Summary

Zeke Hersh has been guiding for 27 years and is the head guide at the Trouts Fly Fishing shop in Frisco, Colorado. This conversation covers three things: the ladder fishing for tarpon he helped pioneer on the sandbars off Sarasota, how he actually fishes the Colorado River from a drift boat, and the deep dry-dropper rig he runs for most of the season instead of an indicator.

The through-line is that the Colorado is underrated and misunderstood. There are well over 100 miles of floatable trout water on it, most anglers crowd the upper stretches, and the river gets written off when it runs high or off-color. Zeke's argument is that success there comes from river memory, slowing down, and refining your presentation — not from constantly changing flies.

Takeaways

The Colorado is a misunderstood river. Its proximity to Denver and its habit of running off-color scare people away, and the crowds stay high — float farther down and you can have it to yourself.
Zone concentration beats food concentration. The fish aren't especially picky; if you get the fly where they are, they'll eat it. Refine your drift, your depth, and your water before you refine your fly box.
River memory is a float guide's single biggest asset. Note the little nooks when the water is low in September — at high water the river looks completely different, but the fish will be near those same spots.
Roughly half your fish come out of eddies: the back eddy along the bank, the eddy line coming off a point, or the swirl itself. On a hard day, that's where the day gets saved.
Dink and dunk. Fish a lot of small, specific spots rather than grinding one run, and push through low-percentage water to get to the next seam. Little spots nobody fishes hold fish that haven't seen your pattern.
Ferry angles are key — around 45 degrees across the current, never working against it. Learn to use the oars as a counterbalance crossing a heavy eddy line, and mind them so they don't catch and hurt you or flip the boat.
Use the power of the river with the oar rather than manhandling the boat. Rowing well and rowing for the drift are two different skills, and plenty of strong oarsmen have never learned the second one.
Streamers: skip the sinking line and run a 7-to-10-foot sinking leader to a tippet ring, then 0X or 2X. Hit the bank, three or four strips across the current line, then look for the next pocket.
The best dry fly fishing on the Colorado is a Blue Winged Olive hatch on a genuinely crappy day. Size 16s in early summer, smaller in fall. Fish a double dry — a size 12 Parachute Adams with the BWO 16 trailing — if you can't see the small one.
The deep dry-dropper, or "shallow water nymphing": a big chubby on 6-7 feet of 3X or 2X, 3-4 feet of dropper tag to a heavy Pat's Rubber Legs or big stone, then about 16 inches to a Prince Nymph, flashback, or San Juan Worm. Tie off the bend of the hook, heaviest fly first.
Lift slowly for the first couple of feet of every cast. A lot of eats come on that lift, and on the right day you can catch a fish on nearly every one.
Start two anglers on different point flies to find what's working, then match both rigs once it's clear. Shorten the dropper to two feet if you're snagging, or drop to a single fly.