Ruby River – Below the Reservoir and Later at Ruby Island

September 6, 2008

Good friend Hafferman came to visit along his tour of our beloved Montana before leaving for a third tour of Iraq. Faced with innumerable choices for fishing (what a chore!) we decided to head for the Ruby, first right below the dam and later at Ruby Island above Alder. There were only a couple other fishermen near the dam and no one seen lower down in the afternoon. Fishing was mainly streamers and hoppers.

Water

Unbelievably, the river was high and murky. We heard later that the reservoir is being drawn down to make room for winter snows and spring rains. Reportedly, the murkiness was from the reservoir “turning over”. That is, water temperature changes bring cooling water down full of algae. It did seem to affect fishing. The visibility couldn’t have been more than 12-18” in the water.

Fishing

While I was wrestling 8” rainbows out of the high water, Hafferman found an opportunity to check in on the iPod and out on the stressful pre-Iraq holiday. The curiosity of the day was that another fisherman stopped to visit just below the spillway bridge. Curiously, he and his son had been fishing on the Beaverhead over Labor Day and he remembered seeing me. It was actually during the windy, stormy weather while I was enthralled with the spry action of the Stoddard’s Special. I recall the two of them stopping across the river to watch as the senior citizen was firing streamers clear across the Beaverhead. This day on the Ruby, he was surprised to see what I had been casting with that day.

Later in the afternoon in the afternoon, we moved down the river to the Ruby Island, a section of the river where it splits just above Alder. It’s a different river at this point, with less water as irrigation takes its share, but also clearer.

I did manage to hook a couple small trout and land one. Hunger eventually drove us home and to a later evening on the Big Hole.