I appreciate that my brother. Another question if I may. I generally use Powerbaits when I go Ultralite but generally that is in Missouri (Taneycomo, Current River, etc). Will PB eggs or worms work up there or is there something better I need to be picking up for MT river trout?

Here you go:

http://fwp.state.mt.us/FwpPaperApps/...2005NRMisc.pdf

I would stick to worms, flies and lures. :)

Thanks a bunch. $15.00 is actually better than I expected for a 2 day permit. I assume that permit is all inclusive (didn't see a special fee for a trout stamp). Looks like I'll be getting a line wet and broiling a trout or 2 on the bank this run. :drool: :)

Hasn't been much action in this thread lately.

My summer of fishing hasn't been that great. I am headed to the Big Piney for a smallmouth trip tomorrow morning. I hope that things will improve.

Had one good day (if 30 minutes can be called a day) where I caught 3 smallmouth, a carp, and a bluegill in about 10 casts. All caught on a crawfish imitation called the Crazy Dad.

I was fishing with my 4-month old son in his baby carrier on my chest and he got impatient, so I didn't get to stick around any longer. This weekend the son stays at home.;)

I spent a week in Canda the first full week of June.
No monsters caught by anyone. My biggest fish was a 23 inch Walleye weighing in at 5lbs. The biggest fish of the week was a 32 inch Northern.
Our boat caught the two biggest fish of the week
so we had braggin rights.

We also had a brown Bear in Camp for several days too. It got about 30 feet from one of us, the bear turned and ran down a path. The bear showed up again in about 15 minutes but this time was next to our fish cleaning cabin. He didn't stick around long.
We called our outpost owner by satelite phone and informed him. They flew out some firecrackers
to set off.

Last summer one of the guys in our party was at this same cabin, and the out post owner sent a
30.6 handgun with him for the week...

We were rained on DAILY, but caught hundreds of fish. BUT no HAWGS on this trip.

Next June were going to this place www.piketales.com
We'll be on Lake Preston in NW Manitoba.

Henry: good for you for getting out! It sounds like you had a good time other than a little "bonus rain" and a few encounters with Gentle Ben. I am heading up to Cooke City this weekend to hook up with my brother for a little Fishing / ATVing / relaxing.

So how has everone else been doing? The summer is half shot. Lets hear some fishing tales.

Haven't been since Memorial Day weekend. The crappie fishing pretty much sucked for us this year, although we did catch enough slabs to have a nice fish dinner about three weeks ago. Yummy!!

And we still have a bag of filets in the freezer from last year that I forgot about.

Stayed at a friend's cabin and went out for smallmouth two weekends ago on a small creek. Caught about 25 over a day and a half of fishing. Good times.

Went to the Little Red for trout last weekend. Pretty slow day. I think I landed maybe seven fish, all small. One buddy tore them up, landing 25 or so on a fly called a San Juan worm.

Ouch, I hope you have a chance to make it out for your yearly fishing trip / beer drinking run again this year. With your new found brewing skills, you can hang some tasty home brew in the cooler. :drool:

Nice! I have been putting in 12-14 hour days so I am ready to hit the mountains again to unwind before I go crazy. Work hard, play hard. :)

Which flies have been working for you down there? It may be to early for the hoppers to be out where I'm going, but I will bring a few along just in case.

In Arkansas, which is all tailwater fishing, it's pretty much the same flies year round with a few exceptions (like hoppers when terrestials are out). Midge patterns (zebra, jujubee, black beauty, rainbow warrior), scuds (UV scud, Mclellan's hunchback scud, flashback scud), sowbugs (Mclellan's v-rib sowbug, ostrich herl sowbugs), and soft hackles (red ass) are the goto flies day in and day out. Oh, lots of people fish wooly buggers as well.

The only significant hatches we get are caddis and sulphur, but the fish don't really key in on the dries even when a hatch is full swing.

I just hope I catch them while they are on the rise this time. I did last trip, but it took all day. I would just as soon use the dry flies and leave the the others alone if I can help it. I had one big hawg that I could see that would rise, sit there and look at the dry on the surface and slowly swim off. It drove me crazy until I landed him after about an hour. Nailed him with a blue wing olive.

A few weekends ago, I went fish’n with a long time friend on the Neosho River and I got to watch him haul in a 20# flat head. Since then I’ve dusted off my river poles and have been try’n to catch some of those for myself.
Not nearly as easy as he made it look, flat heads are pretty wily.

I dropped my boat in a lake about 6am saturday and fished until 1....its only been stocked for 3 years, so the fish aren't big yet....I pulled in 15 bass, mostly 14-15", but one that was 16 1/2 and a little over 21/2lbs. My Buddy's boat of pan fishermen pulled in 57 eating size bluegill in the same timeframe. They were good eating...for bait.

Last night I went to one of my favorite ponds in our county....and was terribly disappointed. What was a very healthy pond last year, full of nice, hard fighting bass....had WAY too much Algae and I fear a fishkill when that stuff dies. The Fish also were sluggish and had some blisters/growths on them. Needless to say, I left and didn't keep any.

Good ponds are tough to get access to here, and I think I'm going to have to take that one off the list. Dammit.

Still haven't landed a bass over 3lbs this year. I'm figuring on fishing alot more for the next month though.

I wonder what happened to the pond to make it go so downhill? I hope to one day have a pond on some property to manage. I think that properly managing a pond for trophy size fish as a hobby would be pretty damned cool.

Of course, if I get really rich, I'll have Dave Whitlock build a private trout stream for me on my property.