October with the Blue Winged Olive’s on the Gunnison River is a special time of year.
The mornings are cool and so is the water temperature. As the water cools into the upper 40’s the Blue Winged Olive nymphs start getting active. On those cloudy cool days, the bugs will start to emerge around 10 o’clock. Nymphing with beatis nymphs like the JuJu Beatis, WD-40, Mighty Mite, and the RS2 will produce fish from sunrise until you start seeing the first adult on the water. Once you start seeing adults tie on a BWO dry fly then 18″ to 24″ behind adding an RS-2 as an emerger. You can fish these two fly the rest of the hatch. On those perfect cloudy days, you will be watching hundreds of fish rising. It is an unbelievable sight to see.
Check out RIGS fishing report on our web site. This is the time to get down there or hire a RIGS guide on a walk wade trip on the Gunnison River and see why October fishing is so much fun. ~ Matt McCannel