St. Vrain Angler

San Juan River

             River: San Juan River begins near Pagosa Springs and is private until it reaches Pagosa Springs. There is one mile of public water in town on which there is quite a bit of stream improvement work. Special regulations on this section of the river are in effect. Below town the river is again private and then enters Navajo Reservoir on the Colorado-New Mexico border.

 Fish: A mix of rainbow, brown, cutthroat and brookies are here. In town, you have a good chance for a brown up to 20 inches. Average fish will be 10-14 inches in length.

            Bugs: good populations of stoneflies, caddis and mayflies. The stone flies begin hatching during runoff making the hatch unfishable in many years. Caddis are hatching all summer. PMD’s hatch in late July and BWO’s hatch in September/October.

            Flies: For dries, the fish aren’t very selective, so standard attractor and cadis patterns work well. Terrestrials are very good through the summer into fall. For nymphs, try all sorts of small stonefly and caddis fly patterns.

            Techniques: there are some deep pools that require deep nymphing to get to the larger fish. Otherwise, typical dry fly or nymphing techniques work great.

            Seasons: begin fishing in late April but runoff soon comes; best fishing is July through September.

            Rating: Good

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