In the latest installment of the Three Amigos saga, this trip took place in October of 2021. We still doing COVID protocols but we were all boosted, so we felt protected. Also, I had already had COVID a month earlier, plus I just got boosted, so I was feeling fairly immune. None the less, we masked up at restaurants and fly shops and anywhere indoors.
Yellowstone closes for fishing the first weekend in November, so there are actually a lot of visitors the last two weeks of October. We decided to be a part of that crowd, and I had done this before with some other fly fishing friends. Anyway, I pitched the trip to the other Amigos and we decided to make it happen.
The guys were waiting for me at the SLC airport. The fares are a lot cheaper than Jackson Hole or Idaho Falls and there are more airlines and a better selection of flights. We had a little time so we had plans to fish White’s Ranch on the way up to Victor, Idaho. Whites Ranch did not disappoint. The had rising fish taking small baetis and we caught other fish on streamer patterns too. We left after three hours of fishing and each had 6-8 fish.
We spent the night in Victor and took the morning off the plan was to wade the South Fork. It was a tough evening fish. We got a few whitefish on dry flies and a couple of cutthroats on dry flies.
The next day we decided to wade the Henry’s Fork near Ashton. It was overcast and cold that day. Reid did well fishing nymphs. We all caught a couple but it was slow.
Yellowstone was next on the agenda. Along the way, we stopped in Island Park and paid tribute the “Railroad Ranch” section of the Henry’s Fork. As I have said previous posts, this section of water is my absolute favorite. It is a dry fly haven and will drive your fishing skills to a new level if it doesn’t drive you away first. A place where when fishing to a rising fish I average about 100 casts for every eat. It can be frustrating, but also tremendously rewarding. It is just you and the river, even on days when there are 50 other fishermen. A big, open, beautiful fishery full of big, beautiful rainbow trout!
What we discovered this day, the 25th of October, 2021 was that the Henry’s Fork was overcast cold weather and water, and not much insect activity. The water was extremely low. In fact, the Streamflow data had the flows at 66cfs. Given how wide the river is, I wondered how that could be. There was a channel in the middle that was flowing, but on the edges the water seemed almost stationary. We realized when we got there that it was still very fishable but also the low flows were why the parking lot was empty when we got there. But, it was on our way from Victor to West Yellowstone and I felt compelled to stop and fish it. There were a few baetis spinners on the water. The more predominant fall baetis hatches were taking place earlier in the month and we were at the tail end. We spent a lot of time watching for heads and they were very few and far between. The cold messed a bit with our patience too. I finally found a regular riser and was able to get into position and make some casts, right into his lane. My 3wt Scott G2 was rigged with a 12′ leader, and at the terminal end was Trout Hunter 5.5X nylon tippet. As I have said before, 5.5X is a really good compromise between 5X and 6X. Once I had the distance dialed in and could reliably hit his feeding lane, I was able to get the eat and the battle began. A few minutes later he came to hand, a beautiful 17″ rainbow. Unfortunately, there weren’t many heads after. What we did see was over toward the far bank. THe rises were swirls with dorsals showing, and not the usual heads. It turned out these fish were all whitefish. We all managed a few whitefish, they were not the reason we were there, so we packed up and headed north toward West Yellowstone.
While we were driving north I had this crazy idea. Why not make one more stop along the way? So we did. I knew of some good water that had Cutthroats and we made a quick stop there and we each got several fish. A simple size 14 pheasant tail nymph was all that was required. What was really great was an indicator was not required. Just make an extremely slow retrieve. We wanted to get to West Yellowstone(West) before the fly shops closed, as our plans were to get up early the next day and head to our “not so secret spot”, so we needed to get our licenses for the Park in advance. So I rounded up the Amigos and he continued our trek north.
We managed to get the 4 day license and a few flies and then it was time to seek out dinner. There aren’t a lot of restaurant choices in Wes this time of year. But the Mangy Moose was open so we went there. The food was actually pretty good.
0′ dark thirty came pretty early and I rustled up the crew and we got out while it was still dark. There is a fairly large crowd of fly fishers fishing in and around the park in October, given the weather and the time of year. My fly fishing club was here the weekend prior and had to deal with road closures due to a snow storm. We were up early because some of the better secret/not so secret spots, are actually fairly well know and they are guide favorites. The place we were headed to is where I was actually aced out of at 7:45am a couple of years back and I was determined to not let that happen when I had the Amigos in tow. We got there just prior to first light and needed our headlamps to see where we were.
You can see from the pics above that “the spot” did not disappoint. Most of the fish were big rainbows caught on nynphs but we had a couple of big browns too, that were taking streamers. The action lasted a few hours and we decided to hit a few other places in the park. Luckily our day and our trip were totally “made” on the first stop, because our other choices were a bust.
Later in the day we had plans to meet up with a couple of my friends, brothers Troy and Mike, at a restaurant back in West. We chose pizza and had a nice evening chatting about the day and we made plans to all fish together the next day. Mike and Troy have been coming to West each fall for a number of years. Their knowledge of locations, flies, techniques, etc is remarkable. The had a spot in mind up in the north end of the park that I had heard about, but never been to before and we were all excited to fish it.
There were six of us so we needed to take two cars. Six is also problematic as a fishing group. It is tough to all spread out and make sure everyone has an opportunity to fish. However, the spot they chose did not disappoint. We were nyph fishing to hungry Cutthroat trout. Troy happened on an amazing honey hole. He had already landed 6 nice fish there when I came along and had one on as I approached. I asked if I could get his picture and he was delighted. He also invited me to fish his spot with him and gave me a copy if the fly that was working for him. I was doing OK, but only had a couple so far. IMHO, this is the true sign of friendship, sharing a really productive hole with your fishing buddy. We each caught more fish. It was crazy, but they were stacked up in there and actively eating. The hole produced around 15 fish before we decided to move on.
We fished outside the park too. We had decided to fish the Madison between the lakes, Hebgen and Quake. It was really slow. We were chucking big streamers and swinging them hoping for a big brown trout eat. Almost shut out, but I managed a small rainbow on a leech. Next stop, Three Dollar bridge.
The next stop was clearly a nymphing spot. Reid got right on it and found a nice run and landed a few browns. That spot was a little crowded and not productive for Mel and me. So we headed further downstream and after crossing a bridge and walking up we found a few deeper runs that looked promising. Mel ended up fishing a spot I just left and low and behold, hooked into a really nice brown. I ran back ready to help net it! Before long, we were headed back to Victor.
The Three Amigos! We always have EXCELLENT adventures. Looking forward to Tarpon fishing in the Florida Everglades in April!
