Artistic view of a Male Pteronarcys californica (Pteronarcyidae) (Giant Salmonfly) Stonefly Adult from the Gallatin River in Montana

Salmonflies
Pteronarcys californica

The giant Salmonflies of the Western mountains are legendary for their proclivity to elicit consistent dry-fly action and ferocious strikes.

Stream photos

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Onocosmoecus (Great Late-Summer Sedge) Caddisfly Larva Onocosmoecus (Great Late-Summer Sedge) Caddisfly Larva

Lateral view of a Onocosmoecus (Limnephilidae) (Great Late-Summer Sedge) Caddisfly Larva from the Yakima River in Washington

This specimen keys pretty easily to Onocosmoecus, and it closely resembles a specimen from Alaska which caddis expert Dave Ruiter recognized as this genus. As with that specimen, the only species in the genus documented in this area is Onocosmoecus unicolor, but Dave suggested for that specimen that there might be multiple not-yet-distinguished species under the unicolor umbrella and it would be best to stick with the genus-level ID. I'm doing the same for this one.

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27" brown trout, my largest ever. It was the sub-dominant fish in its pool. After this, I hooked the bigger one, but I couldn't land it.

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Callibaetis ferrugineus (Speckled Dun) Mayfly Nymph Pictures

This nymph was one of a horde I could see cruising the still shallows of a cold tailwater, mixed in with an intense emergence of duns. It's one of four specimens I photographed together from the same hatch, also including a male dun, a female dun, and a male spinner.

This nymph keys to either Callibaetis ferrugineous or Callibaetis pallidus. The lack of a darkened preapical band on the femora would suggest pallidus, but I can't definitively make out the "single seta" on the outer, ventral apex of any of the tarsi, the length of which is supposedly a more reliable characteristic to tell the species spart. I can maybe make something out on one of the legs at the highest magnification, and its dimensions would suggest ferrugineous.