Roll’n down hill like a snowball head’n for hell…Apparently our snowpack is gone. Finito. Say0nara. We thought the drastic drop in flows was due to the cold weather and recent snow we had in the high country but it looks like that’s all she wrote.  Guide trips out on the Flathead this past week and fishing has been pretty good. PMDs and sallies have fish up in the afternoon. Caddis in the evenings and a few green drakes and golden stones starting to show. A mid sized foam fly with a small stone, prince, or SJW will pluck some fish until they get to look’n for pmds. A few nice bulls around so a streamer might be a good bet while the river still has a little color. Flows are dropping out like crazy. Scary actually.

The Swan drainage is in good shape as well. Like everywhere else it’s in shape early and fishing is picking up. Stones and worms under an indicator, streamers on a tip, and big foam flies with deep droppers of the stone and annelid variety will hunt.

The Blackfoot is shaping up very quickly as well. So fast in fact that if you blink you’ll probably miss the salmon fly event this year. Any day the bugs are going to pop. Yuk bugs, big hole crawlers, bitch creeks, turds and all that stuff will work until the big bugs get going. Streamer fishing will be worth the effort while the river still has some color and water.

Summer is here!

Jason Lanier
Latest posts by Jason Lanier (see all)