6th Day Fly Fishing – February 10th, 2023 – Henry’s Fork, Ashton
Two Fridays ago, John and I decided we needed to get out and fish. We made the call to drive to Ashton and fish the Henry’s Fork. John had waded this spot more than I and I could see that he clearly had a game plan. There was already a guy near the end of the run nymphing in thigh deep water. John decided to nymph as well and went to the same general area without crowding the other fisherman.
It was tough for me to get started. I decided to swing streamers and wanted to fish upstream. I rigged a complex twist Drunk Drea in ginger. on my 5wt Scott G2. I had recently sold my 6wt G2 because my 5wt was my go-to streamer rod whenever I was fishing floating line. Also, it could easily be re-rigged for nymphing or dry/dropper. My 6wt never had that versatility. My 6wt G2 just did not handle sinking tip line well. So I rigged my 7wt Meridian with that line and loved it! Hence, why the 6wt is no longer in my quiver. The challenge that faced me was a huge ice shelf that formed on the bank of the river, extending 20′ out into the river. In some places, if you were crazy enough to walk out to the edge of the shelf, the drop off from shelf to bottom was 4 feet! Eventually I realized I had to head downstream to a spot on the shelf where the drop off was more like 6 inches, so not dangerous at all. Then I waded upstream to where I wanted to fish. Fish my streamer, changed it, swung some more, changed again and then realized, I might be better off nymphing.
Before writing about this, I re-read this post from three months ago.The Nymphing Paradox – A New Years Resolution . Where my New Years Resolution was to nymph more and to up my game. So today I had that very opportunity staring me in the face.
The water where I had been concentrating my efforts was a faster section of water right in the middle of the river. Faster, is relative as the current was generally very slow. But this run was faster for a reason. I suspected that it was a deeper channel that literally funneled water into it. The funnel is what you want when nymphing. The material that is drifting gets concentrated by the funnel effect. Part of “upping my game” was to be hypercritical about how I chose a spot.
As I was changing over to my nymph rig a few minutes earlier, I chatted with the other fisherman, who was taking a potty break. He was using a small black zebra midge. He had one eat, but no fish to show for for it. I like the midge idea, so I tied on a size 22 3 dollar dip in red. Also, because we had already made it to February, I felt it was likely that baetis nymphs were active as well. So my point fly was a size 16 black with a peacock collar and some cdc. This fly had a tungsten bead and I knew it would get down quickly.
Great choices all the way around. The run I was targeting did indeed hold fish and the beatis jig nymph was the ticket. A nice rainbow landed on the second cast(pic below). Several minutes later, another rainbow, same fly. This fish was slightly smaller but still put up a healthy fight. John was still fish-less, so I went downstream and found him working a shallow run along the bank. I offered him my spot and one of my nymphs and he accepted. He already had a size 14 perdigon, in point position. John got two fish in that spot as well, one brown, one rainbow(see pic above).
Shortly after, we decided to pack it in. Although it was a nice sunny day, the temp never rose above 25 degrees all day. Picking ice out of the guides all day long. In short, we were getting cold.
Thinking back to that New Years Resolution. I had a thought about the spot I was fishing this day. The spot I chose to nymph was right in the center of the river, 30 feet from where I wanted to stand. You see getting closer to the target zone also meant go deeper than I was comfortable going. Even with a 11 foot Euro rod, I was still looking at a 20 foot cast. Having a solid connection with your fly is problematic at that distance, taking away the euro advantage. Still looking for opportunities where it makes me want to invest.
