Fishing Our Way Home

Dover had to spend time with his wife on her birthday, Rob was meeting his wife, but Tom and I were free to take a couple days to get home. We chose to head home via Dillon, Montana. We drove to Idaho Falls Wednesday night, then arose early for the fairly short drive to Dillon, where we visited a local fly shop to get information, to buy some flies, and to set up a guided trip for the next day. We were directed to Poindexter Slough, a nearby side channel/spring creek adjacent to the Beaverhead River. We arrived mid-morning and tried fishing some of the funky ways that the shop had suggested, without success. With some fish rising, we soon were fishing hoppers right against the grassy banks.

Poindexter Slough browns

Yup, that was better. Tom caught two nice browns slurping hoppers, and I missed a couple. We ran out of water, and wanted to give the Big Hole a try, so we left with the idea in our minds that we might come back and give it another shot in the evening. The first place we stopped on the Big Hole was a dud. The second place we found a couple fish above the bridge. My first was a native Montana grayling, a surprise to me when I brought it in.

Native Montana grayling from the Big Hole

Tom worked upstream, found some small ones in a side channel, and was surprised by a 17-incher. We continued upstream, but fish were either not there or not willing. With evening fast approaching and the fishing in the Big Hole less than stellar, we bailed and hoped to catch the last few minutes of daylight at Poindexter Slough. Arriving about 45 minutes before sunset, we walked downstream about 15 minutes and started fishing back. We were in the same water we fished in the morning, but  with low light and our confidence in the hoppers, the results were much different. We took turns, one fishing until a fish was caught, then yielding the hole to the other. We were never waiting more than a few minutes for a turn. We raised a fish at almost every bank, big fat browns, feeding on our hoppers with reckless abandon.

An average sized Poindexter brown

We like this place!

We came to a bank where I had missed one in the morning. I pointed to a large tuft of grass and told Tom I was going to pick one up there. First cast upstream, it drifted down, and was grabbed by a nice brown at the exact spot where I had missed it earlier in the day. The light was fading fast, but the fishing wasn't slowing down. We had each landed more than a half dozen fish, all big, fat brown up to 20-inches. In the twilight, Tom broke his fly off in a fish and decided to call it a day. I continued fishing, and caught a couple more, mostly by sound rather than sight.

Yes, it was pretty much that dark when we quit

At the last hole at a railroad bridge where we would get out, I heard a splash and missed one on the left, cast into the middle, another splash and another miss. After a couple more casts, I sensed a problem and sure enough, found the last splash had also taken my fly. With it pretty much full dark, phone flashlights were very helpful, and as we climbed out of the stream and walked back to the car, we marveled at the amazing hour we had just had. An evening like that is something special that you just hope will happen again sometime. Maybe tomorrow night...