A MOST EXCELLENT ADVENTURE TO THE GREEN (UTAH) AND BIG HORN (MONTANA) RIVERS

by

June 2007

June 9 and 17 were the start and finish of a most excellent adventure for PFF members Larry Mitchell, Mike Pinelli, myself and three other hardy members of our community. Five of us flew into Salt Lake City on the 9th, then made the 4 hour drive to Dutch John, UT, in a rental van. The sixth member, my son-in-law, drove in from his home in Broomfield, CO. Our totally satisfactory accommodations were split between the rooms available at Trout Creek Flies in Dutch John and a resort not more than five miles away above the Flaming Gorge Dam.

For those of you who have not fished the Green below the Flaming Gorge Dam, you are really missing something. The fish population is reputed to be in the 8,000 fish per mile range – for reasons not easily understandable, they continue to plant rainbows, but the browns are native. Fish size increases as one goes down river, with 16 – 18 inch fish not uncommon. There are three sections below the dam, A, B, and C. Most fishing (2 out of 3 days for us) is on the A section, and we had equally good fishing on the B section. We missed the bulk of the cicada hatch, which was enormous this year, but the fish were still striking those patterns. Some of us fished cicadas with a midge dropper early in the morning, catching smaller rainbows on the dropper. By mid day we were all on the cicadas – easy to see and hard, at least for some of us, to be patient enough to let the fish really take the fly before setting the hook. Arms literally got tired and fish counts lost by midmorning - - there were that many fish caught!



The Green is a beautiful river, in a deep canyon just below the dam, with the depth of the canyon obviously decreasing as one goes down river. Access for hikers and bank fishermen is limited in the upper portion. Most of the fishing is from drift boats, with some opportunities to fish from the bank, increasing as you go down river. The guides are great, lunches wonderful (BBQ burgers one day), and the weather held out well for us. Spring seems to be the best time to fish the Green – Mary Nishioka and friends have fished it for some time in April, and that is when Andre Puyans used to take a group there. May, at least the middle of the month, is out because of heavy water releases – it becomes a white water rafting venue then. There were some rafters in the water while we were there, but that was not a problem or distraction at all. (Well, some of the young ladies in the rafts were a distraction to some of our members, who will remain unnamed.)



After three great days on the Green, four of us (Mitchell, Pinelli, Duncheon and I) continued on to the Big Horn on June 13. We returned our rental van in Salt Lake City, flew to Billings, then rented another van for the 1 ½ hour drive to Fort Smith. Our outfitters there are the Big Horn Trout Shop. They had a tragic fire last August, with three guests, reportedly smokers, losing their lives in the fire. As one consequence, they have an all new facility – fly shop, kitchen and dining room, and double rooms. The people and the facilities are all first class. The accommodations are no more than a ten minute walk to the put in, which is below the after bay for the Yellowtail Dam. So, if one has enough energy after a day of fishing, perhaps a cocktail or two, and a large dinner, one can throw a few dry flies at the fish in the evening. For some strange reason, none of our group did that.

While the topography does not limit walk-in fishermen on the Big Horn as it does on the Green, the fact that this section of the river flows through the Crow Nation Reservation does limit such access. So drift boats do have the river to themselves. There are many more opportunities to bank fish, however, and we took maximum advantage of that. The per mile fish count is probably not as high on the Big Horn as on the Green, but the size is larger: fat 16 – 18 inch rainbows and browns over 20 inches are not uncommon. And I’m sure we caught as many fish per day on the Big Horn. We did not have the hatches to dry fly fish, so most of the time we had double nymphs below a balloon indicator. The nymphs were mostly size 18 to 20 midge, sow bug, San Juan worm, and caddis pupa patterns. Late one afternoon we tried some streamer fishing – some electric hits, but nothing landed!



There is a whole different personality to the Big Horn as compared to the Green – both the topography and the guides. Somehow, at least to me, the ambience on the Big Horn is more laid back – like the guides we had, one of whom was raised and has worked as a cowboy. As we talked about and compared the two rivers on the return home, after three days fishing on each river, we really couldn’t say which was our favorite river – they are both great! What we did decide, at least tentatively, is that we will return next year. But we probably will set up a four day fishing trip to the Green in the Spring (maybe April), and do a separate four day trip to the Big Horn in the Fall (maybe September). Keep tuned - Homer Eaton