Lake Fishin’ Time!

Nice fish, Jack!

Cold and wet, but still fishing!

Well, it’s that time of year. Streams and rivers are high and brown. Good thing we have plenty of still water options! Luce, Hogan and Newton lakes are all fishing well.

Jack and Jack endured a morning of cold, wind and rain to catch some bass on their first day of fly fishing. (Dad caught some, too.) The fishing was slow, but these boys hung in there to the very end. My kind of kids!

Streamer fishing is good on area lakes. Black is working best, but olive is also taking fish. Not much insect activity yet, but look for damsel and dragon flies to start hatching as the weather warms. Chironomids are active, so fishing a big midge nymph under an indicator is also a good way to go.

One Last Day on Rock Creek?

Area streams and rivers are rising fast! Stephanie and Noah from Billings via Houston wade fished Rock Creek with me yesterday. Stephanie hammered this 22 inch rainbow on her first day with a fly rod! Yeah, I said 22 inches. On the tape. From Rock Creek. Stephanie is my hero.

With the start of run-off, fishing our streams and rivers will be challenging to say the least. As you can see from the photo above, Rock Creek was off color and it’s worse today. Fishing in dirty water means stripping or dead drifting something big and black. This fish ate a black wooly bugger.

Stay tuned for lake fishing reports. Just because the streams blow out is no reason not to fish!