Smoke gets in your eyes.

 

A strange day to be on the river for sure. The smoke from the Canadian fires seemed to get denser and denser as the day wore on. Have now watched the sun turn into a glowing orange ball in the sky at 6:00 pm the last two nights. If I weren't a fisherman I would hope for a south wind to get rid of the smoke, but I have no desire to have bright sunshine and 90 degree days wipe out what's left of our freestone fishing.

This morning I fished a place on the EB hoping for another day of cornutas, it wasn't to be. There were lots of boiling rises (the early stage of a cornuta hatch) but I didn't see a single cornuta dun hatch. Not to worry, there were cornuta spinners over the riff, but when the spinners fell (there were a good number of them) the fish paid them no mind and kept right on boiling. Finally saw a couple of tiny flies emerge from the boils but was never able to catch one for a closer look. When the feeding stopped I was able to get a few fish to look at the flies I was throwing, some even tried them. But it was no walk in the park.

This evening, after an afternoon of fly tying, I again fished the EB. There was wind, smoke and an assortment of bugs, both duns and spinners. Found a few fish willing to eat flies with hooks in them but in the last half hour, with lots of flies on the water, the fish just shut down. What looked like a great night of fishing, turned into a bit of a disappointment. Walked back to the car, took off my vest and waders and when I got into the car the inside of the front windshield had dozens of tiny black caddis on it. Was that what the fish were feeding on? If so, we are all out of luck as they are far too small to fit on a hook, let alone see on the water.