Made it to the lower Stan last Saturday morning, found water at about 230cfs, clear, and many cooperative fish, almost all of them came on a 20-22 midge pattern.  I started with a size 18, got a couple and suspected I wasn't small enough.  Sizing down made a huge difference.  I used a beadhead attractor on the upper fly to help as a sinker, plus added a small shot as necessary.  Nothing hit the copper johns.  Caught mostly trout 5" to 16" but also ran across some small 6" salmon that were clustered below a plunge.  Saw an adult salmon or steelhead, not sure which but it was clean, no splotches and looked very healthy and very big.

Smaller fish were caught under a small foam indicator, bigger fish caught high sticking when I wanted to make sure I was on the bottom of a hole.  Action slowed down mid day, but there were a lot of fish sipping some kind of emerger mid day, I didn't figure out what it was but suspect may have been a midge, looked like they were sipping them from the surface film or just below it.  I was off the water by mid afternoon after doing a little scouting.

Lost 1 very nice fish @ 4-5 lbs when the tiny hook pulled out and the rod tension launched my fly rig into the trees, hopelessly out of reach.  I was using a 4wt 9' Sage LL that  I picked up used, this rod was perfect for these conditions.  I'm sold on the slower action rods, I've had far fewer breakoffs and I attribute that to the rod providing better protection for the tippet. I was using 7.5' 5x tippet, fish were not leader shy at all.

windknots wrote:

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Made it to the lower Stan last Saturday morning, found water at about 230cfs, clear, and many cooperative fish, almost all of them came on a 20-22 midge pattern.  I started with a size 18, got a couple and suspected I wasn't small enough.  Sizing down made a huge difference.  I used a beadhead attractor on the upper fly to help as a sinker, plus added a small shot as necessary.  Nothing hit the copper johns.  Caught mostly trout 5" to 16" but also ran across some small 6" salmon that were clustered below a plunge.  Saw an adult salmon or steelhead, not sure which but it was clean, no splotches and looked very healthy and very big.

Smaller fish were caught under a small foam indicator, bigger fish caught high sticking when I wanted to make sure I was on the bottom of a hole.  Action slowed down mid day, but there were a lot of fish sipping some kind of emerger mid day, I didn't figure out what it was but suspect may have been a midge, looked like they were sipping them from the surface film or just below it.  I was off the water by mid afternoon after doing a little scouting.

Lost 1 very nice fish @ 4-5 lbs when the tiny hook pulled out and the rod tension launched my fly rig into the trees, hopelessly out of reach.  I was using a 4wt 9' Sage LL that  I picked up used, this rod was perfect for these conditions.  I'm sold on the slower action rods, I've had far fewer breakoffs and I attribute that to the rod providing better protection for the tippet. I was using 7.5' 5x tippet, fish were not leader shy at all.

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 Without revealing your secret spots, where on the Lower Stan is good right now.  Thinking about heading that direction next week, but I've never fished that water before.