As I’ve written about before, when heading west I typically start at base camp on the Missouri River. It’s a great and steady dry fly river, that gives you a nice option to jump right in after getting off a plane and getting into some big fish on dries. And this year you could say real big thanks to an easy winter and high water. With high water on the Mo comes some changes, most of them positive. First, it tends to bring out the big browns on the surface on PMD’s, which I’ll reinforce as being important by reiterating that rainbow trout are secondary citizens. They are not as cool. Borderline fact though I’d like to remind everyone I also do know the difference between a fact and an opinion. Just shy of a fact on this one.
Secondly, the higher flows tend to make the bug life condensed to the upper section of the river lets say down to Stickney or even higher depending on how high it is. The river below Stickney is beautiful and has more diverse character, but when the bugs aren’t there it’s a tough go unless you want to float bobbers or throw meat which is done by usually 9-10am. That said, my liking of the mid to lower river is due to the fact that more browns exist there on a population basis. And with high water, the lesser population of browns suddenly appear up top. So I stop caring about missing my favorite lower sections fairly quickly during high water years after a couple floats higher up.
Thirdly, I find in high water years, the evening predominates on the Mo. The morning can be decent, or even good. But not with the same consistency as it is when the river is running a steady 4-7500 going into your trip. When the river is 9k plus, the river looks great and fishes great, but most consistently in the evening starting in or around 6pm.
This year was no different, and things played out as I described above. The big browns were there, and identifiable which allowed my dad and I to pick several out and land on our first few days of the trip. After doing so though, the jungle boy in me started to surface, thinking we should roll the dice and try some remote waters I had read about between the prior season and now that were on my radar. I loved the steady dry fly and big browns that the Mo had to boast this year, as it was probably the best big fish year I’ve seen there in 16 years of going. But I had my fill, it was time to expand the horizons. Catching big fish on a high population tailwater isn’t that hard, but finding a 20”+ wild brown on a rugged freestone is. What better time to try than when you’ve already landed enough big fish to make your trip,
The Turn to Western Freestones
Once my buddy Trav got in, I booked a raft for the next day and we took a shot on a small to medium sized freestone that drops quick and has a limited window. We brought my other buddy along as well. I knew going in to this float that it was a technical row, and likely was a searching method type of river where you chuck big flies whether it be foam dries or streamers to take fish. We drove to the river and it was smaller than we had expected, but still navigable in our raft. We headed down starting with a dry/dropper rig and having a few limited strikes from smaller to medium sized fish. After 4-6 miles of downright dangerous rowing, limited pools and holding water, and numerous snake encounters, we began to wonder why the hell would anyone want to fish here? We kept on going however, and as we got lower, several tribs came into the main river that helped expand the river’s width and with that added volume came a change in the river’s character. It was still fast and technical on the sticks, but you started to notice more areas where you thought better fish could live, and the fishability of that water was better. In or around that time, we also started seeing a lot more bugs. PMD’s, caddis, spinners. It got buggy. We had come prepared with numerous rods for a mixed method day as we knew not to float this thing with the expectation of heads, but kept heading down hoping sizeable heads would show. That never happened though, and we entered a canyon where the river became deep and fishy in a non-dry fly way. We threw meat and started moving bigger fish, landing several 18 to just shy of 20’’ browns, and missing a few that may have touched that mark. We came into the ramp tired after a hard row, but with numerous good fish under our belt, and feeling accomplished knowing we landed some good fish on new water in a river that posed a lot of challenges both physically and from a fishing standpoint.
The following day, I took my sister’s boyfriend and other buddy with me on a different freestone that we had heard was good as it was likely the last day the flows would let us float the stretch without issue and we wanted to see it. Logistics were difficult but once in the river, and seeing it’s gradient and bug life we immediately had hope that we could have some good dry fly fishing. Not the case though. We saw drakes, pmds, spinners, caddis, yet the only fish we saw rising were 4-8’’ dick fish”, and not what we came for. We came prepared with a streamer rod and chucked meat instead, moving and landing some nice fish upwards of 20’’. We also focused on the concentrated runs and riffles nymphing up numerous browns in the 16-18’’ range, with one standout fish that was around 22’’. It was a classic western freestone day. Opportunity and a great setting for dry fly fishing, but ultimately the need to be versatile to find success.
From there, I transitioned with one of my buddies who had been on both of the prior trips to Wyoming where we were scheduled to float the Wind River. I assumed going in that the river would be more of the same, mixed method with big dries, streamers, and some nymphing being needed to find and land good fish. On the first day we fished the Wind, we were on a section that had a diverse, but overall fast stretch of water of 10 miles give or take. We started with a mixed approach of dry and streamer with the back seat throwing meat to give the front guy a realistic shot at moving any fish willing to take the dry. After grinding out the morning, it became apparent that the fish were not willing to take a fly that floated though, so we transitioned to both throwing streamers taking a few good fish, as well as a couple fish on dry dropper rigs. We also tried to take advantage of several back channels, as the river had been very high, but was dropping. The sense was that there were a few fish in select channels, but overall they could sense the flow was dropping and had started transitioning out of those areas. We pulled a few fish out of them but clearly things were in a transitional period.
The evening ended with a stellar streamer bite as the light lowered. Even fishing an entirely unpressured section of the wind on an Indian reservation, it was evident browns are browns no matter what- and that they do not like light. From 6 to dark we netted 4-6 browns in the 18-20’’ class, that were fat as hell but not the two footer we were hoping we’d find. Yeah we were being whores as anyone is when you hit water people haven’t really fished before you. But we were happy, and went into day 2 committed to the idea of chucking meat to find that fish we came for.
DAY TWO: WIND RIVER
On day two, we started where we took out the day prior, which I was happy about because I liked the way the river changed at the bottom end on the day prior. My buddy and I both had our streamers rigged and started off hot landing a few good browns within the first hour that were between 18-20’’. We kept grinding with the meat and landed a few other solid fish before lunch. After lunch, our guide. Nick Fiorini, had the dry fly itch and demanded we give the dry a shot thinking the water and surrounding landscape we were in could provide some solid hopper fishing. And he was right. We took a channel shortly after lunch and my buddy landed the first legit fish of Wind River trip on a dry that took big foam dry. The 30 minutes that followed included 6 or so fish landed in the 18-20’’ range, all being very hard takes on foam dry flies imitating hoppers. Knowing it was on., we slowed our approach down stopping in different sections where the was a little shade, or something to indicate it made sense to chuck a dry in there. We landed or moved big fish in nearly every spot we suspected should have one. That was approximately a 2-3 hr window of glory before suddenly the fish hated dries again. I recognized this and went back to the black meat, landing two big fish before ultimately my other two boat mates gave up the dry fly obsession and did the same. We hooked and landed a couple more solid fish before the day was done. At the end of day 2, we probably landed 20 fish, mostly between 18-20’’, maybe half of them being on dries. We got the unexpected window we had hoped for, but to be clear, it was luck.
BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER
The reason I detail both the Missouri River experience with the other freestones is because it highlights in a very realistic way what the choices are for anyone considering a trip out west. If you are an east coast dude that fishes the Delaware, waits for fish to rise, and pouts if they don’t- you need a western tailwater. Mind you, western tailwaters are flat and lack character, so be prepared for repetitive fishing situations that seem déjà vu after a mere 2-3 days. But the fishing is usually good at worst, and excellent at best.
If you are someone that likes the fish water that feels like a “real trout stream”, not see a production line of boats and feel like you are in the crux of the whored out fly fishing out west tourism circuit, and also don’t care about giving up a few inches on your fish, maybe the freestones are for you. But you can’t be a technical dry fly snob and hate crowds at the same time. The western freestones require an assumed mixed method approach going in, not cdc dry fies and waiting on the bank for heads. Most of the freestone rivers do allow for dry fly (but perhaps small fish) with foam attractors, but anyone in the group I’m warning probably wont like throwing a purple chubby hopper either so the point is futile.
Something to consider though is this- especially if you are an east coast angler. In being honest- the every day dry fly fishing for the lengthy strong hatch season we have as Upstate New York anglers is hard to beat. This raises the question- why head west? The answer is the chance at a true fish of a lifetime, unless you are rich enough to just head out just because you can. The fish of a lifetime are often not landed on the tailwaters, with the bighole, yellowstone, and other rivers I wont mention here being rivers you can hit right on the drop during runoff where true beasts come to the net. There lies the decision. Lots of 18-22” fish, or the shot at one monster.
I hope this article helps and highlights the options and what to expect on each. There were some spring creeks involved too that are a separate thing but something that was difficult to work in here and also in my opinion generally overrated when it comes to the western us. Topic for another discussion. Over and out.