Diamond Fork

[Fishin_Fool78]

Today was a bust at diamond fork. We tried 2 different stretches of the river. No hookups. Tried brown wooly and black leach. Maybe it gets fished hard or we were in the wrong spots?
[signature]

[_6x_]

When I moved to Utah I initially decided to make the Diamond Fork, rather than the Provo, my official "home water". I liked the feel of it and the emptiness of it. That lasted till the caddis hatch my first summer here. My finding was that the Diamond Fork was kind of a marginal fishery, but maybe I never gave it enough of a chance.
[signature]

[doggonefishin]

[quote Fishin_Fool78] Maybe it gets fished hard or we were in the wrong spots?[/quote]


It doesn't get fished all that hard but it is a different type of stream. Sometimes it is excellent and other times it can be real tough. It doesn't have a fish population count comparable to a place like the Provo but it can produce some bigger fish. Typical hatches don't seem to be as common, probably due to the silty bottom. The flies you were using sound like decent choices.

As it is close to my home, I fish there regularly and I maybe shouldn't admit on here that I do the very best with small gold or silver spinners and spinning gear.
[signature]

[Joe_Dizzy]

I've fished it a handful of times, so by no means an expert on the overall fishery, but having been on it this time of year... I believe the further up on the stream you are, the higher the fish density gets.

Also, the fish, and the insects they enjoy, really like the sun. I've been shut out in the "woodsy" shaded sections which gave way to terrific action on the wide open, well lit sections.

Standard dry dropper rigging is the way to go on a stream that size IMO... Stimulator w/ PT dropper should net you some fish. I often end up snipping off the dropper entirely as the browns and (especially) the cutts are quite receptive to dry's.
[signature]

[riverdog]

While Diamond Fork can be fickle it’s a tremendous stream. The only problem it rarely fishes well with dries. About a week late on the Salmonfly hatch now so until the fish key on hoppers in another 2 months forget about dries unless you want to catch a handful or less of trout under 14 inches at most. Don’t bother with streamers either for another 3 months. Fish a single large flashy weighted nymph. The flashiness helps as visibility is always 3 ft or less. It works well even with 12-18 inches of visibility. Even though you missed the Salmonfly hatch it’s important to understand their nymphs are in there all year as they have a 2 year lifecycle. A size 8 -10 tungsten beadhead Prince nymph is my go to fly all year except the few productive dry fly periods. It will also work as well as streamers prespawn with browns when the big trout are moving upstream in October. There is no question the trout feed better on nymphs on cloudy days in there. Hit a cloudy period midafternoon and it’s an absolute feeding frenzy and you’ll begin to understand it’s a very productive little stream of big trout. Admittedly I’d did occasionally get skunked for an hour or 2 and moved on to other waters. But far more common was to catch at least a dozen or two all over a foot and usually some in the 17-18 inch range. I’ve caught as many as 60 over a foot in 3 hours on cloudy days and in October I’ve caught up to 6 trout 20-27 inches in a single afternoon. If you must fish a dry and a dropper don’t even bother to show up here. If all else fails move on as while it’s more productive the the Provo per cfs there are a couple other streams even more productive nearby.
[signature]