2-9 SS Winter Trout

 It’s winter and you’re longing for spring so you can go fishing right? Well not to break your bubble, or make that break the ice, but you can go fishing right now. Wintertime is a great time to go flyfishing for winter trout. Says who you ask? Says the Northwest guru for flyfishing, our Zen master when it comes to being in a trout stream, none other than Josh Mills. Here he is. “Now that it is winter and most of the dry fly hatches have gone to bed for the winter, don’t stop fishing because it can be one of the most productive times of the year for winter trout fishing, especially on a fly rod. What happens is that it turns more into a nymphing show meaning that you are going to be running a tractor nymph like pheasant tails, Copper John’s and things of that nature as well as stone fly nymphs.  What you want to  look for is slow but moving current streams because the fish have moved into what we call winter lies which are areas where they can expend the least amount of energy but at the same time be sitting in the food conveyor belt that is the current. They’re not going to move as much, they are not going to be as active, but a properly presented drag free drifted nymph under a strike indicator called a thingamabobber which is the classy term for a bobber can really be effective as well as this time of the year whitefish have a tendency to be a little more active and feed a little more heavily. So you can go out on rivers like the Yakima, the Clark Fork in Montana and do excellent at both whitefish and winter trout.