Today is opening day on the upper Madison river south of Ennis, Montana. The sections of river from Quake Lake to McAtee Bridge and from Ennis Bridge to Ennis Lake are now open to fishing. These sections close every spring to protect areas with spawning rainbow trout. Now that they are open we have twice as much water to fish and plenty of dumb fish. This is a great time of year to be out on the Madison river fly fishing.
The conditions for opening weekend this year are a little different than normal. Most years opening day falls during our spring runoff. The river is still fishable and normally fishes well but to find clear enough water we are often confined to the upper sections near Three Dollar Bridge and Reynolds Pass. This year is a bit different. Low snow pack in the Madison river drainage has made for a pretty minimal runoff and the entire river is more than clear enough to fish. In fact it is even clear enough to fish it with dry flies on the right afternoon when the fish are looking up.
The forecast for opening weekend is cool and rainy so that should keep the water clear and at least some of the fair weather anglers at home. We fished near Three Dollar Bridge last year on Sunday during opening weekend. On that day the water had less than two feet of visibility and the weather was cloudy, cold and rainy. It turned out to be one of the better days of fishing that I saw all year on the upper Madison and I don't recall seeing many if any other boats. There should be some pretty fun fishing to be had over the next week or so. Get out and make those fish smart again because if you don't somebody else will.
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