Bourbon, Flies, and Lies: August 2022

A trout vacation story filled with proper planning and execution.

Warning lol I am going to be long winded with this blog entry, but all the things I am writing about will make and or break anyone’s trip planning no matter where you fish.

I would be a total liar if I said this was a normal fishing trip for me. I am very lucky to be taking this trip for several reasons. A great friend and former co-worker who I used to enter confined spaces with at work will be going together. I trust him with my life and is a great person. Some of the things we are going to try and accomplish together you must trust the person you are going with on vacation.

This is all part of the experience and this experience I have dreamed of for a while. So, my friend has family in Montana. His daughter lives in the Helena area and the other Lives around Eureka, Montana.

When my friend Steve invited me to Montana “over a year ago now” I jumped at the chance. We spoke about immediately how long we wanted to spend out there. We agreed eventually to 14 days. We would be driving and will drive time from and to Montana 5 days “2.5 days out and 2.5 days back” I thought it sounded reasonable.

We then spoke about how do we want to access the rivers out there? I spoke to him we should do it by watercraft. His daughter has a canoe and later he would have his brother purchased a used canoe “that does not leak lol”. So, eventually our river transportation was taken care of.

Then I thought about the safety of the canoe. I am not as nimble as I once was and thus the idea of some type of stability mechanism was needed for these canoes. I looked to use my Google-Foo to find the correct equipment to give he and I a better sense of stability with the canoe. Here is a link to the company that I found.

Spring Creek

We would be using these canoes on the following bodies of water Bitter Root, Bull, Big Mo, Black Foot, Big Hole, Flathead, Ruby, Clarkfork, Beaverhead, Kintla Lake, and Kootnai River.

Yes, this a grand pipe dream I know to fish such an exhaustive list of rivers. I will go into detail of why I choose all these bodies of water.

Let’s talk about the weather in that part of the United States of America. There are several factors that need to be considered when fishing in the region. They range from spring run-off, drought conditions, hoot owl restrictions, wildfires, smoke, and fish per mile. Now, for me these variables have more devil in the details associated with them. Due to this being part of the Rocky Mountain Range the weather patterns are a crazy as the Great Lakes Region.

Here are some helpful websites that I found for information:

Montana Wildfires

National Realtime Satellite Imagery

National Fire and Smoke Map

USDA – Natural Resources Conservation Services Montana

Montana DOT (Department of Transportation) Cameras

Here are a few websites that I used for weather planning:

NOAA – Northwest River Forecast Center

USGS – Dashboard

NOAA – National Weather Service

I have found in my only 26 years of fly fishing that its easier if I let Mother Nature dictate where I fish and adjust from there. This allows me to believe it or not more freedom in the large scheme of things. This is a key reason I have some many rivers on my list to potentially fish. There is no way I would be able to fish all those rivers in a season let alone while on vacation.

I am also lucky that we are going to cover so much of Montana on this vacation. From Helena to Eureka, it’s a six hour drive and thus the weather patterns are so different.

I chose mid-September for several reasons. I look at the recorded weather history over a three-year period from 2018-2021. By this time up north they will have had their first snow event and down south they would be in the low 40’s at night. One of the rivers I wanted to fish is the Big Hole. The river stays cooler all summer due to the location of it in a high river valley. While it’s known for its trout fishing its known for a prolific mosquito hatch! Lol Here is a great website that good write-ups about Montana Rivers and here is the link for the Big Hole.

Big Sky Fishing

These cooler temps will be more conducive for trout fishing and less likely to have low dissolved oxygen in the waters we choose to fish.

Next comes planning the put-ins and take-outs for the canoe. I have a Garmin GPSMAP 64sx and use the Garmin program called Bascamp to have all my waypoints in it. As a land survey technician, I know the base map that Basecamp uses is accurate to a point. So, in conjunction with Basecamp I use Google Earth Pro (GEP) to make the float routes in and export them from Google Earth Pro and import them into Basecamp. This is still not perfect, but it gets it into the reel world closer than with Basecamp.

For those of us who have floated rivers before one of the biggest issues is to familiarize yourself with the float. Now, this is not a perfect system then again nothing is perfect. You can use GEP with its aerials to see the waters your going to fish providing the rivers and or creeks have a clear view of them from above! Here is another secret about GEP you can use the historical feature (timeline) and go back in time and look at the same rivers and or creeks in different years and months. Also, Montana has a great Fish, Wildlife & Parks website. Here you will find all the FAS (Fish Access Sites) FAS Locations

BLM “Bureau of Land Management” has a great site located here:

Bureau of Land Management (BLM)

Google Earth Pro Route lay-out and set

Garmin Basecamp with imported Google Earth Pro Float Route

Garmin Basecamp Route Information

With the above information to this point, you will be less likely to miss your take-out! I have been there done that and lack of better words its sucks! You will be able to also see how long the floats are. With the Garmin 64sx I make routes and I can tell how fast I am going and how long it will be based upon my current pace how long it will be before I get to my takeout!

Well, I hope I have been able to keep your attention and now onto the fly selections.

With this trip I thought long and hard about what flies to tie up for this trip. I can’t lie it was a tough process. There are so many great simple patterns. With the time we will be out their Hoppers will still be around and the fish will be feeding and getting fat for winter.

I choose with my much debate the Chubby Chernobyl hooper tied on size 6’s, 8’s, and 10’s using the Tiemco 9395 hook. The other fly that I tied was several soft hackles with tungsten beads. The soft hackle flies are tied on size 10’s and 12’s. I will attach photos of the flies I have tied up for this trip. The soft hackles are the king in my humble opinion in searching for fish and coming in number two pattern for searching for fish are the dreaded wolly buggers! I have tied these up in olive, white, and black. These flies are tied up on 6’s, 8’s, and 10’s. The forementioned flies are tied on Tiemco 9395 hooks.

Like American Express never leave home with out it!

Well, I have spoken about a lot and now let’s move onto rod selection for the trip. I will be bringing my TFO TiCr 6wt, a TFO Deer Creek 5wt switch rod (grain weight window 250-450), a custom rain shadow blank 6wt switch rod (grain weight window 325-500). I will be using the switch rods to swing and search for trout! I will be using the TiCr rod for my hopper dropper set up and nymphing rod.

****WARNING**** WARNING**** WARNING**** WARNING**** WARNING**** WARNING****

I will be talking about my use of an eggbeater next while on my trip!

I will be taking my two eggbeaters “spinning rods”. I will be taking my good ole trusty St. Croix Avid 9’ Med-Heavy Fast Action eggbeater for fishing the Kootani Dam. Then my other eggbeater will be vintage Pro-Star 02-602M 6-foot medium action rod. This rod will be used to fish for trout and mainly for Kintla Lake.

I will bring small spoons and jerk baits. These all have single hooks on them. While if the regs called for it I would debarb them.

I am going to end Part I here because there is going to be plenty more entries when this vacation begins. I Thank you for reading and being a part of it.