In my opinion, "The Mother" of all Mother’s Day Caddis hatches occurs
on the Arkansas River. It begins in the Canon City area around
April 15, and gradually moves upstream and past Salida until runoff
blows it away around 30 days later. The irony is, however, that
by Mother’s Day the fish have seen so many bugs that fooling them with
an Elk Hair Caddis is next to impossible. The Caddis species is
Brachycentrus, preceded and combined with Rachycophila. The
Brachys hatch when water temperatures spike into the low 50s.
When people call and want to know where the hatch is, I simply tell
them to drive until they can’t see out the windshield from dead
bugs. Then stop, clean the glass and drive about three more miles
upstream. The idea is to get above the blanket hatch so fishing a
dry fly can be more productive. Having bugs on the water is good,
but during this hatch there can just be too many. Just picking
out your fly on the water can be impossible, let alone picking them out
of your ears and nose.
Being able to think your way through this hatch is very
important. As it begins, the larva and pupa patterns are very
important. I like to start out the morning with Larry Kingrey’s
Rubberleg Stone trailing a bead head Caddis Larva. I run this
system deep until mid morning when I switch to a large dry fly
(Stimulator or Wulff) with a deep running pupa as a dropper. This
system should be fished on the swing (across and down), so that the
pupa rises in the current like the natural. When fish move to the
adult, I use a Black Foam Caddis, size 14, trailing Larry’s unweighted
pupa or a LaFontaine Sparkle Pupa. Generally mid afternoon is
uneventful, so I come back to the water with an Egg Layer and a Spent
Caddis from around 5PM, until just after dark. All of these flies
are necessary to be successful throughout the entire hatch if you plan
to fish all day. Don’t forget that sometimes when the bugs are
too thick to breathe, the fish actually are gorged and don’t feed
much. Use this time to take a break and reassess what’s going
on. There are days when just fishing an Elk Hair Caddis can bring
75 fish to hand. This is generally around the third week of April
before the fish are literally "bugged" out.
The interesting thing about the Arkansas is that most folks think the
Caddis hatch is the best fishing of the year. It is the most
famous, but the spring Baetis hatches can produce just as many fish and
the Hopper/Dropper fishing all summer can be exceptional. The
first hatch of spring is the Blue Winged Olive, Baetis
Tricaudatus. It can be spectacular on cloudy, overcast March and
early April days. Light snowfall can generate hoards of these
beautiful little bugs, and basically kick starts a feeding frenzy that
lasts through the Caddis hatch until runoff. If you fish the
middle of April, you may fish BWOs in the mornings and a Caddis hatch
in the afternoons as water warms. We commonly see them on the
water at the same time.
After runoff, clear edges start to produce big numbers of fish on adult
Golden Stones. This generally is available around the middle of
June, and is the best time of year to float fish. Working
shoreline from a boat produces big numbers and big fish. Just
cast to the dirt and let the boat drag it away from the
shoreline. Explosive rises occur just inches from the dirt.
If you don’t have a way to float, then walk the shorelines and pick
apart the submerged rock gardens with a Stimulator trailing an
attractor bead head. These systems are used all summer and
fall. Favorite Hopper/Dropper Rigs are Yellow, Orange, or Green
Stimulators or Parachute Madam Xs, trailing a Copper John, Silver or
Gold Ice, Bead Head Flashback, or Prince nymph on 24 to 30 inches of
fluorocarbon tippet. PMD hatches, Caddis, Red Quills, and fall
Baetis mix it up with the wonderful terrestrial activity well into
November. Streamer season follows with pre and post spawn
behavior. Midging fish can make warmer December and January days
very attractive, although this river in winter is not very
consistent.
The Arkansas River, in my opinion, is the best dry fly fishing in the
Southern Rockies. Some dry fly will catch a fish twelve months a
year. Access is great the weather is generally very good (they
don’t call this the "Banana Belt" for nothing and the wild Browns are
willing participants in your day off. What else could you ask for?
