Brule Report

[matthothand]

Brule opens up in a few hours. Hope everyone stays warm, dry, and has fun! Good luck and let everyone know how you did.

[Nate McVey]

It was a good day on the river........I want to thank the guy with the hole in his boot for pulling my truck out of the ditch. I was not looking forward to walking back to find Quickstrike and RodandGun to give me hand. Hopefully I can return the favor sometime.

[matthothand]

Just got home. We had enough fun. My contribution was pretty weak but as a group roughly 15 fish went into the lost column and 13 steelhead were landed as well as 14 browns. Biggest steelhead was a 27 inch fresh hen and the biggest brown taped out at 29. It's true, they're easier to measure when they're dead. Pretty decent opener. Pretty much everyone else we saw had fish too. Sam cook stopped by to chat and did a few photo shoots which hopefully don't make it to print. I read 38 degrees four times...anyone else get near that or is my thermo-gauge on crack? I just figured it'd be a couple degrees cooler. Tmrw I'm bringing the camera so that means we won't catch squat. I doubt anyone will see many browns after the slaughter that everyone put on em today. We did see the same 23 inch buck steelie get caught 3 times in an hour. He musta liked the ride. I dunno. Anyways I'm tired and going to bed so we can get up and do it all over again tmrw. Good luck to everyone. Hope you got fish.

[matthothand]

I'm pretty suprised there aren't any other reports. Is there another thread someplace that everyone else is using? Today I went out with the same few guys and it was definately slower. We got three browns and landed around 10 steelhead. Had difficulties keeping fish attached to the hooks today. Our fish have all been coming in a hundred yard area. The fish were really on the move for a little bit sometime mid day and then things calmed down again. Again fish were caught every which way and in differing spots. The water I read was at 41 in the am and 42 around noon. I'll be back out tmrw and it will be nice not seeing hordes of people.

[Catfishunter]

Might have walked past you and twenty other people fishing that hole. I walked lots of miles and did the same as everyone else who stayed in one hole all day. Sat. fish ate every thing Sun. was a bug thing, my specalty. matt next time i'll say hi, but i don't yell across the river.

[DeathRoe]

None of you did as good as the guy who said he landed 30 fish on Saturday and his buddy across the river landed 21 steelhead. Guess i just don't know how to fish. Yeah, i also heard the Browns got the hurt put on em. I got a couple Sunday evening, but let em swim. I don't know but recuperating, spawned, wintered fish don't need to be in my freezer or my belly. There's a time for killin a brown or two, and that time is the fall.

[Quickstrike]

I had a good weekend as well, but I guess I'm not quite as good at keeping exact stats and numbers as some guys are. I also saw a lot of nice browns around. I was actually surprised to hear most of the guys I talked to weren't having much luck. I did best on pink yarn flies with a chartruse dot and brown stones under and indicator with little to no weight.

Saw a total of 3 guys on sunday.

[matthothand]

Only a few fish today. Couldn't get anything to bite in the same hole that was so busy this weekend. Had to go elsewhere. Just fished the morning.

[DeathRoe]

3 Guys Kent?? Man, we pulled up by your stomping grounds and found cars everywhere, with 6 guys walking down out of two of the many cars. We went elsewhere.

[trimbelle22]

thanks for the reports guys, good to hear that there are some active fish. Has the water been high up there? I'll be up in a few weekends (april 18-20), but with my luck we will have some bad weather or the streams will be high.

[bdog162]

Went 5 for 8 on Sat, with one 27" spring fish for the grill, went 4 for 7 on Sun, with a 27" fish winter fish for the smoker, and 0 for 2 today. Water was low and clear Sat and Sun, but she came up a couple inches and got some color this morning. I'm guessing with all this snow we are getting she will swell up by this weekend, and hopefully ger rid of that ledge ice. If she does, and we get some warm sunny days, the temps, water level, and color should be about right for them to start digging, and that is when it gets fun. I've had enough of this slack water bobber fishing stuff, might as well be crappie fishing. Give me some fast colored up warmer water and I'm in! Good luck.

[Quickstrike]

Oh Eric, you know my spring stomping grounds are different than my fall ones. Glad that everyone got into some fish.

[Swamp Scooter]

I had to go solo for opener. Tons of people. A few smaller steelies landed. Not much for browns. River was low and clear. Sunday I had the area to myself all morning. tough wind too. Fish rising on bugs. So what type of stonefly do you toss to get the rising fish? Had a hard morning but landed 3 bows, all small 12".

Been a while since I have read or posted. Lots of changes to site.

[dave12341234]

hey, i was wondering if anyone had any ideas on some hotspots or what they are ussually biting on this time of year. im new to the sport, but i also live here. i tried fishing it last weekend, but no luck, just used a small caddis imatation. would using a bobber with a worm, or spawn eggs work?

[DeathRoe]

 Originally Posted By: dave12341234

hey, i was wondering if anyone had any ideas on some hotspots or what they are ussually biting on this time of year. im new to the sport, but i also live here. i tried fishing it last weekend, but no luck, just used a small caddis imatation. would using a bobber with a worm, or spawn eggs work?

Hotspots, no. Worms and eggs, yes.

[gooty]

hahaha, i love this HSOforum

[trimbelle22]

hey guys,

just wondering what the brule will be looking like this weekend? how much snow did that area get this weekend? i had a trip planned for this coming weekend, but if the water is going to be real high, I wont waste my time.

thanks

[dave12341234]

I was just out yesterday, and yes the water is very high, and the current is probably at its peak ( warning: do not enter into the ledges more than an arms length away, personal experience). we just had a big storm up here, and there is definatly alot of runoff, but there should be plenty of pools to fish, i heard its been really well luckwise up here. i only had an hour outso there wasnt much for me.

by the way, does anyone know when the peak fishing action is on this river? maybe water temp. or water level?

[trimbelle22]

anybody have any updates as to how the river is flowing? is there still snow melting up there, or is all of it gone? hopefully the conditions will be ok for this weekend...

[fish4itall]

I suggest you man up and go fish it regardless

[Nate McVey]

I got a report today saying it's blown out. The shelf-ice and all the trees that blew down in the storm are now flowing down the river. It's flowing at 280+ and will probably hit 300 by tomorrow.

[dave12341234]

but its still fishable, right?

i plan on goin their friday evening with spawn sacs and worms, any sugggestions?

[Quickstrike]

The Brule is blown out, watched it come up all day yesterday. Trees from the blowdown, and huge chunks of ice were constantly ripping down the chocolate milk colored water yesterday afternoon. I would think of somewhere else to go if you were planning on coming up this weekend. With warm temps it won't get much better by then.

I'm done with the Brule for the spring, it's almost time to start hitting the north shore.

[matthothand]

Git yer kayaks!

[dave12341234]

does anyone know what part of the river the majority of steelheads are now. what would work better, fishing everything from mays ledges and on up, or fishing anywhere from copper range campground on down?