The Salmon Fly watch is officially on at Rock Creek.
“The famous flies were officially out last Saturday”, says Doug Persico of Rock Creek Fisherman’s Mercantile (406-825-6440). Persico says if the weather cooperates, then the salmon flies will start aggressively to move up the creek. By the weekend he expects them to be more than a third of the way up.
“The hatch now should be going on strong for the next 30 days”, according to Persico.
Lake fishing for perch on the east Polson Bay on Flathead Lake still has not produced any numbers. “We went out the other day and caught a lot of small perch but for the most part none had any size,” added Dick Zimmer from Pablo (406-675-0068), “in fact we ended up with some lake trout, whitefish and 25 bullheads.”
The other species are obviously feeding on the smaller perch in the area. The water level on Flathead Lake is now about a foot and half from full pool, so most of the ramps are useable.
Lake Mary Ronan had a pretty good opening weekend of the fishing season, according to Zimmer. Up north, Zimmer said he heard that they were catching salmon out of Bitterroot Lake. The lake, which is located about 25 mils west of Kalispell, has been producing salmon from 11 to 19 inches.
Anglers jigging with a Glo Hook tipped with a maggot seem to be having the best luck.
The lakes east of the mountains have been doing well for trout and still spotty for walleye. The cold and wet weather they have been having in the area always affects the warm water fishing.
Gerry, from the Silos RV on Canyon Ferry Lake, said that the anglers fishing late into the evening – typically 8 to 9 p.m. have been having some luck with the walleyes. The water level on the lake has been raising some concerns with boaters.
“Currently the lake is down 17 feet from full pool,” according to Gerry. “They expect to raise the water level to around 12 feet below fool pool as its peak this summer.”
Currently only one ramp is being used to launch boats on the south end of the lake at the Silos Campground. Some options are being explored to extend some of the other ramps in the area. The ramp at White Earth campground at the current lake level is not able to launch any boats.
Call Gerry or Lesa at the Silos Rv at 406-266-3100 for daily updated fishing and water levels.
Further north, Paul at the Canyon Store (406-235-4111) on Holter Lake says that the trout fishing is good and the walleye anglers, if the are catching some, are being tight lipped about it.
Below Holter Dam on the Missouri River, the trout fishing has been super. “When we got the snow last week, the dry fly anglers were having a lot of luck,” according to Paul.
He also mentioned that some walleye anglers caught their limit below the dam on the Missouri River by using a slip sinker and crawler and floating it into a back eddy right below the campground below the dam.
Reports out of The One Stop in Valier (406-279-3600) say that the Lake Frances water level is low. Anglers, and there have not been that many, are using the boat ramp at the East End of the lake.
