With high smoke and low water, where should I fish?

Early this evening the air was pleasant.

The air quality index varied between moderate to good - stable enough for Jan to plan ahead, marinate some fresh veggies and chicken chunks for kebabs, throw them on the grill and plan a pleasant outdoor meal.

Left in my hands, we'd have eaten cold tuna sandwiches indoors. It's a good thing she's more energetic and playful than I am these days. Smoke gets to me and I become a house-bound creature of dour habits when enough wildfire smoke hangs in the air to shut down my breathing. I huddle indoors with a variety of room air filters, try to imagine what it would be like to go fishing and grouse around because I can't.

The sky overhead was a shade of blue when Jan and I ate dinner, although the silhouettes of the Bitterroot Range on the horizon were a bit blurred in the lingering smoke. The mountains around our home in the middle of the Bitterroot Valley are pock-marked with fires.

I started to daydream when I came indoors about where to fish. When I let the dog out, a couple of hours later, a blast of harsh smoke hit me in the face. In that instant my eyes burned. No, I thought to myself, I don't want to get trapped outdoors by a sudden wind-shift bearing heavy smoke. Pass.

Usually this time of the year I like to go down to the Stevensville Bridge for a long morning and fish the small black-bodied and silver-winged tricos that fall from delicately dancing swarms just a few feet above the water. The fishing can last for hours.

After that, when the bug activity dies down, the fishing usually slacks off, but it can be fun for as long as it lasts. I was down by the Stevensville Bridge just a couple of days ago and the water was low - uncomfortably low, for me. The upper Bitterroot drainage is also low and smoky.

Pass.

That means, for the next few days, I'll plan to fish somewhere else. Fortunately there are plenty of options.

We've done well at Georgetown Lake this time of year. The smoke levels there have been clear enough. The fish usually stay close to shore in the morning hours, and move into deeper water as the day heats up.

Damsel nymphs, stripped in erratic short jerks under the surface (experiment with depth and retrieve - spray your casts around) near the weed-beds have always done well for me at Georgetown. This time of year I've also done well on small olive-gray nymphs, any size from #12 to #18, fished on a slower retrieve near the weed-beds. To get tighter information on Georgetown before making the commitment to head over, I'll call Flint Creek Outdoors in Phillipsburg at 406-859-9500.

Another option is to head east to the Missouri. Air quality in the area has been decent; again, I'll check locally before I head out. The Mo typically yields some good fishing this time of year.

When the dry fly hatches seem a little off, you can usually find me doing one of two things: fishing a floating line, a long, light leader, and small mayfly or caddisfly nymphs under the surface if the wind is reasonably still, or when the surface line gets blown around and a good presentation gets troublesome, I'll switch to a full-sink line and a streamer. If the weed snag-ups aren't too bad, I'll start with the streamer rig or maybe fish the streamer on a sink-tip line.

In the evening when it all settles down I'll look for a caddis grab. This time of year on the Missouri they can be superb. I'll dance a Caddis Variant on the surface if the big fish are up and I'm into one nearly every time I get the cast in, but until then I'll fish a caddis emerger under the surface on a twitch-pause retrieve and try to steal my nerves against overstriking. And at that, I'll plan to get broken off a time or two. Those broad-shouldered Missouri River rainbows and browns can get aggressive, downright savage, on the take. I'll slip-strike when I can, letting the line slide through my hands as I raise the rod.

To learn more about what's happening on the Missouri, call Mike Bushly at his Trout Montana shop in Cascade at 406-468-9330.