Some of the people in Western Montana refer to me as ‘Hopper Man’. It has been said of me by those who have fished often with me, that I could catch a wild trout on a hopper in January. Definitely an intriguing idea. Golden Stone, Green Drakes, Brown Caddis, and hoppers are the flies of summer.
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Between June and July 7 we have high water runoffs and most of our rivers have not come into shape yet. So this time of the year we do a lot of fishing on the Kootenai River which is a tail water out of the Libby Dam and runs ‘gin clear’ year round. Depending on the cloud cover, the Brown Caddis hatches start mid afternoon and run through early evening with some pretty outstanding trout activity. The Kootenai River currently holds the Montana State record Rainbow Trout at 33 pounds. There’s some big fish in here, boys!! They are mostly Columbia River Redside Rainbows and also some native west slope Cutthroat Trout. They are a hard fighting fish and will walk on their head as well as their tail for you. Blue-Wing Olives, Western March Browns, Pale Morning Duns, and Green Drakes are the flies of the day. |
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