Fly fishing 101
Tait Rocksund, Columbia Falls High School graduate now teaching at Whitefish High School, recently asked me to talk to his student fly fishing club.
The topic was fall fly fishing.
I told the students they won’t catch fish if there aren’t any where they are fishing.
Sounds trite, but think about it.
For example, brown trout make their spawning runs in the fall. Larger Flathead cutties move up the river in April. Do your homework.
I had recently returned from a couple days on the Bitterroot River where, although the fishing had been great in late summer sunshine, the catching had been slow.
Among the reasons for challenging fall fly fishing are low water, sunny days, and sporadic hatches.
Water levels on the ‘Root were low, so low it was easy to cross back and forth across the river. With air temps in the high 70s, wet wading felt pretty good!
When I asked the students to ‘think like a fish’, they mentioned birds, bigger fish, and fishermen as threats to their security.
And those threats are more significant in shallow water.
The fish I caught on the ‘Root were immediately adjacent to dark, deeper holes. And always the bigger fish were caught first.
Obviously the trout were concentrated in deeper water, venturing only short distances for food.
Sunshine compounds security concerns in skinny water.
Depending on the river, insect hatches are relatively predictable in June and July. But not so much in September and October.
A Trico hatch on the ‘Root came off at 10:00 a.m. my first day, at 2:00 p.m. the next.
Hopper imitations, chubbies, and foam ants may fool fall trout. Also, tiny parachute Adams. And use fluorocarbon tippet material.
I encouraged students to hang a Copper John or Beadhead Prince Nymph off their over-sized dries in fall.
No doubt they’ll catch a few whitefish in addition to trout. But both put a bend in their rod.
Kudos to Tait and Chris Schwaderer for volunteering their time to mentor young fly fishers.
Jerry Smalley’s Fishful Thinking column appears weekly in the Hungry Horse News.