Charlie and Tim,
On sunday where we were fishing, baetis were being taken down the gut of
the run from the middle to the tailout. Even as caddis and the smattering
of March Browns came out, the trout continued to key on the baetis.
Occasionally, the fishing would slow down and then we would catch fish when
we switched to soft hackles. Partridge and Green will work during a caddis
hatch as well as my favorite black. But neither worked as good as the
pheasant tail soft hackle which is a good baetis emerger (which told me
that baetis were the predominant feed in the water). I switched back to my
baetis cripple (a Quigley Cripple pattern with an olive body) and it would
begin all over again. During this time, there were a lot of caddis in the
air but the rise forms never indicated that they were what was being taken.
A classic masking hatch if there ever was one. Interestingly, there were
three guys, at various times, nymphing across the run from us and none of
them ever saw the rising trout in the middle of the river nor noticed we
were fishing dries. In fact, a couple boaters even came down and pounded
our banks as they rowed over the risers.
Leland.
>Well Leland I'm so glad to see you had some luck over the weekend. I was
>there too but my tale differs in that I only caught some dinks on Sunday
>with the largest being a 7 incher. Last Saturday I hit the March brown
>hatch from 1:30 to 2:30, this Saturday no Brown hatch what so ever but in
>it's place was an all day caddis hatch but guess what? The fish weren't
>keyed in on them, I watched bug after bug land on the water unmolested. I
>watched this happen all day long.
>
>So it all depends on where you were when. I fished Bighorn to Red's from
>12:30 to 6:30 on Sat. and Red's to the slab on Sunday from 10 till 3 with as
>I said 4 or 5 dinks, ( they wouldn't leave the fly alone). I figure when you
>find dinks you usually don't find any larger fish with them. Every time I
>figure I've got a clue as to how fish the Yak the conditions change and I'm
>back to square one. Maybe next time.
>
>
>Tight lines my friends,
> Charlie
