Clear Water

Does anyone know where the water is not crystal clear. I want to go trout fishing but not if I can see every fish with in 100 ft. We need some rain really bad. If anyone knows please let me know.

When I was a trout-nut I used to like the low-clear water periods for fishing after dark. My brother and I used to stalk the rivers from sun down until the 11 PM end of fishing and caught our largest fish of the season doing this. Several friends of mine, Mel Haugstead comes to mind, does this with fly gear and large streamers and just whacks the better fish… most of his 20″+ fish for the year come this way. Does anyone else ever wait for the sun to go down to hit the rivers? When the waters are really clear and low like they are now, the after sundown bite was always the best. You had to be very cautious getting into place so as not to spook the fish but the larger browns were often pretty aggressive.

Just curious…

I know Mel fairly well and he catches most of his bigger fish on the surface with some large fly patterns after the sun is well down. Flashlight angling might be a better term for it. I’d fish late if I was doing something other than fly fishing. Right now the morning hatches and some in the evening are so good, I’m catching a ton of fish in the clear water. The only way I’d want to see rain would be some very heavy rain to wash out some of the weed growth in the streams. I can see where the spinner anglers would have some problems fishing in this type of water, but I can’t say I’m too sympathetic – the fly anglers have their own problems when the water is ugly.

i fished at night one time. i fished a hole that i knew had some bigger browns in it hoping to get a strike. i fished with spinning gear only because i thought it would impossible to cast a fly rod in the dark. i fished for about 45 min and didn’t catch anything so i gave up and went back to bed .

As far as water clarity is concerned, i personally don’t know of any streams that have a tint to them at all. i don’t like the streams this clear either, not even for fly fishing. the fish spook if you even drift your line over them. i always have better luck with just a little color to the water.

If you’re drifting your fly line over the fish, you’re either too close to them in the first place or your leader and tippet combination isn’t long enough. I’d much rather fish on the streams now when trout are readily taking tricos, hoppers, beetles, ants, and just about any other well placed dry fry (and dropper) than to fish when it’s dirty. You can certainly change your tactics enough to fish in the clear water and be successful versus the water being mud brown. If nothing else, the clear water deters many spinner and bait anglers, so there’s less competition and crowding on some of my favorite summer watersheds (no offense to those who spinner and bait fish). I have seen very few of them on the streams lately.

now i didn’t say mud brown, i just said a little tint . i agree that crystal clear is better than mud brown for fly fishing.