Icing on the cake... 17+" small river Rainbow. Thank you Caddis hatch.
With all those factors in mind (and a Montana fishing license in my pocket), I figured I'd hit the St. Regis River for some mountain freestone action. A straight shot over I-90 (which parallels the river for most of its length before it dumps into the Clark Fork), the St. Regis River is a bit of an enigma. Not known for great fishing, it runs cold and features high gradient fishing in it's channelized waters (thanks Interstate!). Some of my friends swear by the river and gave me excellent intel about where to go and what to use... others said to stay away from it (they used less appropriate language). I decided to give it a shot.
What I found when I got to the river was interesting. Some fishy looking spots, freeway traffic blaring in the background, and very few fish. I several promising looking spots and saw just two fish (one of which said "no thanks!" to my Golden Stone pattern) in 3 hours of fishing. I followed my friend's advice but with water temps just barely over 40 degrees, I figure that most of the fish aren't terribly active yet... that and there wasn't much in the means of obvious holding water in the heavy-ish flows.
Dejected, I pulled into St. Regis, conferred with some locals (who also scoffed at my fishing their local river, telling me it'd been poor this year), and grabbed a bite to eat. I couldn't head home yet. A two hour drive with nothing to show for it? No. I decided to jet north an hour to the Thompson River... get a few hours in on the Thompson and then cut over Thompson Pass and be back by 8 pm. Not a poor plan it seemed. Worst off, I'd be down two more gallons of gas... but at 30 MPGs and $3.40/gallon (sad that I'm stoked about that), I couldn't pass up the opportunity to catch fish.
Last week on the Thompson, it was a nymphing clinic that my fishing partner and I put on... This week was slow on nymphing. I had one strike while nymphing a usual hole that produces for me. I worked my way upriver (which was substantially lower than last week) and pulled up to a favorite spot of mine.
Pulling off the road, I looked into the water below and saw rises... lots of them. I could literally see 30 fish stacked up in the current below... smallish fish, huge fish... it was like looking at a wild trout aquarium, and these fish were hungry. Money.
I casually worked up to a hole well above where the fish were working and examined the hatch... PMDs, Drakes, and an odd Golden Stone. And big looking ones. I tied on a Golden Stone, PMD double dry set up and went down the bank stealthily below the active fish. Now, I'm known to be a clumsy, piss poor wader. I could scare a fish across the river from me, but on this day, I was smooth. On my hands and knees, ninja-style smooth wouldn't even describe it. I made a first cast upstream to the rising fish and it was game on.
Westslope Cutthroat... A fishing partner would've made for better photos!
Cutthroats, Browns, Rainbows... it didn't seem to stop. While I didn't hook them all, and I certainly lost a few fish during the fight, it was a glorious time. Over the course of a few hours I landed several fish on the PMDs.
Feisty small Brown trout.
I rested the hole for 10 minutes at a time (it's a big run and you can fish different sections in it without scaring too many fish), and eventually noticed a lull in the action. I moved upriver to a different locale (which was a big producer last week) but came up empty handed... the lower flows made the hole less suitable for holding many fish.
Big Thompson River Rainbow. X-Caddis.
After three more fish in the same hole, I realized it was nearing 5:30 (PDT) and decided I should get back over the pass. It was my first time taking the Thompson Pass road, and I doubt I'll go another way again! I saved 40 miles and nearly a half hour of drive time... Only downside was a robin that decided to play chicken with my car on the CDA river road. My car won and I felt a little bad about the whole affair.
All in all, it was a great day on the river. I wasn't gone too much longer than I had originally planned, I caught nearly double digits trout on the dry, and got some stealth wading practice in. Always have a back-up plan, and never let a skunking ruin your day on the water.
Now it's time to gear up for my extended Montana trip next week. More reports to come!
I grew up the T-Falls. My Grandfather blasted a lot of the roads in the mountains around that area. My Father worked in the saw mill all his life. He lives in Superior now. He fished the St. Regis a few weeks ago and he said exactly the same thing you did. It looks like fish but no fish. He said if he kept it up, he might find a few but it doesn't seem to be worth the effort. I own a place on the Thompson River but I live in Hawaii. I take my family there once or twice a year. My focus is fishing and hiking. Growing up in that area meant that I ate a lot of fish, deer, and elk. No elk means more fish. The Thompson River was a main source of the fish we ate. There's another small stream on the other side of town called Dry Creek that had a lot of cutthroat in it. I could watch my Dad catch 50 fish quite easily. There used to be beaver dams and the fish were always hungry up there.
ReplyDeleteWhen we return home each year, I managed to catch some nice fish out of the Thompson River. Since my Father was never one of those pro fly fishermen and he always used whatever gear was available (spinning rods with whatever line was on them) and he only ever uses a royal coachman, I am still learning. Back in December, I tried nyphing and again in June, when you were up there. I never even got a look. I have 2 rods now, 1 for nymphing and 1 for dry flys. I would love to learn how to nymph. It doesn't matter how many videos I watch or how much I read, I don't get it and my Dad never did it.
If you don't mind smaller fish, try the West Fork of the Thompson River some time. It is a very small, fast stream but I caught 2 bull trout, 4 rainbows, and a brown out of it last time I fished it. They were small but it is such a beautiful place. I hope it never changes.
You also followed the Clark Fork from St. Regis to the Thompson River. The stretch of river between St. Regis and Paradise is absolutely packed with trout. I always take my kids to fish there and catch we do. I never caught a trout under 15 inches. I caught some of the biggest cutthroat I ever saw out of that stretch. The fish look like footballs. I let the eddys suck my dry fly down and catch some woppers. I let the kids reel them in.