By Rich Ridgeway and Jan Axtell Last week it appeared that winter had settled in on our Paradise Valley fisheries, but Montana weather being what it is, we’ve been given a warm spell reminiscent of the first days of spring. Warm temps, good cloud cover, dropping […]
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Current Conditions As September settles in, the Yellowstone River near Livingston is offering anglers good weather conditions, and less pressure on the River. This year the Yellowstone has experienced some near historic low flows; However, with the grace of cooler weather and some afternoon thunderstorms, we […]
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Ask me why I love fall fishing in Yellowstone Country. Is it big streamers for big browns, tiny fall baetis mayflies on the Paradise Valley spring creeks, solitude in Yellowstone National Park? Is it ‘hopper action without the crowds, cooler weather, cooler water and re-energized fish? […]
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“Willow Flies” Are Crawling—And the Hatch Is Starting The Salmonflies have begun their crawl up the banks and into the willows—exactly where the trout are looking. These insects don’t emerge midstream. They migrate to the edges, climbing rocks, grass, and willows. That’s where you’ll find the […]
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Why I Choose Smith Optics and Suncloud for Fishing Around Livingston by Max Smith and Matt Swan Fishing around Livingston means dealing with a variety of water conditions—from the gin-clear spring creeks like DePuy’s and Armstrong’s to the bigger, often murkier Yellowstone River. On the Yellowstone, […]
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Every great trout water has three “signature hatches,” I’d argue. Applied to the Yellowstone River, you’ve got the Mother’s Day Caddis, swarming over the river prior to runoff and the ‘hopper “hatch” in mid- to late-summer, as the Montana breezes blow chunky terrestrials into the trout’s […]
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Spring 2025 fishing in the Yellowstone Valley continues to produce great fishing, although the Yellowstone has teetered towards its annual cycle of spring runoff. Yellowstone River Up-and-down weather has bounced the Yellowstone River to muddy near-runoff levels, then way back down with a recent cool spell. […]
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The Yellowstone River is soon to be big and muddy, Throughout the state of Montana, and particularly in the Yellowstone watershed, we received a good amount of high-mountain snow this past winter. All of that snow needs to melt and make it through our rivers and […]
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Hi, this is Dan Gigone from Sweetwater Fly Shop in Livingston, Montana. We’re right on the banks of the world famous Yellowstone River and around this time of year, late April into early May, we start getting a lot of phone calls, people just asking, are […]
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If you’ve never seen a real Mother’s Day Caddis hatch on the Yellowstone, let me try to describe it—though I’ll fail, of course. Words rarely do it justice. Imagine a spring afternoon that smells like wet cottonwoods and melting snow, the river moving fast but not […]
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