Madison River
Dam: 2,100 cfs
Kirby: 2,580 cfs
Varney: 3,470 cfs
We’ve had another great week of fishing on the Upper Madison, and the nymph and streamer bite continues to impress even the most skeptical anglers on just how well the upper section fishes in the dirt. Visibility is still around 1.5 feet, but with Cabin and Beaver Creeks slowing down, and over 2,000 cfs of clear water coming out of the dam, we should start to see improvements by early this week. As far as patterns go, the worm bite has been feast or famine depending on the day, and the fish are starting to get a little more wary of big rubber leg stones in areas close to access sites…walk a little further and you’ll find fresher (and a little dumber) fish. You can usually pull out a fish or two out of a hole on the big stuff, but small caddis larva, baetis nymphs, red serendipitys, and hare’s ears have been the key for numbers over the last few days. Streamer fishing has been good to excellent along the banks, and we’ve been doing well on black sculpin patterns under dark conditions, and olive & white has been a good color combination for us under bright skies. Still not a lot of anglers to share the water with these days, but that should all change here in a couple weeks.
