Trip Report: January Driftless Trout Fishing

With temperatures forecast to hit the mid 30's today I've been looking forward to fishing since late last week. I woke up with a tickle in my throat that turned into a full blown sore throat with stuffy sinus's. Not to be dissuaded by my wife I got out early before the wind kicked up too much.

I headed to a creek that lies around 20 miles from home and put feet on the water by 9am. I fished well upstream from the spot pictured above. I rigged up with a nymph and indicator and dredged all of the deepest pools. Surprisingly most fish did not come from deep pools but rather deep fast runs. 

 I immediately tied into  a few nice trout. The fish pictured on the right dove into an undercut bank a few times leading me to believe I hooked into a behemoth. After some dancing around on the bank I was able to steer him to safety. I caught a few more average sized browns before hooking into some more good ones.

 These guys came from some faster water. They fought well for their size and were released to fight another day. As the morning progressed the clouds grew thicker and the wind picked up. Windy conditions always make casting difficult but the key today was to wait out the breeze in order to make good casts. After catching a few more small trout and losing all but my last Secret Weapon fly and last indicator I found the chunky trout.

I hoped to find some fish surfacing to midges. There were midges all over the snowy banks and skittering across the surface but no fish rose to them. I continued with my last Secret Weapon.

An added benefit to leaving early was to get on the stream before anyone else. I hate fishing behind people, although I can usually still manage a few dinky fish. Today I saw only one other set of footprints and they appeared to be made by someone only walking the banks of the stream and not fishing! My goal is always to get away from the heavily pressured waters to find fish and today it worked well. I caught at least 20 fish in just under 3 hours of fishing. All fish were caught on the same patterned fly although changing depth in each new stretch of stream was necessary.