I haven't posted for a while.  Streams were high most of the spring, summer;
and are Finally getting down where they fish good

went out last monday, march 11th.  Hickory creek was pretty near ice free; but the road parking hadn't been plowed (much), and the the trudge through the deep snow was exhausting. I fished for about 45 min in the late afternoon; but couldn't (didn't) get down to the water; cast from shore.  I didn't see any rises or even trouts swimming, had had no luck.  I worked my way up to the end of the Nursery run, and by where the big tree used to be at the top, i switched to a size 14 woolly bugger (black).  I cast it out next to the stump (where there used to be a deep hole), and on my 3rd cast hooked up on what seemed to be a holdover rainbow; but it broke the line.  So i was skunked.

Rain this week, so streams will be blown.  At least (hopefully) winter is over!

i went fishing at Bohemian creek at Ludwig park (by Protivin, near Spillville) last Thurs, i didn't stay long; but it only took me three casts to get a strike (and land the rainbow).   I didn't see any trouts rising during the 10 minutes i was there; but when i was there in late November i saw Many trouts rising (midges?  tiny BWOs?). 
I think that there are Way More holdover stocked rainbows there that you might think.  

went fishing at Hickory creek yesterday (12/13/2018) for first time this month
It looks like the Browns are off their redds, and are hungry as horses
Don't forget though; even though adults are off the redds, eggs (and then babies) will be in them through January.
So, if you don't remember where the Redds were made back in October, don't walk in the water, 'cause it will gett hard to see where the redds are now that the adults aren't keeping them clean. Fish from shore!

had good luck with my soft hackled pheasant tails (orange thread and wire, brass bead), and with small adams dries.
I saw quite a few fish (some large) rising to what i figured were midges, but i got 3 on the adams
Still quite a few rainbows in the water, they seemed fat (from eating eggs?) whereas the browns were all skinny

Just got back from fishing in Wyoming, on the Grey Reef and then up in the Big Horns.
They are having a hopper infestation, which means that those are the thing to use out there now.
Here's a pic of the North Tongue river up on US-14a, which is a cutthroat protected (catch and relase) area.

The stream work on Hickory creek is almost complete!
here is how it looks as of August 31, 2018

the fish seem to have adapted to it already, and they are feeding well.  They seem to like grass hoppers more than past summers (i'm assuming because of the extra sun), but this might be the fact that i'm Throwing more grasshoppers. 
The water has sped up, and is deeper; which means that the bottom is less silty (which should be Great for reproduction!); but the trouts don't seem to find it Too Fast (at least when it's not flooded). 
The bad news is: the construction equipment has made a lane, which makes the Whole lower stretch completely accessible to anyone walking up; this might be terrible, we'll have to see

yesterday , I went up to Patterson creek (which is up north of Waukon sort of on the way to Pine creek, if you were going to Pine creek from Waukon)

a couple of years ago, TU gave the state $28,000 to give to the landowner for a PERMINANT Easement on his property (which he was allowing access on already.  Then, the state did Quite a bit of stream enhancement (riprap, bank hides, etc)

I hadn't been up there for years, and wanted to check it out.

 The middle  stretch was full of very polite cattle, and the lower stretch had a guy and a girl fishing; so I went up from the second style, up to the east bridge. 

The pasture area didn't work for me (too sunny?), but once I got up to where the trees started, it was full of trouts.  I only landed 6 (2 browns & 2 bows on a quill Gordon, a brown & a bow on a pheasant tail), but I had countless strikes, including at least 10 on grasshoppers. 
There were trouts in the trees all the way up to the east bridge.  

It was a sunday, and I had about a mile (half mile?) totally to my self.
It was WAY better than it used to be, that's for sure.