Well, trout season is finally in full swing, and although I don’t participate in any trout fishing on the opening day, I did stop by a couple of local fishing spots to see how things were going. Of course, there were a good number of fishermen lining the banks, and as expected, there were a number of different baits and lures being offered to what fishermen hoped would be hungry trout. Live minnows, salmon eggs, spinners, and a number of other offerings all seemed to produce at one time or another throughout the day. There were even a few fly fishermen working nymphs and streamers with some success as well.

When I started trout fishing back in my high school days, I was a dyed-in-the-wool salmon egg fisherman, and I caught tons of trout with those little pink eggs. However, once I was introduced to fly fishing, I changed over and never went back.

One of the things that intrigued me most about fly fishing for trout was taking trout on a floating dry fly and especially one that I had tied myself. I guess when I think about it, taking any fish on some kind of artificial surface lure is one of the most exciting ways to hook up; I get the same rush when I hook a bass on a rubber frog or surface plug.

Although I’ve been trout fishing in several of the special regulation areas over the past couple of weeks, all of my catches were on nymphs fished right on or near the bottom — that’s pretty typical in those early days before the regular-season opener.

What I really look forward to, however, is taking my first trout of the season on a dry fly. Interestingly enough, before I sat down to write today’s piece, I thought I would head out to a local trout stream to see if I could make that happen.

Things were slow the first hour or so — no hook-ups — but then I noticed some caddisflies starting to hatch, and then I began to see some trout taking the flies with quick snaps at the surface. It didn’t take me long to replace my nymph presentation with a size 12 light brown deer hair caddis that resulted in a dozen hook-ups over the next couple of hours. That light brown caddis is a good choice even in these early days of April. Another popular dry fly that I’m sure would have produced as well during the caddis hatch is the well-known Adams in sizes 12 and 14.

One of my favorite dry fly hatches to watch out for in April is the Quill Gordon. This grayish/blue fly will generally start showing up on many streams around April 18. Sizes 12 and 14 are good to work with. This hatch usually occurs in the faster water at the head of the pool on down into the midsection of the pool. If you don’t have a Quill Gordon try the Adams — it’s been known to produce for both a caddis hatch and some mayfly hatches.

Another one to be on the lookout for is the smaller Blue-Winged Olive. As the name implies, a greenish body with blue/gray hackle and blue dun wings. I tie my wings parachute style, and I usually tie these dries in sizes 14 and 16. There are other dry fly options as well; Little Blue Dun, Blue Quill, Black Caddis, and a few others. It’s not too soon to enjoy some great surface action with your trout fishing, and if you are new to fly fishing with dry flies, make sure you take some Adams flies along-they may produce for you in a lot of situations.