Top o’ the week to you! Certainly looks a bit more like early-mid April than a few days ago. By that I mean the new snow in the valley as well as up in the High Country. Seems to keep piling up in those higher elevations. Snow Water Equivalency (SWE) still holding steady at almost 120% of historic norm for right now… Could be a later start to the post runoff summer season around these parts.
What might be expected should you choose to get after it today? Water’s been on the drop for a day now. That’s the good part. Bad part is it’s stained, again, with a bit of earthy brown/olive and it’s cold.
With this last push of snowmelt and rain, the Lamar, Gardner, and area tribs have been pushing colder water into the river system along with the color. Next couple days look to remain chilly and potential for more wet stuff falling from the sky (could be rain, could be snow, might be both). Likely the bit of color in the river will take a few days to filter out. In the meantime, as conditions visibly improve, fishing will hopefully pick back up. Baetis have been quite good, especially on the magical days of clouds and less wind. There’s been a good grab from Yellowstone trout from midday on to the early PM on the subsurface nymph rigs. Both long and short. Short has been better later. Top water- dry fly fishing has had its moments. Just have to be looking for the right water and be there when the bugs are. Streamer guys- been hearing a lot about how it should be good. Not much proving up. Yet? There’s a couple Jedi out there that have shown how to…. Waiting to see some more.
