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Wintertime midge eater.
Photo by Jordan Myers.
Intro by Josh Almond
It's weekly newsletter time and we're glad to have you! It's been a wild ride with the temperature here in West Yellowstone over the last few weeks. Two Saturdays ago we woke up to -44º and this past Saturday we hit a peak of 37º here in town...which makes for an insane 81º temperature swing in a seven day period! A few of our guys took advantage of the little warm spell and got out to chase some fish and from the sounds of it found some pretty good fishing. This weekend looks as though it should provide some more opportunites for angling for those looking to get out of the house.
I spent a lot of my weekend experimenting at the vise and watching some great playoff football games. This is the first place I have lived where there's an "off season" for fishing so I do my best to make good use of the time to tie. I always try and have a good selection of the long time favorites but there's a lot of fun to be had tinkering with fly ideas. Chances are I'm not coming up with the next Sparkle Dun or Elk Hair Caddis but I have pretty good odds of coming up with a fly that fishes better for me. Here's an example, I love the Morrish Hopper but I can't see that orange piece of foam on top to save my life. A simple change to yellow foam on top when I tie them and I can track the fly all day. So while it's not creating a new fly I was able to make a slight change to an established pattern in order for it to fish better for me.
Another simple change we can make is dubbing type or color to better match the bugs you're seeing. Whether you're fishing caddis on the Madison or Iso's on the Manistee, there's a variety of dubbings you can play with to better match what you're encountering on the water. Or on the complete opposite end maybe you want to see how goofy a fly you can get them to eat. I keep a row of X-Caddis tied with purple Ice Dub and there are some evenings where they can't get enough of it. Again, it's not a new invention by any means but it creates an opportunity to have more fun tying and fishing!
As always give us a call at the shop, swing in or shoot us an email if you have any questions!
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