Brown trout Archives - Montana Wild

2018, Fly Fishing

South Island Brown Trout 3/3

Read Part 1 HERE and Part 2 HERE. Well it’s been about six months or so since we were in New Zealand and it seems like forever ago. Time is short as we are in the midst of hunting season so there won’t be much words for this final installment but be looking for some content to roll out around the New Year. For now enjoy the photos and be looking for more here on the website and through our Instagram page.

new zealand, nz, fly fishing, brown trout, diy, bucknasty browns, huge browns, backcountry, fishing, helis

Hiking to the next zone

Josh wrangling a cicada eater from a backcountry zone

Starting the day off with a one hander

Zack hooking up and about to get schooled by a backcountry brown trout

What a specimen. Caught in a creek only two rods lengths wide.

Long, wet hikes were the name of the game in the backcountry

Front country sunrise

Hatch of the day boys!

Josh with his biggest brown of the trip and life

Exploring a wild, tiny creek with big browns

Zack with his personal best and the biggest weight fish of our trip

–Zack Boughton

October 10, 2018/by Montana Wild

2018, Fly Fishing

BENT 2

The Simms Shoot Out 2013, our first big splash into mainstream fly fishing media. The film titled “BENT” won the award that year and our friendship with Dan “Rooster” Leavens was just beginning. If you haven’t watched it do yourself and get acquainted with Dave Priebus’ client phone call and Rooster’s prowess with a fly rod.

With $2,000 in cash we quickly re-invested in camera equipment and kept making fishing films.

Good times and a reminder that Rooster is a short dude haha!

It wasn’t but a few months later and Rooster called me and said “Get your butt over here with your camera, the salmonfly hatch is stupid good!” Fortunately I believed him and a couple days later I’d witnessed the best of the salmonfly hatch and laid down some amazing footage that would soon become Bearback Rider.

A few more years went by and we talked about making films but it always fell through either from a schedule or funding standpoint. Finally, Rooster wanted to follow up with our first film and make BENT 2. I was all in and a few phone calls later and it was on the books. This would be a short two day film shoot and we hoped the magic would still be there. Dave Priebus showed up in fine form and as always the fishing in SW Montana never disappoints.

We hope you enjoyed the film. If you ever want to book an awesome guided trip in Montana definitely give Rooster and the fine folks at The Stonefly Inn a call (406-684-5648). A special thanks to the great folks at Hatch Outdoors and Simms Fishing for their support of the project!

–Zack Boughton

August 28, 2018/by Montana Wild

2018, Fly Fishing

South Island Brown Trout 2/3

Read the first part of this series HERE. After a few weeks on the island we had put some great fish in the net but conditions had been tough. The rivers had blown out twice and most of the fishable days had overcast skies which made spotting tough in lots of the water we were fishing. We pushed through and made the best of it. We spent some time fishing the flats for kingfish which was a wild experience. I think we were a few weeks behind on timing and it seems that the locals feel the fishery is getting heavily pressured and there’s some shady tactics being used by guides with boats. We had a good time despite few kingfish sightings and wen’t back to town before being flow deep into the backcountry.

Headed into the abyss, and hopefully home to many big brown trout.

NZ flats tugger

Headed out in search of kingfish

Kahawai headed back to go smash baitfish

Target spotted. Clear water made it easy to see fish but harder to catch.

Teamwork as Zack tries to bring a brown trout to the net.

A medium sized backcountry brown. A hell of a fighter though.

The longest and arguably the prettiest fish of our trip to NZ.

Josh making light work of a bank side brown trout.

This day we got worked for hours until Josh picked the right bug and flawlessly drifted it until this brown took.

Chasing brown trout in big water meant a slip was inevitable.

Got him netted baby!

Small guy but big engine.

1st fish after the heli drop. Stoke was HIGH

The backcountry was amazing but the fishing was tough! Coming that late in the season meant that the easy to see fish were insanely spooky and picky on flies. We all got into beautiful fish but our hookup to sighting percentage was definitely in the single digits. Finding fast water and taking extra time to try to spot fish in that water made things easier as it seemed these fish hadn’t been pressured as much. Be looking for Part 3 soon.

August 12, 2018/by Montana Wild

2018, Fly Fishing

South Island Brown Trout 1/3

If you didn’t catch some of our posts through social media you missed out on the fact that we went to New Zealand this spring in search of big brown trout. It was amazing and we could write a whole book about it, but it’s summer in Montana and we are insanely busy. We also hunted Himalayan tahr which you can read about and watch HERE. With that said New Zealand is almost as amazing as it seems. Some days it’s better and some days worse, but overall a place we were stoked to finally make it to. This had been a bucket list trip for myself and to finally see it realized was something special. For now I’ll leave you with photos from this amazing trip and be looking for two more parts down the road. If time allows we will definitely write more about the trip. Shoot us an email if you’ve got questions or want us to talk about something specific.

Months of preparation both researching maps and also flies. The final organization takes place just days before we leave.

Travel was about 14 hours from Bozeman to NZ. Not bad considering we were leaving winter and headed to brown trout paradise.

Flying in and seeing river after river made what once was a dream now a reality.

Day 1 on the river and this was Fish #1. Life was more than good!

Next Level Stoke

Zack’s 2nd fish of Day 2. We started the trip off hot and thought this was going to be the daily occurrence. Rain had bumped the creek and a streamer sealed the deal on the hike out.

We soon found out that we were going to see unusual amounts of rain for this time of year. Blown rivers, wet gear, and minimal dry fly fishing made some days tougher than others.

Fishing on the front of an impending cyclone. Beautiful water but no fish this day.

Dry fly eater after almost a week of down time. Rivers clear fast after big rains and a risk to hike deep into the backcountry paid off.

Upriver in search of more hungry browns.

Trails in New Zealand don’t always exist even though they are supposed to. Having wet feet is pretty much a necessity even when there is a trail. Fortunately the rewards are always worth the effort.

Cicada smasher. We missed the best part of the hatch but still found a few eager to look up and take the big dry fly.

Written by Zack Boughton

July 30, 2018/1 Comment/by Montana Wild

2018, Anything but fishing and hunting!, Fly Fishing, Spring Fishing, Uncategorized

Score big on new gear with SKWALHALLA.

Looking for some new gear to bring along on your next fishing trip? Look no further. As part of our launch of SKWALHALLA on iTunes, we’re giving away some of the best fishing gear that money can buy. Sounds like a pretty good deal huh? Well it gets better. For just $2.99 you can watch 21 minutes of non stop, action packed, savage dry fly eats AND be entered to win a Simms Slick Jacket ($300 value), two pairs of Smith Dockside Glasses, a Yeti Rambler, and a Good Altitude Trucker. Not a bad deal for less than the cost of a cold one if you ask us…

You’re probably thinking “Ok cool, but how do I get entered to win?”, and the answer is simple. Follow the three steps below, and tune into Montana Wild’s Instagram story on Friday March 9th to watch us pick THREE WINNERS.

Step 1: Watch SKWALHALLA on iTunes.

Step 2: Leave a review on iTunes with your thoughts on the film.

Step 3: Keep your fingers crossed, knock on wood, and patiently wait until March 9th.

Prize Packages:

Winner #1: Large Simms Slick Jacket.

Winner #2: Smith Dockside Glasses, Yeti Rambler, and a Good Altitude Trucker.

Winner #3: Smith Dockside Glasses.

Watch SKWALHALLA on iTunes

Still not fully convinced? Check out the official trailer, and get stoked on SKWALHALLA.

February 26, 2018/1 Comment/by Montana Wild

2018, Uncategorized

SKWALHALLA is LIVE

Without further ado, it’s our pleasure to release our latest fly fishing film, SKWALHALLA. Filmed over the past three years, SKWALHALLA is all about big bugs, big eats, and good times on the river with the boys. Sit back, relax, and enjoy 21 minutes of some of the best spring fly fishing that the West has to offer. Available for purchase or rental via Vimeo On Demand HERE.

Still not quite convinced that SKWALHALLA is worth your time or money by now? Check out the official trailer below, and see for yourself.

Shop our selection of Hats, Tee Shirts, and Apparel HERE.

February 1, 2018/by Montana Wild

2017, Fly Fishing

Bucknasty Browns II Kickstarter Follow Up

First off I’d like to say Thank You to all 127 people who backed our Kickstarter! Your support means a lot and goes a long way in helping us create future films. Unfortunately we didn’t meet our goal on Kickstarter and you will not be charged for your support of the Kickstarter. If you’d like take that money and spend it to support future Montana Wild Fishing films please consider supporting our new film SKWALHALLA which will release in full on February 1st. You can currently pre-order the film and be entered into a giveaway for a Simms hip pack.

The failure of this campaign probably was a result of quite a few things. Starting the campaign over the holidays meant people had and were spending their hard earned money elsewhere, we also had less than a week to plan and create the Kickstarter which was just a necessity given our time and hunting season lasting till the end of November. With little time to plan the campaign it was tough to convey what the funding would actually go towards. The reason we wanted to raise $12,000 was to fund the actual production of a film given the guidelines of our Kickstarter campaign. A five part web series and a film released through iTunes, Amazon, and Vimeo On Demand would have cost well in excess of $12,000. Permits for commercial filming would have cost in excess of $350 per day in NZ and trying to capture a 5-6 week trip would have been a costly endeavor. Add in music licensing which would have been thousands and then paying a 3rd party to upload to iTunes and Amazon and we are pushing 10K easy. Then add in our time and extra expense to take time to film and properly document our trip each day and then spend weeks to edit and you can see that it is a costly project. A few haters had a good time claiming this was just a way to fund an extravagant trip to NZ. That’s false as we will still be going to NZ on our own dime and no we aren’t trust fund babies, we do in fact work like everyone else for our money.

With that said we will no longer be filming Bucknasty Browns as outlined in our Kickstarter campaign. The chances of us doing any filming outside of some personal shots is slim to none. That brings me to my final point, if you do in fact value our fishing films and want to continue to see us create more we NEED your support. If half our followers rented our film SKWALHALLA we would be planning a LOT more fishing films. Right now that’s far, far from the case despite over 20K views of the trailer in the first week. And as you can read HERE, that film took us three years and was funded 100% out of our own pocket to try to give our fans something they’ve yet to see and get them stoked to set foot on the river with fly rod in hand.

The content landscape is quickly changing but without fan support our content delivery which includes lots of free content will be diminished. The market will dictate our actions and right now it’s shifting in ways difficult to predict. If you have comments, advice or input related to this or fishing films in general we’d love to hear from you. And again, thank you to those who have supported our projects, the Kickstarter and future films and projects!

–Zack Boughton

January 26, 2018/by Montana Wild

2017, Fly Fishing

Top 10 Bucknasty Brown Eats

Watch the Top 10 Bucknasty Brown eats from the original film.

Want to see more Bucknasty Brown trout eats? Support our Bucknasty Browns 2 film by clicking here: BUCKNASTY BROWNS II

We are 25% of the way to our goal and really would love your help! If you enjoy our films, now is the chance to lend a hand and bring this film to life. You can help with as little as $5 and you can pre-order the film for $10. Thank you to all who have supported the film so far and have a Happy New Year!

December 28, 2017/by Montana Wild

2017, fly fishing

SUMMER HYPE – Video Launch

Our latest fly fishing film, SUMMER HYPE showcases some epic salmonfly fishing, big fish, savage eats, and good times on the water. Shot by our most recent summer intern Bryant Patterson, this short film captured a few great days on the water. Pull up a seat, sit back and enjoy SUMMER HYPE!

Shop our hats used in the film, by clicking on the images below.

December 4, 2017/1 Comment/by Montana Wild

2017, Fly Fishing

Spring Fishing 2017

Another spring has almost flown by once again. In a few short weeks runoff will be here and our spring fishing window will be shut down and we will be back in the mountains chasing bears and turkeys. This spring we have gotten the privilege to wet a fly in eight different rivers here in Montana. Although the fishing wasn’t as good as previous springs we still were able to find a healthy number of nice trout and beautiful Montana views. Below are a few images from our spring travels around the state.