Dry Fly Fishing Montana with Dixon Adventures

The Bitterroot has some nice fall colors and still some hatches in the afternoon!

Date: November 1, 2011

Report: The Bitterroot is looking good and has some good flow thanks to the fall runoff.  The fishing will be a little tough with the cold snap coming, but just yesterday I was fishing to some big, picky risers at 3 in the afternoon.  The trout are in their fall feeding mode and looking for food.  There are some nice afternoon hatches of mahogeny duns and blue winged olives.  They are in slower waters and can be picky, but with good presentation and 5x, you can still catch some big trout on dries late in the season.  Usually these hatches are pretty well over, but with our weird season this year, the hatches have been set back by a couple weeks.  If you want to catch some trout out of the dry fly window, you can use about 30 inch droppers under an october caddis or attractor.  Droppers that work well are pheasant tails, purple copper johns, bubble back pheasant tails, and other mayfly nymphs.  I use sizes 16-20 since the trout are keying in on small bugs.  Streamers can be very effective in the late fall, you might even come across a big terratorial brown.  look for the warmer days and remember that I have some great fishing thru Novenmver for years!  Feel free to call for some hardcore fisherman advice!

Look for the white mouth, but watch out they can see you better too!

Date: September 25, 2011

Report: The Bitterroot is an exciting river to fish in the late fall.  There are morning trico and other duns hatching in the morning.  The funny thing to me is when I am guiding the trico spinner hatch I see incredible amounts of great opportunity, but usually not much catching.  There is not a lot of room for error.  There is a lot of tecnique using skills like aerial mending, parachute casts, good hook setting tactics, good rod angles while playin the trout, understanding tippet strength, and more.  Some of these arts require an angler to learn from mistakes.  The trico hatch is located primarily from Hamilton to Missoula and there are stretches that have more intense hatches than others and a little research can produce some nice results.  Besides the picky expert class stuff, the sustained fall heat has the attractor fishing in full swing.  I have always thought the hopper fishing can be best right now towards the tail end of their life cycle.  The fall weather is coming and the afternoon hatches of blue winged olives, mahogonies, and october caddis hatches will pick up in the cool weather.  Look for nasty weather with light winds and the hatches and feeding frenzies can be intense.  Good luck and enjoy the mercurial fall fishing conditions!

 

Guide John Wilcox with a beautiful 23" Brown caught be a beginner. Nice!

Date: September 16, 2011

Report: The Bitterrot is fishing well, but with some trout you better bring your A game required for picky fall trout.  Although I have not spent lots of time on the Root due to smoke, I know my local waters in Florence ans Stevinsville has some nice trico and morning risers.  The hecubas are out and the big trout are looking for these inchworm mayflies.  Hopper fishing can still be good.  The river can be very tough and there seems to be some pressure here and there so choose your float wisely.  Work the big bugs maybe with a dropper, but look for the hatch and risers.  The smoke will clear with the rain and the fishing might really turn on.  Fall fishing on the Bitterroot can be awesome, but the best is to come here in late September and October when the mahoganies and blue wings come marching out.  Good luck out there.

Date: September 6, 2011

Report: The Bitterroot can be a difficult river to fish during the record heat September days, but you can catch some nice trout.  The cool days last week was great fishing and it dropped the water temps down, but now the heat is on again.  The frustrating part is that we are all used to fishing tricos in the morning hours and seeing some nice pods in certain areas on the middle and lower river, but the hatch has not really kicked in yet.  There are definitley some risers in the morning, but not for long.  I dont use indicator rigs anymore so nymphing strategies are up to you.  The most fun is working hoppers and attractors.  The fishing can be tough, but there are some nice trout willing to grab a terrestrial in the middle of the day.  I can’t wait for the fall temperatures to come because the fishing will get a lot better.  I have seen some hecubas, but I think there will be more when we get another cool spell.  Look for trout in oxygenated riffles, log jams, rip-raps, and just right down the open waters where there is good holding water.  I would like to congragulate one of my guides, John Wilcox, for landing a beautiful 23 inch brown with a total beginner!  The browns are elusive in the Bitterroot in the summer, but they will start to appear with cool fall temperatures.  I have been using smaller mayfly patterns in the morning and then switching to hoppers/terrestrials in the afternoon.  You can try a dropper, but I think my subsurface fishing days have been maxed out this year, so I am huntin the dries.  Look for good cut banks and then when the water is hard to read with gravel on the edges, fish in the open waters.  The trout have to hold somewhere, so think like a fish!  The river is gettin in its late summer low mode, so make sure you know your floating distance.

Date:  August 19, 2011

Report: Well since we are about to have some nights that are under 50 degrees it looks like the fall fishing has begun.  I have always said that the fishing starts to improve from the dog days of August after the 15th.  There is less evapo-transpiration and the daylight hours are getting shorter. That means that the Hecuba and trico hatches will be starting with cool days and nights.  There will still be some heat spells that will put a damper on afternoon fishing, but scanning the big hopper with a long over 30 inch dropper might fend off the slow periods.  The upper sections have cool water temps and the parachute and ant dry fly fishing is pretty good.  The best hint I can give is that you may think that hoppers all fall in from the shore and that the trout are lurking looking for an easy meal, but in reality the hoppers can make it to the middle of the river and the trout are spread out now that the water levels have dropped to lower flows.  So make sure you do some fishing in the middle, sometimes pretty random.  Good luck out there and make sure you know what sections have irrigation dams if you are floating.   

Make sure you know where the diversionb dams are if you are floating

HATCHES:  Terrestrials of all sorts, tricos and hecubas will be popping up with colder days and nights.

STREAMFLOWS
UPPER RIVER AT DARBY