Hebgen Lake

Hebgen Lake backs up the Madison River for about 15 miles just west of Yellowstone, at about 6,500 feet. It covers some 12,000 acres, with three long arms, the Madison, the South Fork and the Grayling, and the arms are where the fishing that made it famous happens. From July into September, on calm mornings, rainbows and browns cruise just under the surface and sip spent tricos and callibaetis duns, leaving the gulping rise forms that give the fish their name. Anglers wait in float tubes and small boats, then cast a single small dry ahead of a fish's path and hope it keeps coming.

It is wind-driven fishing: a flat calm until midmorning is the window, and once the breeze ripples the bays the gulpers stop showing. Outside the hatch, damsel and leech patterns on a slow-sinking line work along the weed edges of the arms, and fall brings bigger browns toward the Madison and South Fork inlets. NorthWestern Energy's dam draws the lake down through winter, and it freezes over most years. West Yellowstone's shops sit about 10 miles away.