Stonefly Hatch on the Gunnison


Phredator

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My Brother and I are heading down into the Black Canyon of the Gunnison early tomorrow morning. We hope to catch the Stonefly hatch at it's peak. When you catch it just right it can be awesome. Hopefully I'll have some pictures to share after tomorrow. It's a bit of a grunt to get in and out but well worth it.

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It's always a tough hike/climb, especially when you do it in and out in one day. But it's well worth the pain I feel my legs right now. 2800' in three miles plus two more miles of up and down. We hiked in at first light and came out under headlamps. I got home at midnight.

In spite of it being one of the best times to fish we had 5 miles of National Park river all to ourselves. so you have to add five miles upstream and downstream to the total hiked. I'm pretty hammered today.

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To reach the best fishing you have to strip and wade.

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Just one of the 100 plus Brownies the three of us caught, all on Stonefly patterns.

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The best portions of the river are all deep wading and I left my camera behind for that section. The fish ranged between 10" to 20". These stonefly bugs, Pteronarcys californicum, are about three inches long and when you catch the hatch they are crawling all over you while you fish. There were a couple of short but magic periods during the day when the frenzy was on and you could do no wrong on any cast that hit the water.

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It was an epic day of flyfishing with my Brother and Friend Andy. We fish the Black Canyon usually three times a year. Tis a pleasure to live in western Colorado

Edited by Phredator
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