Looking for Suggestions for Jigs for Yellowstone Trout

[shredmandan]

My wife and I are planning a trip in mid September this year to Yellowstone Park. I plan on fly fishing and my wife will be spin fishing. Looking to tie up some good jigs for trout in the rivers and looking for mold and pattern suggestions.

Dan

 

[LedHed]

Maybe a wooly bugger style on a minnow style lead head. Brown or black. Check out the tutorials...

Yellowstone trout sounds like a blast - good luck.

 

[Hawnjigs]

Agree with LedHed, dark natural buggy ties are a good foundation. I also find light color minnow ties useful especially in larger sizes.
1/32 #8 with a casting float
1/16 #6 on 4# mono
1/8 #4 or #2 for bigger fish in rivers, say 15"+. I like braid & heavy wire hooks for this application.

If you're fishing for lakers, well, thats a whole different ball game.

Haven't fished the park yet, but pretty sure Yellowstone is lead free. Its possible the rivers might be too choked with broken weeds to jig fish, in which case float-fly or hard wobbling crank like HD Trout MIGHT offer a marginal window. A single double hook on the tail works better for me than stock twin trebles on a crank. Or, theres always the lakes.

 

[jiggerjohn]

I've stopped using anything but the woolie jig (see page 2 of the fishing forum below on "vertical jigging master") or this pattern tied as a fly, and the boolie jig(same tail as the woolie) for trout everywhere. They've produced well over 1000 trout in extremely hard fished, big city public waters( Yellowstone should be a breeze!) during only a few weeks in mar/apr over the past two years. I use leadfree 1/14 oz HU heads from Hawn jigs and his roundhead 1/28 oz model.

 

[Hawnjigs]

SMDan, these alloys are a good start for lead free casting.

http://www.rotometals.com/product-p/leadfreebulletalloy.htm - can be heated to 325* for powder paint

http://www.rotometals.com/product-p/lowmeltingpoint281alloy1.htm - for unpainted heads

 

[shredmandan]

I've stopped using anything but the woolie jig (see page 2 of the fishing forum below on "vertical jigging master") or this pattern tied as a fly, and the boolie jig(same tail as the woolie) for trout everywhere. They've produced well over 1000 trout in extremely hard fished, big city public waters( Yellowstone should be a breeze!) during only a few weeks in mar/apr over the past two years. I use leadfree 1/14 oz HU heads from Hawn jigs and his roundhead 1/28 oz model.

Looked at Hawn Jigs site and don't see roundhead 1/28 oz or 1/14 oz HU jigs. Also not sure what an HU head jig is??

 

[Hawnjigs]

I consider forums as venues for discussion and sharing, not bizness promotion. As information relevant to this thread however, powder paintable trout jig heads including 1/24 are available in light wire Sickle and heavy wire versions.
http://leadfreejigheads.com/gpage14.html
http://leadfreejigheads.com/gpage13.html

JiggerJohn's preferred trouting "1/28" ball head is an unlisted 1/24 size version with #8 VMC hook. The HU head is an abbreviation for Hooksup which hook options are limited - I'd suggest ball heads (sorry, I don't make LedHeds suggested minnow heads) as having a more adequate trout specific selection.

What size line are you running on your spin/jig pole setup? For straight line connection without additional casting weight 1/24 and 1/16 size jigs are best served with 4# supple mono, and 1/8 size can handle OK on upsize 6# mono or braid, my favorite being 5# Power Pro. Is your wife's skill level adequate to handle possible trophy size trout on light line? Heck, I've been jig fishing for over 50 years and have lost trout fairly recently to breakoffs on 4#. Boosting casting weight to 1/4 oz heavy metal like Kastmasters and inline spinners can beef you gear into the 8-10# test range.

 

[Bucko]

Thus is a jig I tie a lot for trout here.

 

[shredmandan]

Thus is a jig I tie a lot for trout here.

Looks nice - is it possible to get some details??

 

[Bucko]

Sure. Is as follows...
Head = 1/32 ounce head painted withbrown 1/3 of red yellow and black mixture of harbour freight powder paints.
Tail = pheasant tippets
Body = Amber colored bodi stretch from Sierra flyfishing, synthetic dubbing (will have to check on the brand/color), and black hackle wrapped on the neck.

Other colors work too. Have fun tying this. I have caught many species of fish I this little jig. Post some pics of this if youdo tie some!

 

[deathb4disco]

I would mimic some popular trout streamers, like Kelly Galloup's Zoo Cougar and Sex Dungeon.