Fly Fishing the Foam Lines in Southern Chile

Southern Chile is a fly fisherman’s paradise. It is home to numerous huge rivers and lakes that abound with Trout and Salmon.

As prolific as the fisheries can be, the sheer size of the waterways can be intimidating to anglers from the US and Europe. Many rivers are for the most part unwadeable and hold heavy and powerful currents that make it very difficult to find the fish and present a fly that will entice a fish. Oftentimes these rivers and lakes hold less fish per mile than the rivers in the Western U.S. and hatches are generally sparse, putting a premium on fishing the highest percentage waters.

Trout are basically lazy animals and tend to concentrate in areas where food is easy to obtain with a minimal effort. They can’t afford to rise up through 6 feet of heavy current for a small mayfly as they would expend more calories getting to the food than they would obtain from eating it.

For the fly fisherman, it is important to identify the places in each waterway that hold the most catchable fish. In Northern Patagonia, this often means fishing the foam lines that exist in the river eddies and oftentimes in the lakes. Food concentrates in these foam lines and the fish can float around lazily with the gentle currents and eat with little to no effort. There they can find a variety of food including midges, mayflies, stoneflies, caddis and terrestrials. Many times I have found numerous rising fish in these foam lines when not a fish is rising outside of them.

On big rivers such as the Yelcho and the Futaleufu , anglers often use heavy sink tips and streamers to cover a large amount of water, which can be an effective technique. However, almost everywhere you can find an eddy with a foam line, you will find numerous trout sipping midges and whatever else they can find, and they do it all day long as the insects keep recirculating through the eddy and offer an easy meal. The observant angler can take advantage of this by carefully presenting small dry flies in the foam lines to these cruising fish and with a minimum of effort enjoy incredible fishing in small areas on these big rivers. If you ever see one of these foam lines, be patient and observe carefully and you will almost always find fish sipping gently and hovering just under the surface waiting for the next meal. Depending on the wind and the currents, these foam lines shift around, dissipate and grow again and the fish will follow them as they move around.

Oftentimes when we are float fishing one of these rivers I will have 2 rods set up, one with a sink tip and big streamer and the other with fine tippet and a small dry fly. When fishing from shore it can be very effective to wait for the foam lines to come within range. This can mean waiting patiently for the wind or currents to change favorably but once they do the waiting time pays for itself many times over. Anglers need to remember that the fish in these foam lines are at times very selective and even in these huge rivers it is often necessary to use 6X tippet and a #20 or smaller dry fly to fool them.

In Northern Patagonia , the lakes provide spectacular fishing at times, and as in the rivers, the fish will concentrate where the food is. Hot spots in these lakes can be difficult to identify and generally anglers concentrate on the reed beds where dragon and damsel flies hatch. These areas can be very productive as can be river and stream inlets, which are almost always a good bet. Foam lines can form where water enters these lakes from creeks and rivers and if you are lucky enough to find one of these, you may just wear your arm out catching fish. Additionally, on many occasions I have found a foam line in the middle of these lakes that was full of fish and I have enjoyed incredible dry fly fishing completely away from structure, reed beds or inlets in over 100 feet of water. Sometimes these mid-lake foam lines can cover a huge area and hold large numbers of big trout.

In short, when fly fishing in Patagonia, never bypass or ignore a foam line, you may just hook the trout of your life.

Lu Warner
Owner/Valle Bonito Lodge
Futaleufu, Chile
www.vallebonitochile.com