River Conditions: 5/27/18

Water Clarity: Clear to Stained

Water Temperatures:  Mid 50s to 60s

Hatches: Black and Brown Stoneflies, Olive Caddis, Hendricksons, Quill Gordons, BWOs, PMDs

Suggested Patterns: Pheasant Tails (#12-16) Copper Johns (#14-16-Chart) Hare’s Ears (#12-14) Montana Prince Nymphs-Black (#12-14) Kaufman Stoneflies Black and Gold (#10-14) Anderson’s Bird of Prey_Olive (#14-16) Taylor’s Gut Instinct (#14-16) Girdle Bugs (#6-10) Tan X Caddis (#12-16) Olive Elk Hair Caddis (#16-18) Adams (#12-16) Light Cahils (#12-14) Blond Wulf (#12-14) Royal Wulf (#12-14) Olive Wooly Buggers (#6-8) Zonkers #4 Montana Mouthwash Wht/Grizzly

Things have continued to improve over the past few days. We’re starting to see some consistency on the Winooski and Lamoille with dry flies as well which is great! Been seeing a variety of bugs around. The fish are super happy right now. The larger rivers are holding right around 60 degrees right now giving us great fishing opportunities all day long. If you’re going to get out over the next few days take advantage of the great conditions on the larger rivers while you still can. In a few weeks they might start to get too hot!

I’d be bringing two rods down to the river right now if possible. One rigged up with a dry and another set up with a couple of nymphs. The dries are going to vary from day to day but if you’ve got some Adams, Elk Hair Caddis and a Cream colored dry like a Blond Wulf or a Light Cahill you’re probably going to be set for whatever’s coming off. Maybe a rusty spinner too. On the nymphing side of things the standards will all work, vary in size and color. If you’re going to run two nymphs run one larger and brighter attractor with a smaller more natural looking dropper. Varying sizes and colors can often help you dial things in a bit quicker than running two similarly colored and sized nymphs. Once you start to notice a pattern you can then switch over the less productive fly to something more similar to the one that’s getting fish.

The bass and pike fishing has been pretty solid too, things should continue to heat up for the bass once they get off they’re beds and the pike fishing should continue to get better for a few more weeks. Good luck to everyone getting out there!

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