Transcript: On the Water with Dustin White
Transcript
Marvin:
[0:04] Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of the Articulate Fly, and we're back with another On the Water with Dustin White. How you doing, Dustin?
Dustin:
[0:13] Marvin, I'm just thankful to not be feeling like a soggy duck here lately.
We finally have some sunny days, so I am peachy keen. How about you?
Marvin:
[0:21] I'm getting there, yeah. It was kind of like a book of revelation stuff going on in your neck of the woods, right? Yeah.
Dustin:
[0:28] We've had a few tornadoes, one of which I had to row through, which was pretty crazy. And then a few flash floods. So it's it's gotten gnarly.
But thankfully, now our our 10 day forecast is turning around and we're actually in what appears to be Wyoming summer. So very thankful for that.
Marvin:
[0:47] Yeah, but you're kind of not really selling the flash flood very well because you sent me pictures and it looked like pretty much Casper was in about two and a half to three feet of water everywhere.
Dustin:
[0:58] Yeah, yeah, it was pretty nuts. I mean, we got it. I don't know what the official report is.
But it, you know, some of the folks in town who measure the water said we got about three and a half inches in about an hour.
So it just, it just surged on us. And, you know, kind of came up out of nowhere, though.
The water pressure, you know, blue manholes off of the street covers and you know there's houses that were lifted off the foundation so we got a lot of water move that that came in real quick on us.
So you know there was quite a bit of property damage for folks and and obviously that that didn't help our river situation of terms of it clearing up too much in the in the lower stretch through town but thankfully those waters receded pretty quick.
And even the day that it happened by that evening, almost all that water was cleaned out and cleared out. So, it kind of came in quick on us and moved out quick on us. But thankfully, no one was hurt.
And we're grateful for that, but it was gnarly. Yeah.
Marvin:
[2:06] And so, I would imagine that's creating the immediate water's gone, but I imagine there's a fair amount of flood control planning.
So, they're probably still moving a ton of stuff through the system and yeah, flows are all over the place, right?
Dustin:
[2:18] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Our water is obviously just not from me to tailwater, but the flow is just skyrocketed up.
So then they dropped the flows on the reef section. So basically everything here down to Glendo, they dropped that to accommodate all that water moving through.
So thankfully, they were on top of that. They've been doing the same thing with the big horn up in Thermopolis.
So out of boys in the reservoir there, it's it's been, you know, honestly, the last couple of weeks, up and down, up and down, up and down.
And so they're doing a great job just accommodating the water that's coming in the reservoirs and, you know, bumping them and dropping and, you know, just trying to make sure that they they keep things moving along and good for as many parties that depend on that water as possible.
Marvin:
[3:14] Yeah, I got it. So how does that translate into the fishing?
And we'll just kind of tick through them like we always do. We'll do far away to close to home. What are you seeing on the Bighorn?
Dustin:
[3:26] Yeah, admittedly with those flows going up and down, we really haven't ran too many trips at all up there to the point where for a while it was just can't fish it. It's just, there's too much moving through it.
There's some pretty low hanging bridges on that flow anyways.
And so once the water gets up that high, you literally can't even pass your drift boat under it.
So, we kind of deferred people away from that. The reports we have from folks up in Thermop is obviously that bigger water, those fish are eating bigger crustaceans, so crayfish patterns, they're eating worms.
Still on the scud game, but that's been the name of the game up there for those who have fished it.
They are supposed to be bumping it up again this week. So it dropped down to 3,500 CFS last week and we were able to get a few boats up there and fish it.
That was pretty good, but we're gonna get another bump this week.
So we'll see how that goes.
In terms of working closer to home, we've got the mile.
I've been running a bunch of trips on the mile and then a bunch of trips carping as well on Pathfinder. Miles been.
Pretty darn solid.
[4:51] There's quite a few pseudos that are out in the mornings, and we're starting to see fish shift their attention to P&Es as well, so that's been good.
There's a few golden shucks that are starting to show up in the water, so the stonefly patterns have been working exceptionally well, additionally, on the top section of it, so that's been a a lot of fun. And then we have a reef.
And again, with this rain, the first of the two flash floods we have, which occurred at Cottonwood Creek, blew out the reef about a week ago.
And so it's been dirty since then. We've got good-ish visibility right now.
It's probably about six to eight inches of visibility. And I know folks hear that and might panic and I think that's pretty terrible.
Um, but if you're fishing, you know, we call them flashy and trashy rigs, but if you get something big and bright enough in front of their face, they are pretty eager to eat it. So it's not so blown out to, you know, a trip should get canceled or folks should be deterred from the water.
They're just probably not going to eat your size 20 RS too.
Marvin:
[6:05] Yeah, fair enough. But I would imagine too, you know, the silver lining, and we sort of touched this before we started recording is, you know, all this water is going to really kind of scour out the sediment, right?
Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, not this year, but in the future, there should be just some epic bug activity, right?
Dustin:
[6:22] I would think so, yeah. That's the hopeful thing.
I would think additionally as well, if this, the silver lining is too, we talked about hoppers in the last podcast we did, thinking, man, gosh, no, if it's rainy, it's not great hoppers.
But what this did was a lot of that grass got real tall, which is pretty advantageous for hoppers.
And so if this rain shifts back around over the next couple months, I still think we have a good shot of having a pretty epic hopper year.
Time will tell with that. But the other thing that the silver lining this has done is that while, yes, this has, for the most part, leashed us to the top 8 to 12 miles of the reef, depending on how heavy the last rain was, it's really kind of given the fish in the lower section some respite.
And so once that clears up, we're gonna have some pretty eager fish willing to eat down low. So I would expect that's gonna be great.
That said, our fishing on the reef has been really, really, really good.
Even with the additional pressure that those fish are seeing just from boats basically being funneled to, you know, you know, limited options, you know, there's limited places to go, but still, uh, pretty darn good. Yeah.
Marvin:
[7:50] Well, there you go. And, you know, folks, we love questions on the articulate fly, don't we, Dustin?
Dustin:
[7:55] We love questions, Marvin.
Marvin:
[7:57] Yes. And so folks, if you, you can DM them to us, you can email me, whatever's easiest for you.
If we use your question, I will send you some articulate fly swag.
We are drawing for some cool stuff from Dustin at the end of the season before I let you go Dustin and make another cocktail and have dinner you want to let folks know where they can find you so they can book in fish with you?
Dustin:
[8:16] Yeah you can hold me from the Ugly Bug or shops at downtown Casper on South Center Street but you can give the shop a call at area code 307-234-6905 or you can reach out to me on my Instagram which is at Dustin James White.
Marvin:
[8:32] Well there you go well listen folks owe it to yourself to get out there and catch a few. Tight lines everybody. Tight lines, Dustin.
Dustin:
[8:40] Tight lines, Marvin.