at giving the fish "more of what it is looking for" So is purple and flash.
Often the trigger is in the motion. rising emergers, twitching hoppers, falling spinners. Presentation is then key, but something loud and presented well might jet more attention than something subtle.
We often catch more fish by using flies with more of that trigger than the natural object. sort of like a giant goose decoy attracts more geese. A brighter orange egg. A darker mayfly, a really noisy hopper with many long rubber legs. Black is a good start at giving the fish "more of what it is looking for" So is purple and flash.
Often the trigger is in the motion. rising emergers, twitching hoppers, falling spinners. Presentation is then key, but something loud and presented well might jet more attention than something subtle.
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35,204 Posts
I have a high lake I can fish. Above 7000'. The go to fly on that water is a Royal Wulff. I've played around with other flies, but the RW was the ticket for catching fish. Since I've gotten older now I try to make things as simple as I can.
When and where I fish I have them dialed in. I take many fly boxes with me loaded with flies that I will probably never use, but you never know when something I have in one of those boxes that will work when your favorite won't.
When and where I fish I have them dialed in. I take many fly boxes with me loaded with flies that I will probably never use, but you never know when something I have in one of those boxes that will work when your favorite won't.
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No wonder you left.
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For me this is a perfect day of Montana trout fishing.
6 am walk along the Madison looking for risers find a few catch one or two by 7 am there are pools full of rising trout to tiny caddis end the morning around 9 with a dozen fish to the fly. Get in the car and run over to Poindexter slough for a couple hours of fishing cripples. Be done at 1 or so. Leisurely drive back to the Madison have a milkshake and a burger in Ennis then head back upstream for a nap. Back on the water around 7 for either some caddis action or a spinner fall. 7-10 more fish. These are usually rhe biggest fish of the day, the 17-20 inchers.
So an average day say 20 fish 12-18 inches every so often some bigger ones.
Most i would think would call that a very good day.
Could i have caught more fish banging the banks alk day on the Madison, probably would i have had more fun? For me, no.
6 am walk along the Madison looking for risers find a few catch one or two by 7 am there are pools full of rising trout to tiny caddis end the morning around 9 with a dozen fish to the fly. Get in the car and run over to Poindexter slough for a couple hours of fishing cripples. Be done at 1 or so. Leisurely drive back to the Madison have a milkshake and a burger in Ennis then head back upstream for a nap. Back on the water around 7 for either some caddis action or a spinner fall. 7-10 more fish. These are usually rhe biggest fish of the day, the 17-20 inchers.
So an average day say 20 fish 12-18 inches every so often some bigger ones.
Most i would think would call that a very good day.
Could i have caught more fish banging the banks alk day on the Madison, probably would i have had more fun? For me, no.
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We've got a few caddis on our lakes out here that are light brown, and if you don't have a light brown caddis imitation you're just there to watch fish feed. There are also some tiny-ass pale green midges where it's the same deal, but I haven't got the patience to tie or fish sz 30 midges, so if those little bastards are hatching I just put on a streamer and hope there's a carnivore swimming around.
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In my opinion, black bunny leeches work.....in any water I fish, during any season that I fish.
Then again I don't fish much, or catch much when I do.
Maybe I should mix things up a bit.
Never mind.
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Skipping to the end, and I hope I'm not repeating something already said: Let's consider something we've all experienced and tried to cope with: the rapidly changing interaction between light and the transparancy/refractory nature of clear water. Visibility of objects above, on, or under the water surface changes as the angle of light changes. There's a triangle consisting of the sun, the observer (you above, or a fish below the surface), and a food-size object (an insect, a nymph, a little fishie, or a fragment of a leaf). As the object drifts downstream, the angle of sunlight reflected from the object to the observer changes moment by moment. What is bright or colorful at one moment may be dark a few seconds earlier, or later. Fish or human, we cope with this as best we can. The point is, any food object may appear dark (not necessarily black, but "dark" is a useful generality) to the observer much of the time. Lesson: artificial flies that are black, dark brown, dark gray, dark purple, etc. must look interesting to the fish much of the time.
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are you talking the long-horned variety?
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double humpies in black unless the trout are on the ants, black ants, McMurray balsa wood ants. When the streamer hatch is on I will fish any streamer as long as its black. fat and sassy.
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Yeah, really cool, delicate looking bugs. The trout eat them like candy. We've also got some massive caddis on the lakes, but I haven't seen a big hatch of those.
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A hare's ear spider behind a EHC (with trigger horns) can be amazing at times. Caddis are very underrated stillwater bugs!
i cant agree with that 100 percent. i do just fine fishing 1 pattern (1 size) in 4 color variations (purple red black and silver). its def more flashy attractor then match the hatch but it works fine and i dont have to pump fish. then again, different fisheries.
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I like using one of the best natural materials available --> peacock herl. It's color changes from bronzish-green to almost black depending on the light and the herl used. It is great for damsel/dragonfly imitations. Tying bodies with it is not hard but it is time-consuming and is more fragile compared to other materials. When fishing streamers in streams black is the best color IMHO...
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