The Best Streamer Fishing...

[Al Agnew]

I picked up my Missouri fly fishing buddy Tom M. at the Bozeman airport Wednesday afternoon, and we immediately picked up his license and headed to the lower Madison. The rest of the afternoon was spent wading the river, catching good numbers of fish on nymphs, including an 18 inch brown and a 19 inch rainbow. It was a good beginning to our annual Montana trout fishing get-together. The next mor90ning, we met with my Montana fly fishing buddy Tom C., his cousin Lee, his brother, and his college buddy, loaded up the raft and Lee's gorgeous wood and glass driftboat, and headed across I-90 toward the Bighole River. Lee called in a shuttle enroute, and all we had to do was reach the access and put in. The river was up a little and murky, visibility about 18 inches, with the tannin stain that is characteristic of the Bighole. The weather was cool and cloudy, after driving through a lot of rain to get there. It was perfect for sreamer fishing.

The default color of streamers for the Bighole is bright yellow, and there is a local fly called the Yellow Yummy that is supposed to be a part of every Bighole angler's inventory. But I was using a Sparkleminnow type streamer, gold, a bit of silver, and some black in the marabou tail, and I caught the first good fish, an 18 inch brown. I later caught another an inch longer on it. The fishing was a bit odd. We would go long distances with little more than a couple of half-hearted swirls and bumps at the fly, and then hit a short section of bank that had a bunch of active fish and catch several. All in all, however, it was a good day.

We had reservations at a great lodge on the river...with all the beer and wine you can drink included as well as all meals furnished. So it was a fairly late night. The next morning we drove up the river to float an upstream stretch. The river here started out shallow and comparatively slow, in pines and fir, with snow-covered mountains in the background. Beautiful landscape, but not all that great looking habitat. It was dropping a bit and somewhat clearer than the day before, and the weather was highly variable, from sunny to cloudy to a cold rain. The fishing started slow, but Lee hooked a huge brown, in the 25-26 inch range, got it up to the boat before it came unstuck. That made all of us fish harder, and as the day went on the fishing got better. It was a virtual repeat of the first day, with stretches of slow fishing punctuated by short stretches where we caught lots of fish. We came to one bank with smooth current and Baetis coming off, with rises everywhere, so we switched to dry flies. Some of the fish were the native Montana grayling, rare and special fish to catch--the Bighole is one of the very few rivers left in the lower 48 states that have fluvial grayling.

In the last quarter mile of the float, the fish turned on, and we were catching them with both streamers and dries. The take-out came much too soon.

Saturday, we decided to put in at the lodge and float a lower stretch. The landscape was much different from the day before, the river flowing through dry country with prickly pear and short grass along the banks and sagebrush hills. The weather started out beautiful and so did the fishing. In the first mile the action on streamers was fast and we were all catching fish. Then the clouds moved in, the temperature dropped sharply, and the fishing slowed considerably. The rest of the day was spent in a mixture of wind, clouds, rain, and snow, with the trout back to the usual very slow periods followed by short flurries of action.

Sunday Lee and Tom C.'s brother and friend had to leave early, so Tom, Tom, and I floated in the raft. We needed to get back to Livingston by 5 PM, so we did a shorter float, planning on taking out by 2 PM. It had snowed during the night, a heavy, wet snow that covered everything and made the streamside willows droop into the water. There were four inches of snow on the ground at the put-in, but the sun was shining and it looked like a beautiful day. The river was gorgeous in the snow, with the green of early spring foliage showing through. And the fishing started out well. For once, it was steady, with enough fish being caught to keep us alert and fishing hard. We had decided at the beginning of the trip that as soon as one of us caught two fish, it was their turn to row the raft for the others, and the fish were coming quickly enough that nobody had to row for long.

We passed an access, and the river entered a canyon stretch. In the canyon the rapids were steep and rock-studded, a real challenge for Tom M. and me since we didn't have all that much experience in rowing rapids. But in the canyon the fishing got fabulous. Suddenly there were fish everywhere. Any decent looking spot held a brown trout that would attack the streamers with slashes and swirls and roll-overs and even rocketing up to completely clear the water, taking the fly on the way up. The streamers didn't have to be fished deep--the fish were nearly taking them on the surface. Tom C. had a 19 incher take his fly as it was dangling from a limb in fast water, pulling it off the limb when it otherwise would have probably been lost to the wood. I had two attack my fly at the same time, neither getting hooked. For a period of about two hours, none of us had more than a 10 minute stint on the oars. In long stretches, we had at least a strike, if not a fish hooked, on at least every third or fourth cast on average. We were actually shocked when a cast to a nice spot DIDN'T result in a fish, and that didn't happen often. Most of the fish were between 14 and 17 inches, with a few bigger ones caught and a few even bigger ones seen. The weather had deteriorated, with lots of clouds, and when the sun came out a half mile from the take-out, the fishing finally slowed. I caught the last fish, a 17 incher, within sight of the access.

As we loaded up the raft and got ready for the drive back to Livingston, all three of us were almost stunned at the fishing we'd just experienced. We all agreed it was the fastest trout fishing we'd ever had. Tom M. said it best..."This was a day that will be a benchmark in our lives."

[fishinwrench]

Excellent trip report Al. Experiences like that are what cause guys to pull up stakes and move out West.

[kayaker]

Hey Al,

You over throw those streamers for your beloved river smallies of Missouri. Nothing better than smallies on the fly.

[ness]

Nice.

[ozark trout fisher]

Sounds like a great trip.

[Gavin]

Great report...I've never fished the Big Hole, know I want to go.

[Phil Lilley]

Al, I loved your pics from last year... hope you'll share some from your trip this year!!

Thanks!!!!