Henry's Fork Salmonfly Hatch

The Tale of Leadfoot Dale and Shank Finger Kratzer

It seems like we just finished run-off around here, mostly because we did. The Yellowstone is still swollen, in a very healthy, gorgeous way. Grasshoppers are all over the place these days, including the backyard...and for a couple of weeks now, the fish have been eagerly looking up for a big, easy meal.

Last Saturday some friends and I decided to do a rare thing...Get up early and go fishing. Fishing on Saturday certainly isn't rare for any of us, but the early part tends to be. My girlfriend coined a quasi-motto for anyone riding in my boat..."When you're taking off, we're putting on". I don't have a problem with that, there's often many things to do on Saturday or Sunday morning before you can get to the river...ie) work, hike, clean the house, mow the grass, or go to church, even though I don't do any of those things. Oh yeah, and there's also SLEEP!

But on Saturday, my buddy John picked me up at 7:30 and we headed over the hill to the Yellowstone. We decided to float a lower stretch, from the Highway 89 bridge to Springdale. I had never fished that stretch, so it was nice to try some new water.

When we got to the boat ramp, we stopped to rig up some rods and were privy to an extraordinary display of unsportsmanlike conduct in the fishing world. Two trucks, each hauling a drift boat flew into the boat ramp doing about 35 miles an hour. They both passed us without slowing down, and proceeded to launch their before us. I swear, they were racing. I'm not sure who they were racing against, but they were racing. A man in tight jeans and white unlaced high-tops launched both boats in under 5 minutes, as though he was trying out for a NASCAR Pit Crew Position...

On second thought, maybe he's actually in IN a NASCAR pit crew...Check out this boat!

Haha! Pretty good looking ride!

My friend Jeremy politely reminded ol' Dale that there actually is an etiquette to launching boats, to which he quickly responded, "We'll be out of your way in just a minute."

They were out of our way in no time, but a simple, "Hey guys, do you mind if we launch these real quick before we go run our shuttle?", would have probably been appropriate. No big deal though, no hard feelings...made for a good story.

We started fishing hoppers right off the bat, and didn't have any luck until we got into a sunny bank. We picked up a few trout pretty quickly at that point, and ended up having a pretty good day on the river. After getting this nice brown on a hopper, it slowed down considerably and we decided to run some nymphs.

I couldn't keep whitefish off of my big Prince dropper, which I'm certainly not complaining about. I seem to have a special relationship with those under-appreciated natives. I had a great time catching a bunch of whitey's, but Jeremy had some trouble with one of his. He reached down to grab the line to get him in the boat, when a sudden quick release caught him by surprise.

It also caught his knuckle. Ouchski...

That right there is not a very cool situation to be in. The same thing happened to me on the Dearborn two years ago. Pulling in a whitefish, and stuck past the barb...only it was in my palm. So I immediately had empathy for Jeremy, but I do admit that I still giggled a little.

After the requisite 30 or so minutes of staring at the problem wondering what to do, Jeremy was able to pull it out himself, saving him from the dreaded "wrap hook, push down, and yank like hell method" that we were prepared to administer. I was extremely glad for this, because I often feel like if I ever have to employ this method on someone, I'm probably going to get punched in the mouth.

All was well, and we ended up with a few more trout and a great time overall on the Yellowstone. The fishing is superb in Southwest Montana at present, and it looks as though it will continue into the fall...Thank you mother nature for cool temperatures and lots of precip!!!

For a better look at Leadfoot Dale givin'er hell on the Jelly...take a look at this short video....

Salmonflies on the Upper Madison

Thank goodness those things don't bit or sting, or we wouldn't be able to go outside in June or July!!!

We were able to get a few smaller trout to eat dries on the Upper Madison on Sunday. There was no shortage of bugs up there...salmonflies, caddis, yellow sallies, golden stones. Downright buggy day, but a gorgeous one!

Heavenly Hyalite Highlights

With so many incredible rivers to float in SW Montana, we sometimes neglect what lies in our own backyard here in Bozeman. About 20 minutes south of town is an unbeleivable beautiful Hyalite Reservoir. It also happens to be one of the few remaining places in the lower 48 to catch Arctic Grayling.

Last night a couple of friends of mine and I decided against driving to the Upper Madison to chase down salmonflies due to a late start, no shuttle, and of course $4.09 a gallon doesn't help the cause either.

So we decided to head up to Hyalite to see if we could wrangle up a few cutties. We managed to catch a few on dries, but the highlight of the evening was this 16 1/5 inch Grayling that Jeremy caught on a chronomid. It's always a treat to see one of these gorgeous fish. This one let us see its monsterous dorsal fin in all it's glory.

Mo Mo Browns

Yeah Bernie!!!

The Mighty Mo

As you can see from our kayaking/rafting posts, many of the rivers here in Southwestern Montana are pretty blown out right now, as runoff is in full swing. In order to try to find some trout in a period of high-water, my friends Jason, Jeremy and I decided to meet up with our guide buddies Zandy and Trevor over on the Missouri. They had just moved back to the area for the season, but didn't have any trips booked quite yet, so we thought we'd pay them a visit from Bozeman. Our ol' pal from Missoula, Jessica Hazzard Jones, brought her dog Ruby to round out the crew. We stayed over by the little town of Craig, and it proved to be an excellent place to kick off the summer here in Montana. The sun was high and bright, the wind surprisingly calm, and the fish were lookin' up!


Saturday (Cinco de Mayo) ended up being more of a booze cruise than anything else, but we loved every minute of it...caught a few fish on nymphs, then just played music and drank wine on our journey back down to Craig...(read - Local Joe's Bar). It was a hell of a float, and as shown below, Hazzard showed us how they do it over in Missoulatown.

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Yep, that pretty much sums up Saturday. Sunday was a different deal, we were lucky enough to have Zandy and Trevor row us on their home water. They didn't dissapoint, getting us into a few beautiful rainbows and more than a few hungry, fiesty, gorgeous browns. Jessica caught her first trout on a dry, thanks to Zandy's instruction. Trevor gave me ample opportunities to poke sipping browns, a few of which I flailed on, but stuck enough to make my wrist ache by the end of it. All in all, we had an amazing day. One hightlight was a brown that jumped 3 or 4 feet out of the water after being hooked, something we rarely see. We caught several nice browns on dries that day...none of which were small.



It was the first weekend that we realized... "nice, the winter's really over". That's a great feeling when you live in Montana, and we're all psyched to have finally rounded the corner.

If anyone's interested in fishing the Missouri River with a seasoned guide, give these guys a call and they'll put you on fish.

Zandy Zechella (706) 614-0780 - Trevor Madden (406) 459-9221

Zandy has a new Montana Fly Fishing Guides website. Check it out to book a trip.