The abundance of water we’ve been getting smashed with in
the Kootenay Region of BC has been staggering at points. June was torrential and posted record
rainfalls for the area and July has been drier but is delivering some epic rainstorms with some thunder and lightning mixed in. Just as the Elk starts to take gain
visibility one of these hero type fronts rolls in and turns the river to
poo….that’s right poo!!! As in chocolate
brown. Little frustrating for sure but
I’m blessed to know of some good floats and wades in the SW Alberta region and
have been taking refuge in the cleaner and more active waters.
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| The Kootenay Invading Johnstone Beach |
The Elk is crap right now.
I’m not a big advocate of hucking streamers for cutts on the Elk so I
suffer through some mediocre days on the
Elk pumping leggy flies into the few soft seams on the river and watch in
disbelief as drift after good drift just passes by. I’ve even witnessed some epic hatches of
stoneflies that were more or less ignored by the trout. So perhaps the streamer is the answer but I’d
rather fish Alberta and wait for the dry to come back and that has pretty much
been my MO and I’ve really enjoyed the time over there despite the long days.
Have fished with some of my favourites lately, both new and
old clients. It’s been a pleasure to
have the people who I’ve had in my boat over the last few weeks and it’s hard
to use the term clients when there is such comfort and ease in their company; feels more akin to friendship.
Ya….I’m super freakin’ lucky and blessed to have found my way into this
game.
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| Chris Jacobs Styling on the Oldman |
After fishing the Oldman Tailwater with Brad and Chris
Jacobs; an awesome couple from Helena MT who are just the perfect people to
spend time in a boat with. They both are
keen and possess the skills to handle the tricky tailwater and we manage to move
and land some nice fish over the two days of floating. The rainbows were seeing their first few days
of clean and lower water and were definitely a bit skinny; the tailwater raged
for awhile and clearly the fish were laying low through it all. We fished dries pretty much the whole way
which is my favourite way to feed the Oldman rainbows. They responded well to an assortment of PMD’s
and Caddis and aside from one bitchy little pod that snubbed my entire PMD
selection (which is by no means small).
We had hooked two off the start but as they continued to rise it became
clear that they smelt the bullshit of my imitations and there was nothing that
was going to get a hook in their jaw. Always hard to row away from rising fish but we did and
moved into a new school of trout that were eating what I usual put on the menu
for them.
After watching more rain and runoff paint the Elk we headed
further east and fished a certain river filled with Browns with Phil Dupuis,
Ron Myers and Jim Woolacott. Jim
invented the Bow River Bugger and is one of the most enthusiastic anglers I’ve
had in my boat. Dude reads water well
and is not afraid to tickle the edges.
Jim got busy peeling small browns off the boat throughout the day and
continued to touch some nice fish in the evening. After the clouds sunblocked the river we came
up on a gorgeous bank where he smacked a meaty brown that went tail
walked upstream and chucked the fly away.
Impressive.
Ron was fishing out of the front of the boat and it was
probably about the 25th or so day that we have fished together and I
always appreciate having him in the boat cause I know I’m going to get good
presentations. No one works an inside
seam drag free like Ron and watching him short stack mends to make that PMX
dance down the softer edge of the current seam was magic. He hooked lots went on about the countless
rivers his played with throughout Montana and hearing him run through that list
of blue ribbon waters made me want to take the month off and trout bum it
through the Big Sky State.
Guiding Phil Dupuis is like spending a day on the water with
your old drinking buddy. Not that he
drinks on the water but he has no problem telling you what’s on his mind and
has no problem having it thrown back.
We’ve watched him evolve has an angler over the last several years and
we’re not quite sure what he got up to this winter but his game with the stick
was definitely tighter. He crushed a
couple of nice browns on the Alberta float with Spencer on dries after putting up with some shitty wet weather the day before
on an Elk Trib that produced a couple of nice cutts. I haven’t been that rainsoaked in a while,
but both days we went out and walked and waded we got drenched. No major hatches to accompany the lows that
were cruising in which added some insult to the soggy situation. Fine food and drink in the evenings helped us
get over the abuse from mother nature.
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| Phil Dupuis Beating the Weather in Slabtown |
More rain today, severe rainfall warning according to the
weather station and it did hammer down in Fernie for a bit, but it stopped
shorter than expected and I’m hoping the Elk cleans and allows us to have a
peak at her bottom. Fish must be sick of
breathing silt but it’s gonna happen any day now if the forecast gives us what
it’s promising. Still feels like the
season is just kicking off and it’s almost August. When this thing does clear and those poor
lil trout start looking up; they
are going to get reckless on
food. I’m expecting a good terrestrial
season this year as many of the hatches on the Elk have been going off during
this cloudy water stage. The tribs are
still chocked full of PMD’s and Drakes but the Elk has been checking in at warm
temps due to the rainfall created runoff which has kept the bugs moving
throughout this browning of the river.
I’m out again on Sunday to float the beast and I’m gonna
make some burnt offerings on the banks of the Elk tomorrow and ask the water Gods for
clarity. Our fly shop in the Stanford will be opening Sunday....back in the retail game :)!
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