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B
O W R I
V E R A L B E R T A
At the time of the past series of
population studies, the Bow River has in the neighborhood of 500 to 600
brown trout and 1200 - 1300 rainbow trout per kilometer. A kilometer is 5/8 of
one mile. This includes sizes ranging in
sizes from 6" to those hawgs everyone raves about. These are wild
trout and Alberta does not stock its rivers. When
you come you can expect to catch fish on streamers, nymphs, and dry
flies.
S E A S O N S
Another time that we encourage anglers to join us is from mid - September through the end of October. The water is at its lowest level. At this time the Bow River is quiet with few anglers, leaving a relatively empty river at a time when the water is at its clearest state. Again, we encourage you to consider this time of the year for some of the best fishing on a world class river that you could have to yourself. Dry fly action can last until later in October.
T A C TI C S Dry Fly FishingDry fly fishing is very exciting for you to pursue and a lot of fun for the guide to help you with: everyone on board is always at full attention with rising trout and dry fly fishing. Trout exploding on your fly or gentle sips of large heads is a lot of fun. The hook set let's you know what's about to happen, followed by the racing scream of Bow River rainbows as they streak across the river, tearing into your backing. That's a lot of fun! The Bow has very good hatches, and trout begin to feed on them in mid May each season. Caddis, mayflies (pmds, bwo, march browns, etc), stoneflies (skwala, golden, stc) and terrestrials such as hoppers and backswimmers are key hatch periods that bring trout to the surface mid May to late October each year.Anglers remember that the best dry fly fishing in summer is during hot days when the hoppers are out or on cool, wet, coudy days with low light conditions. Pods of risers are often discovered at that time. Nymph FishingWhile many anglers have a difficult time with nymphing it is usually because of lack of experience with it. During the pre hatch period, nymphing can be dynamite, however. We will do some nymphing during your day, many days. The tactic is to work together, to put you on the water in a good position for you to effectively fish the water with our technique. The combination of your style and experience and our techniques take a little working together, but we will succeed most days.The critical component is to understand where to put the flies and at what time of day the fish are apt to be in what type of water. We certainly help you with that as we understand hatch cycles and what's happening. The key is to work specific water types at given times of the day. Fishing StreamersStreamer fishing has a rhythm to it. Open loop casting, smacking the water, and stripping with old rock tunes in your head helps set a good pace to the day. When large trout are on streamers, nothing is more exciting than the slamming of a heavy trout on the line. This isn't to say that trout slam streamers every day, however, when it's on, it's on.Streamers can be fished with floating, sink tip, or full sink lines on the Bow, depending on time of the year and water conditions. Rate of retrieval also varies from slow, dead drift, to faster pulses. |
