We are coming in to my favorite part of the Summer now! June and big Mayflies – brown drakes, iso and the best of them all HEX. Below is a brown spinner they typically start in light keep going into darkness.
Drakes come first and it appeared they would start early last week with some high heat. The Au Sable was getting very warm in upper 60’s but then came the cold snap. Last Thursday started the cold with high temps in low 50’s and night time temps in 30’s. Heavy Sulphur hatches came then in the Big Waters with lots of trout rising with good dry fly fishing in late afternoon thru late evening. Great pattern for these small Sulphurs is a roberts yellow drake in size #16 and #18. Not always the best hatch for big browns but there are always a few eating them. Also been some march browns & yellow Cahill,these are nice big Mayflies around size #12, big brown sure eat these. Tom Buhr below with a beautiful Brown caught on a #14 roberts yellow drake dry fly.
So good to see dad’s get there sons into fly fishing at an early age! James first time out and he got this beautiful Brown on a dry fly on Sulphur hatch.
Extremely cold the last couple days on the holiday weekend but here comes the heat now. There have been some drakes in the smaller waters of the Au Sable and its branches. It’s pretty common knowledge that upper North Branch comes early. Water temp back up to mid 60’s in Big Waters. Some heavy hatches of drakes are coming very soon! Next up is the iso and typical comes before drakes are over. This hatch starts up heavy and then will last most of the summer on the Au Sable.
After iso comes my favorite and king of the Mayflies – HEX! No need to type about this one now but here is what they look like when they first hatch.
