Spring Creek Casting Flooding Changes The Face Of Montana’s Winter Fly-Fishing Paradise

For years, casting for big trout along the valley’s famed spring creeks has been the highlight of winter fly-fishing in Paradise Valley.

This year, things are different. The famed water has been reduced to just a few sections, and there is more of a trickle than a steady stream of anglers.

The spring and summer flooding of the Yellowstone River “took out all of the spring creek” her family’s land south of town, according to Eva DePuy, owner of the DePuy Spring Creek. “It just ruined it. It was terrible.”

Floodwaters also flushed out the mile-long Armstrong’s Spring Creek. “We were totally flooded out,” said Virginia O’Hair, owner of the famous water.

Of the three famous streams, only Nelson’s Spring Creek was left untouched.

“Nothing has happened to Nelson’s,” said Chris Miller of Dan Bailey’s Fly Shop in Livingston. “They did work last year to enhance the fishery and it sounds like it has been a success.”

In bits and pieces, the creeks are being repaired, in hopes of getting the Yellowstone River back into the banks it flowed in before it claimed the spring creeks in June’s flooding.

And there are some stretches open to anglers who wish to bet on the area’s unpredictable weather, dodging blizzards and 60-mph chinook winds to fish the creeks. For those who do, the returns can be enormous.

“They are spring-fed, they have water temperatures that are warmer than the river and stay very stable, so they have fly hatches occurring throughout the winter, if the conditions are good,” said Fred Nelson, fish biologist with Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

“Typically the creeks tend to have fish densities that are fairly high, relative to the area,” Nelson said. “They also have fish coming in there to spawn, the brown in the fall, spawning through December, and the rainbows start moving through the spring creeks in February.”

The spring creeks typically don’t freeze, he added. “You need really, horrendously cold temperatures to freeze.”

And that is important during the winter because, “when you are fishing the standard rivers, your guides freeze up,” said John Bailey, owner of Dan Bailey’s Fly Shop. “With the warm water, you don’t have the freezing problem. The water stays almost the same temperature all year round, depending on how close you are to the spring.”

On the creeks that are open, winter angling is subsurface fishing, “although there are some midge hatches and blue wing olive hatches to be had,” Miller said.

Anglers eager to cast a line in this famous water are not totally out of luck.

Nelson’s is allowing five to six rods a day at winter rates from Nov. 1 to April 25. Anglers pay $25 per rod to fish that three-quarter-mile stretch of creek, according to owner Helen Nelson.

Stretches of DePuy’s are open, too.

Winter passes provide access to unlimited fishing on DePuy’s from Oct. 15 to April 15 for $25 a day.

Armstrong’s is still closed, although the family hopes to be open in the spring, O’Hair said.

Of course, more flooding could occur next this spring. Depending on how far ahead you look, that could be good for anglers.

“I think in the long run, DePuy’s will be better off; it needed a good scouring,” Miller said.

“Armstrong’s, it’s still hard to say.”

Map: Paradise Valley