Lower Madison, Gallatin, and East Gallatin
This past week of decent weather has allowed us to move around local waters with comfortability and good fishing results. Tuesday I hiked the East Gallatin and finally got into my first good sized fish on the east for this Winter! Started off using tiny deer hair sculpin patterns size 8 and 10 and found some browns ready to attack. The sculpin pattern was the only thing i found that the browns keyed in on but the rest of the day was filled with angry macho rainbows going after pink scuds size 14-16, olive soft hackles size 14-16, and pheseant tail nymphs size 12-16. All trout were hanging in deep pools and rocky banks and picked up dead drifted flies, in most rainbows case hitting it with absolute aggressive enthusiasm. Even the smaller ones put up good fights like drunken irishmen with napolean complexes ready to show the world what they are made of.
The Main Gallatin has been an enjoyable and relatively unoccupied place to fish. The past two times fishing there this week i've seen one other person and last week the only other fishermen in sight were a couple of bald eagles who i'm more than happy to share the river with. As with the east all the browns have targeted black or olive Wolly Buggers size 4-8. The rainbows seem to like pink scuds size 14-16, zebra midges size 18, and pheseant tails size 12-18. Again deep pools, below riffles, and behind large rocks were the only places trout were caught. I have also had better luck fishing from the mouth of the canyon and up heading towards Big Sky than in the valley.
The Lower Madison has been coercing smiles from me the last two times I've fished there in the past week. Both times anything pink, regargless of size, was killing it from scuds to sow bugs to san juan worms and virtually all rainbows. Some fish were pulled in on copper or pearl zonkers and a couple on prince nymphs but for right now the fish are totally in love with the color pink. Again in typical winter fishing style the fish podded up in pools beneath riffles and around big rocks. Wading from the bank look for riffles and green colored troughs that occupy those huge grass mats dead drift throught there and almost every other hole has a hungry trout ready to fight!
-Peter