Time: 10:00AM – 6:30PM

Location: Hosmer to Fernie

Fish Landed: 20

Elk River, BC 08/09/2015 Photo Album

Jake Chutz is the sales manager for Montana Fly Company, and Adam Trina is the president and CEO. They invited me to visit them in Columbia Falls, MT, and the invitation included a trip to Fernie, BC in Canada for some fishing on the Elk River. I never met either of these gentlemen in person, yet I felt that I knew them quite well from the many phone conversations.

Jake picked me up at Adam’s house in Columbia Falls, MT where I was staying on Friday evening, and we made the two hour trip to Fernie, BC with his drift boat in tow. It was a scenic drive as we spotted numerous deer along the way and passed many picturesque lakes. By the time we crossed the border into Canada, darkness descended, and this made it impossible to view my surroundings in southern British Columbia. I was pleasantly surprised by the extra hour or more of daylight in the western and northern portion of the mountain time zone.

Saturday morning after breakfast at the Park Place Inn, Jake and I crossed the main highway to the Elk River Guiding Shop, and here we purchased eight day fishing licenses and access permits for two days on the Elk River. I also splurged on a pair of neoprene wading booties for wet wading during the summer, although I did not wear them on Saturday. Jake arranged for a shuttle service to transport his truck and trailer to the take out in Fernie, and we moved on to the Independent Market to pick up lunch supplies and sunscreen. With these chores out of the way we proceeded north along the Elk River until we found the turn off for the Hosmer boat launch. Jake commented on the low level of the river as we crossed a bridge, but I had no point of comparison, and the crystal clear flows looked quite inviting for a fly fisherman.

Since Jake informed me that we would likely be in the boat most of the day, and the forecasted high was eighty degrees, I changed into my shorts and Chacos. Jake rigged up a six and five weight as well as my Sage One five weight. The five weights were configured for dry fly fishing, and the six weight was threaded with a streamer set up. Once we were ready, Jake launched and paddled the drift boat down a narrow channel to the main river just below a bridge. He jumped out of the boat and pulled it across some shallow water so we could prospect a bridge pylon and a long dead tree branch that extended downstream. The water look magnificent, but I was unable to interest any trout in my size 10 Jake’s gulp beetle.

The weather was fantastic with a high around eighty as predicted and minimal cloud cover. In Colorado these clear conditions can presage challenging fishing, but that was not the case on the Elk River. Since we arrived after dark, I did not have the opportunity to see the landscape, but on Saturday morning I was dazzled by the jagged rocky topped hills that bordered the river on all sides. The Fernie, BC area reminded me very much of the Grand Tetons near Jackson, WY.

The first hour of fishing was quite slow, and I was unable to bring any fish to the large net in the boat, but the second hour proved to be more productive. My first fish was a small cutthroat, and this fish proved to be the smallest of the day. All the remaining catches were in the 12 – 15 inch range with several fish topping out around sixteen or seventeen inches. The gulp beetle was the workhorse fly over the course of our eight mile drift, although Jake changed my line from a size 10 beetle with a purple body to a size 12 with a red body for the midday period. The cutthroats seemed to favor purple and red with equal enthusiasm.

It took some time to identify the productive water types, but eventually we solved the riddle and focused on deep slow pockets and slack water along the bank. A drag free drift was required, but successful presentations were nearly always rewarded with stubborn hard fighting west slope cutthroats. For short casts to small pockets I executed high stick maneuvers where the fly line never touched the water and only the beetle gently drifted along the surface. In places where there was fast current between the boat and the slow shelf water next to the shore, Jake taught me to perform a reach cast which positioned the line upstream of the fly to avoid drag without a mend. It was great fun drifting from one side of the river to the other, as I popped quick cast to small pockets and enjoyed longer drag free drifts in other bank side locations. Solid drifts consistently yielded regular bites from the pretty speckled residents of the Elk River.

The other water type that yielded cutthroat trout was riffles of moderate depth over a green bottom where the river dropped into a pool. These areas seemed to be more productive in the morning, as the action in the drop offs tapered in the afternoon.

When I reached twelve fish landed on my mental scorecard, Jake suggested that we give streamers a test. We stopped in a gorgeous deep hole where the main current angled at ninety degrees toward the west bank. I wet waded and landed a twelve inch cutthroat while Jake stripped the sparkle minnow through the aqua depths until he connected on a small bull trout. When we resumed our drift, Jake continued demonstrating the streamer basics and yanked a fine cutthroat from a root ball. The hungry fish darted from beneath the root wad and gulped the fraudulent minnow that gave the appearance of a struggling dead bait fish.

With his fine demonstration complete, Jake handed the six weight rod to me, and I began to practice what I observed. Jake preached confidence in my ability to induce a take, and after twenty minutes I did in fact succeed. I cast repeatedly toward the bank and manipulated the minnow with short jerky pulls on the line. Suddenly I felt a small tug, and I was not sure whether it was fish or bottom, so I resumed the retrieve, and immediately I felt the heavy weight of a struggling fish. I gave the rod a quick jerk to set the hook after the fish was on the line, and then I fought a hard fighting seventeen inch cutthroat to the net. This meat eater proved to be the best fish on Saturday, and I was thrilled to experience some success with a streamer.

After some additional streamer tossing with no success we reverted to the gulp beetle, and this move enabled me to build my fish count to twenty. As we approached the take out point we stopped a few times so Jake could explore some side channels, and he demonstrated exceptional casting and line management capabilities that yielded numerous fine cutthroats in our large net.

Toward the end of our drift I tried a small foam hopper as I searched for improved visibility, but the high floating terrestrial yielded only a few refusals. Jake meanwhile returned to the workhorse beetle and added a few more nice fish to his count for the day. I was surprised to learn that the Elk River fish favored beetles over hoppers, but the riparian vegetation was trees and bushes rather than grass. Grass is the preferred habitat for grasshoppers.

It was a spectacular day on the Elk River, and I enjoyed my first fish caught north of the border. The weather was perfect, the scenery was a sensory delight and a twenty fish day is something to treasure, especially when the trout are thirteen to seventeen inches long, and they are delicately spotted cutthroats with a brilliant orange slash below the jaw. Was it my best outing in 2015? I rank it slightly above the Conejos River on July 22 due to the unique appeal of catching west slope cutthroat. Another factor elevating my day on the Elk was the excellent rowing and instruction by Jake Chutz. Hopefully I can build on these skills during my future fishing adventures.