San Juan Here We Come

My brothers and I are venturing out to the San Juan River this Thursday. Billy has been hard at work cranking out dozens of midges in various colors to meet any challenge the "Juan" may throw at us. It looks like we should be in for one hell of a trip, this is the most recent report before our journey begins:

Visibility: 60 inches - 929 cfs
Water temperature at mid-day: 42 Degrees F
Water condition: Clear
Best time of day to fish: All day long, best dry fly fishing from 1:00pm to 5:00pm
Best stretch: The whole quality water section is fishing well! Try out the braids above Texas Hole, it’s awesome!
Fly fishing hatches in order of importance:
Midges are hatching from 11:00 to 3:00. At the moment they are small, midge pupa and larvae, size 22 to 24, olive, gray, black, chocolate, cream and of course red have been my best. The hatch is strongest from 11:30 to 2:00. The midges are clustering so try fishing a cluster to a single dry midge. Black has been best. Try fishing BWO's from 1:00pm to about 5:00pm. The hatch is getting stronger every day as spring arrives. Best on cloudy days. Dark or light gray, brown and olive have been the best colors in a size 20 and 22. Both dry and wet patterns. Bunny leaches are great attractors! Brown, Black, purple, and white. PMD's are coming off below Simon canyon around 4:00pm.
Techniques & Tips
Fish fluorocarbon tippets at the end of your mono-filament leader when nymph fishing. 5X to the first fly and 6X to the dropper. This will produce more strikes as the fish can't see the fluorocarbon. Fishing 22 to 24 midges in the slower waters has been great, I am using flash on my midges as the water is off color due to lake turnover. Fish light weight ( a number 6 or smaller ) with your strike indicator 2 or 3 feet above the weight. You don't want to be on the bottom when you are midge fishing. We are finding lots of baetis, especially on cloudy afternoons. Baetis live in fast water so look for them in the riffles at the top of holes and at the bottom of holes in the tail out. Fish are eating gray, olive and brown nymphs in these places, it just depends on the day so have them all. You may have the chance to see fish on top during this time. A parachute Adams or comparadun should do the job. The may flies are green and are about size 22. Use dark colored wings as the fish are turning away from white wings. If you can't see this try a marker fly about 12 inches above the baetis. You should fish mono-filament tippets when fishing on the surface as fluorocarbon sinks. Change back to midges when the fish stop eating your may flies. Try some bunny leaches if all else fails. Dead drift them like the rest of your nymphs. Fish are eating them for moss! They will shake the drifting moss to get the bugs out.