Watch Video:Montana Fly Fishing
I recently returned from my first every fly fishing trip to Montana and all I have to say is, wow! Wyoming was good but Montana was spectacular. Taking into consideration that my buddies and myself have families to attend to, we could only manage to swing three full days of fly fishing plus travel time. We stayed at a very nice fishing lodge in Alder, Montana and fished with some excellent fly fishing guides who worked hard to get us on the fish. We didn’t arrive in Montana until September 26th so it was the tail end of hopper season. We had the chance to fish the Jefferson River, Madison River and on the last day we fished the Ruby River, Clear Creek and Alder Creek on foot. It was amazing to see the size of the fish for such relatively small water. The Jefferson and Madison River fly fishing tactics that seemed to work best during this time of year was all nymphing, which was cool with me. A couple of the “go-to” flies that produced great results were San Jaun Worms and Prince nymphs. In three full days of fishing we never saw a single person on the water. That was cool in itself. I don’t think that would be the case during the busy summer season. We were lucky and could not have hit it better as far as the weather was concerned. All three days of fishing were near perfect weather weather conditions. On our departure day we awoke to snow coming in sideways and 37 degrees. Made it easy to leave such a beautiful place.I am home now, but my mind isstill in Montana. Next time it will be the Bighorn and Beaverhead Rivers for sure.
Great fish tale man! I have only fished Montana once or twice too – and when I finally did fish it for the first time a couple years ago, I couldn’t help but think the same thing .. “WOW!” – Being from the east coast, its just a totally different world out there and the numbers of trout in the river systems are incredible. I got a chance to fish the bighorn, madison and a spring creek that I forget the name of. My experience was much like yours in the sense that I was there in April. The fishing was phenomenal with the most epic bluewinged olive hatches I have ever seen (on the bighorn river) – and there were very few people on any of the rivers. Even though it may be busier during the summer .. I would still love to go sometime and experience that too .. as I can only imagine that summer in Montana is pretty cool and fishing hoppers on those river must be a blast. Another river that I would love to fish someday is the “firehole river” in the national park .. I’ve seen pictures and it looks incredible. Anyway, great tale and glad you guys had such a great trip and lucked out with the weather .. it doesn’t always happen that way .. so when it does, its nice.
PS. If you didn’t say “Wow” .. something would be wrong with you. Seeing those mountains and Yellowstone National Park is nothing short of awe inspiring .. if you didn’t say “wow” and weren’t awe inspired by the majestic scenery and the fly fishing, well you’d be very lame. Almost impossible not to appreciate Montana for all of those things .. and more.
Very nice read and video Todd. Looks like one hell of a trip, glad you got to get out there and enjoy all those great rivers. Would love to go to MT one day.
I have been 3 times in my life and hopefully I’ll go this summer. It is my favorite state to visit and the most beautiful. Great video, watched it twice and am thinking of going by train this Summer. That might be a good trip, stopping often to fish.
Good read but check the video link as I would like to check it out but it is down. Sounds like a great trip