September 10, 2009
After a great battle, Smyth was able to land this beautiful Big Hole Brown Trout.
For the past week we have been running all our trips on the upper and middle portions of the Big Hole from Troutfitters down to Melrose. As fall creeps in on Southwest Montana, the Big Hole keeps fishing better and better. Dry flies ranging from size 20 Tricos to a #4 Hopper pattern have all taken fish over the last week. Due to the colder nights dry fly fishing has been picking up later in the day, but there are still fish to be had on top in the morning to the early risers. Ants, Beetles, Tricos, Hoppers, Purple Haze, Adams, Parachute Adams, Humpys, and Caddis have all been working well on top and fished in light riffles or in tight skinny water. The better fish have been taken grass tight to the banks on light tippet with imperative stealth.
Nymphs have been working well in the mornings with zebra midges, hares ears, pt’s, girdle bugs, princes, lightning bugs, and caddis being the bugs of choice. On Wednesday we had an unfortunate incident happen with a monster brown trout in the upper river. Fishing a soft hack lightning bug and a size 6 girdle bug in the early morning, a client of TLA hooked into a behemoth brown trout in the 27-28″ range and weighting in at around 6 lbs. The fish was so heavy it straightened the hook of the lightning bug during the battle and proceeded to get hooked up in the dorsal fin by the girdle bug. After a 15 minute fight we worked the fish into shallow water and had it inches from the net when the hook ripped out of the fin and the fish sank back into the river. Absolutely the biggest fish we’ve had that close to the net this year, and the biggest fish we’ve seen in person on that river. We’ll be back later in the year to check up on him.
Today produced this nice 21-21.5″ brown below Maiden Rock. After a long fight the fish came to the net and threw the hook just as the net scooped under his belly. During the fight the hook came out of the corner of its mouth and became lodged in the lip creating a less than desirable hookup as it slip into the rough cartilage bridge without being set. Everything worked out in the end though as we were able to get some good photos of this beautiful fish as we see the browns start to obtain their spawning coloration.
Fall is a great time to fish in Southwest Montana, and each day is going to keep getting better!
