The first week of January almost inevitably finds lots of fly fisher folk itchy to get out and stretch after the holiday season.
This year in particular finds me among that cadre – the past six weeks or so (since Thanksgiving) have been the busiest in memory and it’s been damned cold around the neighborhood.
The penetrating cold persisted until about a week ago and has fostered the development of lots of shore and anchor ice, and filled many of the area’s typically December fishable waters with slush more days than not.
Warmer temps in the high twenties and thirties, seemingly almost shirt-sleeve weather if the wind isn’t blowing, have enticed a few of us onto the Gallatin and up to the Madison between the lakes of late.
Fishing has been about what you’d expect this time of year, but the snowpack we’ve seen around the neighborhood has not.
Thanks to a snowy late November and early December here in Bozeman, followed by weeks of cold, we’ve got as much snow on the ground as almost anywhere in the region, and it’s spitting snow right now this morning with several inches forecast for the next day or so.
On the other hand, snow cover is pretty skinny just a few miles in almost any direction you care to travel from here.
A look at SNOTEL’s water equivalent chart today shows that most Montana watersheds are behind normal for this time of year (orange and red bars indicate less than 90% of normal snowpack for this time of year)…
More than one friend and neighbor has noted with chagrin that this winter feels like it’s going to be a dry year, particularly when compared to the well above average snowpack winters we’ve had the past two years. Subjective as it may be, the old-timers seem to have a true knack for knowing what’s coming weather wise.
NOAH’s climatology scientists seem to agree – the three month forecasts for temp and precip look dry and warm for the region. If that’s the case, it’ll be Blue Wings in March and Mother’s Day Caddis shouldn’t be buried in runoff this year…..
The quarterly forecast does make me wonder a bit about that March Texas redfish trip we have planned……
Tags: Weather
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