Winter Midges

Winter fishing is at it’s best right now. Midges and some baetis are coming off during the mid-day. Nymphing has been good all day with small sowbugs and midge patterns, sizes #20-#22 seem to be the ticket. I have been using a #20 gray sowbug and trailing a #20 brass zebra midge w/brown thread body. Around noon the midges start clustering and make the trout much easy to catch on the surface. Before noon the trout are keyed on the single midges and the bugs are extremely small. I have been using a #22 dun cluster and doing very well on 6x. Around 1:30 some baetis have been coming off and on the cloudy days the trout have really key in to them. The Mayfly hatch has been lasting for about an hour or so then back to midges. Don’t let the cloudy cool days scare you off, it can be some of the best fishing of the year. Try to plan on shorter floats, A-3 or 3-B. Give yourself some time to fish the slower deep water. The water is cold and the browns have really come on the feed. pg