The Metolius River is absolutely a golden opportunity this time of year. Is every single day a home run? No, but the is the sweetest time of the year for me on the river followed by the period of early May to the end of June.
So if you haven’t been out there playing chess with smart trout, mastering hatches, perfecting your nymph drifts or swinging an articulated streamer to a big Bull Trout, what in the world are you waiting for?
Mayfly hatches continue to be a lot of fun to match, with Green Drakes #10 and Flav’s #14, PMD’s #16 and #18, BWO #18-20, Mahogany Duns #16 all in the hatch cycle on different sections of the river throughout the day. We ought to see the Flav’s for another week or so, and the Drakes for about 10 to 14 more days, the other 3 mayflies will be with us all of October too. Don’t forget the Spinner falls… Especially Rusty Spinners #16, and #14 for the Flav spinners. It’s Rare to see Drake spinners, but the Autumn hatch is the most likely time you will see them so bring a spent wing in the box in case you run into them, and expect that to be more of a morning event.
There are a ton of Caddis out, from meaty October Caddis #8-10 to Micro Caddis #20 and a bunch of Tan #16, Olive #16-18 and Grey #14 in between.
The Little Olive Stones #16-18 have subsided but they are not gone, and may become important to the fish on any afternoon or evening. And here’s the thing, you’ll use a #16 or #18 Henryville (caddis) for the imitation and that my freind is just a good fly one way or another.
Golden Stones #10 are quite a good searching fly all over the river with Golden Stones and October Caddis being matched well with a Clark’s Stone.
We’ve had super good good days on the Euro Rig! Brown or Olive Perdigons #14-18, Jig 20″ #10, Caddis Pupa #8-18, Soft Hackle Jig PT #16-18, Walts Worm #14-16 and Purple Perdigon #18, plus Golden Stone Nymphs and Eggs!
Has anyone seen any Kokanee yet? I haven’t yet…. They ought to appear any day now. Get your eggs ready.
Bull Trout fishing is good and the fish are after big streamers more than anything so bring your 7 and 8 weights to the Bull Fight and leave the little rods for the rainbows. It’s not a bad idea to have a sink tip at this time too. It depends in the fly of course, but for the most part a sink tip will likely be more productive as it slows down the drift of the swing, and puts the flies deeper for longer.