Mid to late September is a great time to be fishing in Montana. The crowds are back to school, the water temperatures cool down a bit, and then browns are on the move. Although the browns are still a long way away from their October spawn, many of them are already starting to “dress to impress” with their ever impressive spawning tuxedos. The beauty of fishing for these brutes in September is that many of these beautiful fish are caught on hoppers! Not much beats seeing one of these lunkers slowly rise up from the bottom of the stream and gently sip your hopper in slow motion. Aside from hoppers, we see a lot of flying ants this time of year on the Yellowstone and inside Yellowstone park, (mostly cinnamon in color). Crickets and cicadas are also working well for larger dries, as well as nocturnal stone flies. Won’t be long until we see some Hecuba on the River and we’ve already seen Fall drakes in the Park…
