Beginning with a Bang

Dateline: June 5, 2014

A month of uninterrupted fishing began almost to the day where I left off two years ago, fishing

Along the Firehole River, June 5th

a favorite stretch of the Firehole River.

Despite heavy snowfall in Yellowstone country this past winter, the river was clear and snowmelt-free. The Firehole is almost bulletproof from the dirty water that can doom fishing on a lot of Western rivers until early July.

If you want to fish dry flies to rising fish, don’t come this early. Wait until mid-June. But, if you want to catch good-sized trout, this is prime time. I experienced this in 2012 and again this season. You don’t catch the Firehole dinks this time of year, and the bigger trout are very active, even mid-day.

This is streamer season on the Firehole. That’s probably sacrilegious to many anglers who think of the Firehole as dry fly water. Conditions are perfect for streamers. Very little insect activity is happening yet, and the water temperatures are ideal. Most importantly, the river is bankful, with plenty of water along undercut banks and around logs providing security for fish.

Undercut banks provide security for big fish

I use a short (3 foot) section of sink tip with my 5 wt rod, throwing a black or olive wooly bugger with some sort of nymph as a trailer. This is search fishing, reading the river for those lies that trout favor.

I started the morning at one of my favorite no-name stretches of the Firehole, the scene of a morning of great streamer fishing two years ago. I have found a number of these stretches on the Firehole, places away from where all the books and fly shops send you (Fountain Flats, Goose Lake Meadow, Muleshoe Bend). They are uncrowded, and the fish are bigger.

1st Trout, probably 13" or so

The action this morning proved that my 2012 season here was not a fluke. I landed three nice brown trout on a black wooly bugger; four even bigger trout got the best of me. With each new season, I always have to relearn the basics for landing bigger fish…getting the drag set right; playing the fish, not fighting it; not pulling too hard when the fish is below me in strong current.

The fish are very aggressive this time of year. I hooked a couple of the big trout on the second cast after missing a strike the first time. They came from along undercut banks, under logs, and from deep in a large bend pool.

In early June, the Firehole is all yours.

All of the fishing is within 20 minutes from Madison Campground where I am staying. Camping here, it’s easy to spend a lot of time…and the right time…on the river. And, it’s another way to avoid crowds on the Firehole. If your lodging is in West Yellowstone, it’s almost an hour’s drive to get up to where the fishing is.