Today I foolishly wore my Chaco sandals to the shop—safe to say they’ll be retired to the closet until the warm air of spring is upon us. Cold toes are the opposite of a good time, even if I am just sitting inside typing this up. Anyway, fall fishing is here, folks, and it’s actually beginning to fish a bit more like winter in regard to our time window for success.
First, there is absolutely zero rush to get onto the river early. With evening temps dropping to the upper 30s, the likely time these fish are willing to show us some love will happen from about 11 am to roughly 4pm. As the weeks continue, that time slot of good dry fly fishing will only become more compressed until we’re chasing bobber rigs through December, or more likely tying flies while watching Wheel of Fortune. In short, get it in while you still can.
The recent push of cold air accompanied by a lovely canopy of clouds has made for solid mayfly fishing. Yesterday we were able to fish a single October caddis, until switching to a blue wing olive (Purple Haze being the go-to bug) at around 1pm. Dropper fishing has been “meh,” but that’s been fine because now is the time to push a single dry fly. That said, size down your tippet and hyper-focus on a drag-free drift. More than anything, these fish are eating a clean drift—the fly is secondary. Good luck out there and stay safe!