Blog

We drove up to Missoula area this weekend in search of a Skwala hatch, however, extremely low snow pack has left the area with low and warm water which has made the Skwala's hatch much earlier this year.  On the Bitterroot the heavy part of the hatch was already near Darby.  With more boats on the water than Skwala's, we decided against a longer drive/boat traffic.  On the way up we stopped briefly on the Blackfoot.  The water looks good, saw a few fish rising in the evening.  However, didn't see any stoneflies around but we were only stopped very briefly. 
Stopped in at a local fly shop for a shuttle and we got three numbers, 1 of which didn't work, 1 was disconnected, and the last one the person doesn't do shuttles... so uh... yea.
Lower Clark Fork had been fishing well, lots of March Browns around but didn't have time for that long of a float.  The Bitterroot in town was experiencing unbelievably large amounts of boat traffic.  So we headed for Rock Creek with plans to dump the boat in at "Valley of the Moon"... and take out at Schwartz Bridge... recommendation from the guy at the fly shop again, and actually looks like a cool float.  However, not doable right now with the amount of water, fisherman, and logs in this stretch... well maybe doable but not fun and doable at the same time.  So we drive up river past all the wade fisherman to the Dalles.  Here, we don't find a lot of fish, although we didn't get skunked.  However, we did find stoneflies, very few other fisherman, and a nice day.  The water is still cold up there though, lots of shelf ice on the banks yet but should be heating up in the next few weeks.