10th Day Fly Fishing, March 6th 2023 – Ashton, Idaho
This morning, I was seriously conflicted about going fishing today. The flurries were still pretty serious and the temps were only 20. Looking for divine guidance I consulted my photos from a year prior. Yes! Just a year ago I fished the Ashton area and I wrote a post about it here. Rereading the post got me excited about the possibility of a midge hatch. That was all I needed to get 100% behind the idea of venturing out into the cold.
Getting to the water proved to be a little tricky however. Due to the recent snows, the roads were in terrible shape. So much so that I was in 4 wheel drive most of the way and driving much slower due to safety concerns. Also, when I got to my favorite spot, the parking area had not been plowed. Not wanting to get stuck, I passed and went to another spot downstream and found a parking area where it had been plowed recently and the snow was not so deep. My plan was as it was a year ago. Rig the 4wt Scott G2, initially as an indicator nymph rig and hope for a hatch. Lately, my nymph set-up has consisted as a tungsten bead point fly in a size 16 or even 14, that is of the pheasant tail variety. My “go-to” has been a Frenchie Soft Hackle, using the Fly Fish Food recipe pioneered by Lance Egan. The money fly this time of year is still some variant of a Zebra Midge. I had been tying the “Three Dollar Dip”, but in smaller sizes like size 20-22. As I was checking out the midges in the eddy stream-side, I noticed that the majority were pushing size 18, so I went with a size 18 Zebra Midge in green.
Having had experience at this spot with John and few weeks back, I felt like I had a handle on what areas to work. But after an hour of working the entire area with the nymphs, with nary a bite, I knew I needed to change my strategy. Changing nymphs was one option, but there were also a few fish rising to a what was turning out to be a very robust midge hatch. So, I cut off one tippet and tied 6x to the remaining section and began making casts at the risers. This turned out to be a fools game really. There were naturals all around my fly on every cast. Several times I set thinking that the rising fish was eating my fly, but it turned out to be an adjacent natural. Eventually, the rises became less frequent and I’m not sure why because the hatch was still going strong. My intuition told me that there was some equally impressive sub-surface activity taking place and I wasn’t sure what it was or what to do to capitalize on it.
So without further hesitation, I decided to try streamers. I was two hours in and the high this day was 23, plus standing in very cold thigh deep water. Bone chilling cold! My confidence streamer this time of year has been the Midnight Fire leech pattern. It is tied balanced with a tungsten bead. When it works, it really really works well, but the key this time of year is a really slow retrieve. I prefer to swing my streamers, working large areas and letting the drift do most of the work. With the low, slow winter flows, sometimes the tungsten bead is a little too much. I was getting a lot of bottom hang-ups. So I went with the Drunk Drea pattern which I tie in Thin Mint and also the Creamsickle colors. Today I went with the Creamsickle version as it has been working really well lately. This streamer has enough lead wire to get it down, but the massive amount of marabou is also what helps it suspend. Working this fly with a painfully slow retrieve with a few twitches, here and there, brings life to the fly but the fish don’t have to expend a lot of energy to catch it either. As I began to work this fly, I was close to some structure (big sub-surface boulders) and I swung the fly behind the structure and swung it through with very short, deliberate strips. The line came tight and I actually thought that I was snagged. Winter eats can be so subtle. Within 2 seconds the snag began to move upstream and I knew that finally it was “fish on”! As she made her first attempt at a run, my reel was completely frozen stuck. I quickly palmed it free just short of the breaking point. The girl made a couple of nice runs and fought me all the way to the net. It was not an epic battle, but you have to lower expectations in the winter. As I eased her into the net, I quickly realized that this was a four pound rainbow. Not super long, maybe 18-19″, but a football in shape. If you closely examine the picture below, she looks like a pregnant female. I’m always careful in handling fish, especially the larger ones. This one never left the water. I am careful to keep her submerged as I am getting my camera out and quickly take the shot in the net and release, never touching the fish with my hands. It makes for boring pictures, but healthy fish.
Thinking there were more like her around, I continued to work the area with the same streamer and after 30 minutes, while trying to free that streamer from a snag, it broke off. Checking the break in the line, it was a clean break right in the middle of the tippet. I was relieved to see that it was not knot failure. But, I was cold and content with the One Fish Day. Sometimes that is all you need.
