Where to fly fish in the winter
Winter Fly Fishing For Trout: Proven Winter Tips
so winter fly-fishing has some unique
challenges that you typically don't run
into in other seasons such as ice and
the guides flight selections a little
bit different and fish tend to move into
different water so in today's video
we're gonna walk you through how to
overcome these challenges and also some
other great tips to get you into more
fish this winter let's get to it
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everyone welcome back to the channel
this is cam with stream outdoors where
we bring you the best tips and
techniques to improve your fly-fishing
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any point during the video check the
show notes down below in the description
we're gonna list everything that we use
in today's video in those show notes so
that you can reference them at any time
so tip number one fish the warmest part
of the day there's no reason to get up
at like 6:00 in the morning and be on
the water the water and the weather is
just too cold the fish are not very
active if you wait further the weather
and the water to warm up just a few
degrees that can often often trigger a
lot more activity out throughout the
fish so focus on between like 11:00 and
4:00 in the afternoon so because of the
colder weather the fish tend to have a
lot lower metabolism meaning they're you
know they're not digesting their food as
much and they just don't have much more
of an appetite in the winter so the fish
are doing everything they can to
conserve energy laying low into the
slower water laying right on the bottom
so they're not gonna be chasing your
flies and they're not going to be super
super active so keep that in mind as
you're going through winter and your
fly-fishing in the winter these fish are
not going to go after a dry fly like
they are in the summer so skip the
shallow riffles skip the faster water
look for those slow deep pools side
channels seems just the more softer
water you can find those fish are going
to be hanging out right there so most
days in the winter there's not a lot of
bug activity if there is some hatch it's
going to be your midge so typically the
fishing is
with nymph inand streamer fishing that's
going to be 90 percent of your fishing
throughout the winter if you do get a
little bit warmer day say above 30
degrees you may find some midge activity
in that case you could throw on a dry
fly one of my top dry flies for midge
hatches are the suspended midge as well
as the Griffith net in sizes like 18 to
22
if it's a tough it's a bow or Rocky
Mountain bumping so nice rainbow we
switch over to that egg pattern we pick
up a couple fish so we're gonna keep
fishing that so the next tip is to
downsize your tippet now if you find a
mid chech and you're fishing dry flies i
usually go down to like a 6x
fluorocarbon the reason for that is the
fluorocarbon is a little bit more
stealthy and the flows are generally a
lot lower and clearer in the winter so
that way you're not going to be spooking
the fish if you have some large tippet
that you're using and when I'm limping
I'll usually fish like a 5 X or a 4 X
even when limping in the winter time I
usually use two flies if regulations
allow the reason for this is it just ups
your odds of catching more fish and when
you're tying on your point fly I love to
throw on something a little bit bigger
one it gets the fly down to the bottom
as well as it's a big attractor
something that catches the fish's
attention and then on my trailer fly
I'll use something a little bit smaller
a little bit more imitative and the fish
will usually look at the attractor and
then go for something that's a little
bit more natural if you're not sure what
river to target I suggest looking at all
your tail waters again anything that has
a dam on it that water out of the dam is
going to be a lot more constant
throughout the year one your water
levels and your water temperatures are a
lot more regulated as well it's not
going to ice up on you like your
freestone would and then your spring
creeks
Spring Rivers those are always a great
option as well because they're not going
to freeze and then anytime you find any
creeks or maybe even Hot Springs dumping
into the river sometimes the fish will
go in and stack up in the river with
that warmer water so another tip to keep
in mind is that the flows are going to
be the lowest that they're gonna be all
year and the water is typically a lot
clearer so as you move into a good spot
keep in mind that those fish are gonna
be a little bit weary they're gonna be a
lot more suspicious of things especially
high I typically like to kind of sneak
in to my different areas especially if
I'm wading in the water when you're
fishing temps below freezing you're
gonna run into ice and your guides and
it can be really frustrating there's a
couple different solutions that you can
try there's not like a permanent
solution that I found that always works
but one thing you can try is simply just
putting your rod in the water and give
it a little shake until that ice kind of
loosens up obviously you know shake it
off just a little bit so the water is
just or the ice is not just gonna build
up in your guides again that way it
allows you to get back into casting give
you a couple more drifts and then you
can keep doing that until hopefully it
warms up a little bit the next solution
is to apply some of this moon ice off
stuff you simply just apply it to the
guides that are freezing up and this
does an awesome job you're still gonna
have to apply it probably every 15 or 20
minutes depending on how cold it is but
this allows you to make a lot more cast
without the guides icing up on you
another thing to keep in mind with your
guides icing up is to minimize your
casting a lot of times it's the fly line
or the water on the fly line that will
typically bring ice into your guides so
if you can minimize your casting either
doing like a simple roll cast or not
casting as far then that really helps
out a ton also consider your own emping
a lot of times your own in thing you
don't really have the fly line that goes
through the guides and you're doing a
lot of short casts so that's another
great way to kind of minimize the ice
and the guides I hope you found these
tips to be helpful try them out this
winter and subscribe to our channel if
you haven't already we also wanted to
thank every one of you for following our
channel and following us along on our
adventures we want to give back bye
away one of our fly rods it's the rift
10 foot 3 wait it's one of our absolute
go twos especially during the winter
months so all you need to do to enter
the giveaway is to leave a comment below
with your favorite fly pattern that you
like to use during the winter that will
get you entered and we will see you in
our next video
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