Dry Fly Innovations

We recently returned from the Big Wood River near Fairfield, Idaho.  We left early in the morning to try and fish both the Wood and Silver Creek over a two-day period.  We arrived at the river around 7 am and decided that since the Wood was closer, we would start there.  We pulled into a river access called sheep bridge and hiked down a small bluff to the river, and the river looked gorgeous!

Fishing the deeper side of the fairly narrow channel, we were targeting the big rainbows and browns that haunt these waters.  There were plenty of large boulders and brush piles that fish love to hang out at so we focused mostly on those kinds of areas.  Initially we tied on a Black Gold Hardback, thinking that since we had no idea what hatch might be going on, that it should get something’s attention.  It took a little while, and we were about to tie on something else when all of a sudden bang!  Fish on the line.  We reeled her in and had a lovely 10-inch rainbow.  It was plump and healthy and shiny, the only real problem was that it was kind of on the small side.  So like usual we set it free and continued on.

We fished that stretch of the river from morning until around 10 am (before the extreme heat and lack of shade sent us packing) and caught well over 15 fish.  Once again, the only problem was that they were all around the 8 to 10-inch mark.  There was one fish that was a bigger, nicer fish.  We had just switched to an CDC Caddis, thinking that maybe that was what the monster fish were looking for.  After a couple of casts, we had a wonderful take and a longer fight.  By the weight of the fish on the line and how it was fighting, we could tell this fish was bigger.  And it was.  After a fun fight, we reeled in a 13-inch rainbow that was just beautiful!  Shiny sides, plump like her little friends, and all around healthy.  We admired her a moment and then let her go.

We then decided that since it was only around 10 and the heat wasn’t quite were it was going to be, that we should go hit Silver Creek and see what we could do there.  So we drove over, then walked the half-mile to our preferred holes and started casting.  There was a hatch coming off but the problem here was that it was such a tiny mayfly, you couldn’t tie to it.  The size of the actual bug combined with the fact that the water is crystal clear makes it incredibly difficult to fool a fish.  We changed flies a couple of times and made cast after cast to feeding fish and never had a swirl.  So an hour or so, we were on our way.

At this time it was somewhere around ninety to ninety five degrees outside, which usually lays the hatches low, so we went back to camp and ate lunch and took a snooze.  The plan was to hit the river again in the evening when the hatches resumed.

When seven o’clock rolled around we rallied and went right back to where we were that morning and fished the exact same stretch.  Since it was still brutally hot, we both decided waders were unnecessary.  On the river there was the beginnings of a caddis hatch coming off the water, but it hadn’t quite started yet.  We tied on a Adam’s Caddis and fished away.  It didn’t take long before our line was snapping and “There he is!” could be heard echoing down the river canyon.

It was fish after fish, but again with the same problem as in the morning, they were all in the 8-10 inch range.  Again we caught a couple nicer fish, another rainbow around the same size as the one in the morning, and two larger browns.  The browns were ranged from 13-15 inches and were just stunning.  Healthy and fat seemed to be a theme for the fish in this river.

We fished until it became too dark to film and again caught somewhere near 15 fish.  It was a fun days fishing, even when you factor in the massive amount of mosquitoes.  We decided that fishing wasn’t going to change on either the Big Wood or Silver Creek so we camped the night and went home in the morning.  It was a great trip and our flies performed exactly as we could have hoped!