Great Falls, Montana Fishing Report 05.25.18

The river is high, but the water is beautiful. It’s got color coming in from Little Prickly Pear  Creek and the Dearborn River, but with the Missouri’s high volume, their influence is quickly absorbed. The river has some color, but it has been fishable all the way down to Cascade.

Nymphs

A fly does not have to be a fly to be a fly. Worms are often the fly of choice. Many are fishing a double worm rig with one made of wire and one made of softer materials. If you don’t groove on fishing two worms, your scuds, sows, mayfly nymphs and caddis pupa are also get you in the game. Look to the banks or to the shelf-lines where the banks used to be and be ready to burn through some flies. You might think you are fishing off the edge, but your fly will sometimes be drifting over the willowtops—those willows are fly eaters.

Dry Flies

Caddis are out, but at the current flows, nobody has come in with glowing dry-fly reports. If you hit the right spot in the evening, you might find a fish or two working the egg-layers, but you will probably keep it to yourself.

Streamers

If you want to tangle with that aggressive brown or hungry post-spawn rainbow, fish your favorite articulated stuff on a sinking-tip like you mean it. On one bank this week, I had 10 hard-charging browns chase my fly. I managed to hook a couple of them, but seeing the ones I missed was just as exciting.

Local Streams

A few boaters have been running Belt Creek this week. The water is perfect right now if you are an experienced boater with the right craft. Highwood Creek and Otter Creek are also both in fishable condition. They can come in and out of shape based on rain and heat, but by and large, it’s fishing season on any given day.

Stillwaters

Early Callibaetis have been coming off on Nilan and other lakes, along with chironomids. Now that the waters have warmed up, the crayfish are also active. Fishing from shore is still a viable activity, but you can also break out the float-tube and get after it. Pishkin, Frances, Tibor, Ft. Peck and the Marias are all in play for pike. If you need flies, pike leaders, wire bite tippet, a pike fly line or information, we’ve got the stuff.

 Click here to see past Great Falls reports, or here to view all northwest regional reports.