Summer's End

Since the fall like weather has set in and I've been laid up pending a roll-over accident, time has allowed me to take a look back over the last couple months, and though most of it seems a blur of flies and trout highlights still pop out. We saw a great water year and by the end of June were seeing over 9,000 CFS. Fishing became very fast paced and if you couldn't get the flies where they needed to be at the exact moment you'd lose ten yards of trout water. Boats were flying down the ditch, flies and fishermen in the bushes. And when the water receded the trout began to eat grasshoppers. In fact they still are. This has been one of the best hopper seasons anyone has ever seen on this river, you could almost hand feed these trout. Our Summer hatches were compromised by ths high water though; mahogany duns never appeared, the caddis came and went, and what PMD hatch? The high flows even decimated the still-decent trico hatches on the lower river. And the grass is out of control at the end of this season, thanks to the high water. We can only look to the bright future that the raging torrent has cleared open for us. Siltation is almost non-existant on the river bottom and the channels now have ample flows to support more trout and spawning gravel. I'm already looking forward to next summer...

A few highlights from this Summer