{Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} San Juan River, New Mexico

So I went to New Mexico for a hog hunt with some old friends. We found no hogs and it became a drinking and shooting fest. But because we weren't finding hogs, all my AZ friends decided to go back a day early. Since I had a day to kill, I drove up to Navajo Dam and did a float on Monday. Epic day of fishing. Truly epic. Numbers of fish and size of fish. Because this area is in the middle of a multi-year drought, Colorado had nowhere to put their hatchery fish this year and most ended up in the San Juan - hundreds of thousands of fish from 6" to 14" I told my guide I was interested in catching big fish, so we only had to wade through 2 dozen or so pee-wees as he called them. The pee-wees on this river were 12"-14". 

Flows were low, the air temp was in the low 30's and the water was off color. We started throwing big meat flies, but only got a couple of flashes. The rest of the day we fished a leech fly, white ended up being the best color, with a size 22 midge fly, orange was the color of the day, underneath it. Takes were unbelievably subtle, even for the big fish. If the indicator did anything funny, you set the hook (hook sets are free). The biggest fish below barely moved the indicator.

Besides the pee-wees, we caught probably 30 "average" San Juan fish. These were all 16" plus. Here is a picture of a smaller "average" fish. He took the leech.

Here is my personal best rainbow, outside of AK. He took the midge. I broke off 3 more this size and had a brown about this size break off right at the boat. Sorry for the terrible picture.

If you ever get the chance, fish the San Juan!

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