If the spring runoff is giving you an itch you need to scratch, than why not fish a lake. This time of year is a great time to put in some hours and work on your stillwater game. There are a lot of people who are intimidated, or at least a bit overwhelmed, at learning how to fish a big, flat, non-moving body of water. Don’t worry... it’s not too tough once you get the basics and narrow things down a bit. Here’s a quick and dirty tip list that will get you started with the basics of stillwater fishing. Focus on areas closer to the shore All of that water in the middle of the lake- don’t worry about it. It’s likely just too deep to efficiently fish it if you don’t have a lake map. If you're looking for a lake map... or if you want to get real technical we've got some gear you could add to your fishing rig here--fish finders... ...

Matt Gutzmann of North 40 Fly Shop in Great Falls had a fly stick in his arm while he was fishing during his lunch break. This afforded us the perfect opportunity to try out the fishing line technique to remove the buried hook.

I've been spending a lot of time on the lower portion of the Missouri lately. If you aren't too familiar with the Might Mo, she's pretty well known as a blue ribbon fishery, but only a very small portion is known as the crown jewel. The rest of the Mo is pretty slow moving and susceptible to agricultural use. I don't know what the native fisheries were like prior to all the dams, but what I do know is that things change drastically after the last dam before Fort Peck. The terrain goes from a pristine mountain cool above Cascade to arid grasslands below Great Falls. Much to my surprise, the steep valleys of what is the beginning of the Missouri Breaks, is a tough place to grow up' filled with prickly pear, thorny bushes, sharp rocks, deer, rabbits and snakes, lots of snakes. The land below Rainbow Dam is so rugged, not much of it has ever ...

Spring runoff is a time of year that most dedicated fly fishers despise. The water is muddy, full of debris, and overflowing the banks. The weather is cold and the wading is sketchy at best... But don't let the runoff get you down... here are a few tips to help you find success during runoff.... 5. Figure out the time of day that your stretch of water has the best visibility. Often times in the spring the cold nights are enough to slow down the melt and provide a 5 to 6 hour period of time where the water clarity improves. You will see this more readily the closer to the snowpack you are fishing. As you move further down drainage this becomes less apparent but windows of slightly clearer water can be found. 4. Fish the softest water you can find. This means right along the bank and the inside of large eddies. Fish will move out of their n...

Back in 2007 Paul, Erik, Broady, Ben and a few of the guys trying to pull off this "fly shop in a farm store" thing (find out how it all got started here) were contributing to the newsletter which we created with very few connections to the fly fishing industry. Names like Gary LaFontaine, Rene Harrop, Kelly Galloup- just to name a very few were about the same to us as MJ, Shaq, Jerry Rice, and Kirby Puckett. For Paul- that guy was Scott Sanchez. So you can imagine how excited Paul was last week, when during a tour and line showing at the new and beautiful Simms facility in 4-corners near Bozeman, MT, he met Mr. Scott Sanchez. Scott works for Jack Dennis Fly Shop near Jackson Hole as the fly shop manager for Jack Dennis Outdoors and was touring the new facility as well. After Paul could soak up all he could from our new friends at Jack ...

When was the first time you fished the Yakima River? I first fished the Yakima River when I was a student at WSU, back in 1992. I didn't start fly-fishing until a few years later, when I moved to Colorado. Back then it was on spinning-gear and lures. What species of native fish are present in the Yakima Drainage? The fish you're most likely to encounter while fly-fishing the Yakima are its westslope cutthroat and rainbow trout. There are 40+ species of fish in the Yakima, including salmon and steelhead, supported by tribal hatcheries. There's also whitefish, pike minnow, and brook trout. Some reports of brown trout from the Cooper River have swirled around lately, but I've yet to see one in person. What challenges do these fish currently face? As with most fisheries in the NW, these fish face the ''Three H": habitat, hatcheries, and hear...

Build a closed cell foam seat. Using closed cell foam to build a raised seat on your tube goes a long way to staying warm. I shaped mine to fit my tube then used 1 inch webbing to strap it into place. It keeps you sitting high and out of the water, and the closed cell foam insulates great. It also is more comfortable. Wear bulky layers. You want to trap as much air between your legs and the water as possible. I wear a Patagonia Capelene 3 base layer, synthetic pants, and then 2 pairs of larger high pile fleece pants over the puff pants. Doing this allows me to trap a lot of air inside the wader. The downside is looking like the marshmallow man when gearing up. Bring a hot drink. Nothing like hot coffee to warm you warm when a cold snowstorm starts to bite through the layers. We have new insulated North 40 Outfitters’ Klean Kanteens, or...

Flashabou Intruder (dressed heavy for fast water) Recipe : Size 2 Streamer Hook or 55mm Shank Black Artic Fox Barred Ostrich Purple Haze Flashabou Marabou Black Rubber Legs Saddle Hackle Lead Eyes UV Black/Purple Ice Dub 30lb Fireline

Chasing blue lines has been a hobby of mine since I started fly fishing. It is the best way to discover new spots, and the exploration is a large part of the draw for me. Nothing beats rounding a bend in the river deep in the woods, miles from the road, and hooking a sweet fish on the first swing or drift. But simply picking a blue line and walking it can be a real test of your skills as an outdoorsman and your patience as an angler. I can recount many days of spending hours hiking down a canyon, through head high brush, over countless dead logs, and finally reaching a river that is seemingly fishless. And that's not even the hard part, the real test begins on the hike out after a long fishless day. Luckily, given advances in information technology we now have some great tools to help us improve our chances and put our limited free time t...