Flaming Gorge Trout Fishing

Three times he circled overhead screaming at me. Once was enough but three times bordered 

on rudeness. The osprey had caught the first trout of the day and dangled it in his claws 

for me to see. And I had not caught any trout and didn't even know we were having a 

first-catch contest!

Eric (my Old Moe guide with 27 years experience in this section of the Green River below 

the Flaming Gorge dam) and I were discussing the approach to fishing this day. Carol, 

who rode gunshot in the rear with her camera had caught sight of the osprey as it dove 

into the 43-degree water, disappeared for a second or two, and then came out of the water, 

wings first, with a trout neatly arranged, for least wind resistance, head first in its 

claws.

Here the water is blowing towards us at a fast pace. Boats are launched to the right of the river. Guides row their clients across the fast current to the left side of the river where eddies provide the guides some time  to orient their clients before heading downstream. It was here that Carol spotted the osprey catch the trout and then circle over our boat three times.

Eric told me this day on the river was a "contest day" for many of the boats leaving 

the put-in just below the dam. Each boat carried two fishermen and a guide. Each fisherman 

who had signed up for the "contest" had to select one dry fly to fish with all day and the one who caught the 

most fish won the contest. If a fisherman lost his fly, he had to stop fishing. 

I told Eric that didn't sound like the way I wanted to fish the river! I was used 

to dry fly fishing when trout were rising to the surface to take aquatic insects, and if 

this was not happening, I would fish below the surface with imitation nymphs.

Eric agreed. We both knew that more than 90 percent of a trout's diet is from aquatic insects 

caught on the bottom of a stream or in the column of water below the surface where the 

insects rise to the surface. I love to fish with dry flies on the surface, but I usually don't 

use them until I see at least one trout rising to the surface to take a floating insect 

desperately trying to dry its wings and take flight. This morning we saw no such action. 

However, very tiny flies were coming off the water that we call midges, which refers to a 

collection of tiny aquatic insects that few fishermen know, or care to know, their 

scientific names. 

So we rigged my fly rod for dry fly fishing so I could test the water, while Eric rigged 

his fly rod with three dangling tiny midge nymph patterns mounted on size 22 hooks, which 

are very, very small hooks. All of the nymph patterns were tied to a delicate 5x leader of about 

seven to eight feet in length. On the bottom end just below the nymphs was a string of 

about ten small lead beads to make the nymphs sink. Attached to the other end was a floating 

ball that looked very much like a ping-pong ball (which in flyfishing circles is politely 

called a "strike indicator" rather than a "bobber"). The fishing line, called a fly line, 

was attached to the rod and reel.

I started fishing first with my fly rod in a backwater area where we had seen a previous 

"contest" fisherman miss a trout that was apparently taking midges on the surface. It was 

then that the osprey show-off circled overhead, dangling the trout and bragging that he 

had caught the first trout.

After several casts with my rod yielded no takes, we shifted to Eric's rod, which I drifted 

down the seam that separates the fast water and the slower water circling back. On the first 

drift, I had a fish on, but he got off. On the second drift I caught my first trout, a 

rainbow of about 9 inches who fought like a much bigger trout. The vivid colors and hard 

fighting told me this trout was born in the Green River. These are wild trout.

Fish on!

On my third or fourth drift down this seam I caught two trout at one time! That's sort of 

like getting a hole-in-one to a golfer. Eric said it was his first for the season. I looked 

around for that osprey to rub it in, but he was nowhere in sight.

Two trout caught at the same time.

After catching a couple of more fish in this fast water, Eric said we should move downstream where 

the fish were bigger. It wasn't long before I caught a large rainbow, who must 

have jumped out of the water six or seven times before we could land him. He was a real 

beauty about 16 to 17 inches with great color.

Jack in the background all smiles as guide Eric holds his rainbow trout for Carol's camera.

As we moved downstream the gorge became narrower and more beautiful. I continued to catch,

or at least hook, rainbow trout of varying sizes. After passing through several rapids then 

I started catching brown trout. Usually I would expect brown trout to run deep and fight 

there. But many of these brown trout took to the air just like the rainbow. I had a long fight

with a good-size brown.

The gorge narrows.

The rapids get heavy.

The fish fight harder. Jack tries to maneuver a large brown trout into Eric's net.

Finally Eric nets the 18-inch colorful brown Jack caught.

This was one of my most fun days of fishing. The Flaming Gorge below the dam is spectacular, I had 

a great guide, the weather was gorgeous, and Carol took lots of pictures, saw lots of birds, and had fun 

also. We were tired and hungry when we got back to camp, and the weather was threatening storms. We

wolfed down a sandwich and took a nap before working on the blogs. We decided to stay another night

at the Dutch John campground so we could do a little more sightseeing in the area.