HARTSEL - Everyone knew the bit of false spring beaming on South Park on Wednesday was a fib - just a dream in this long, fitful winter.

Of course, everyone turned out anyway. Judging by the wagons circled and glistening inside the corral parking lot, the Dream Stream can't keep a secret.

It's March, which means rainbow trout are bulging with eggs and brimming with energy. Big 'bows want to slip from under Eleven Mile Reservoir's aging ice and fin up the South Platte River in search of gravel spawning sites.

Any fly fisher not named Rip Van Winkle knows this. While trout stage under the ice and wait for higher flows to admit them past the inlet, anglers queue up along the meadow meanders as if each had taken a number.

On Wednesday, they discovered a few rainbow scouts had swum up.

"It hasn't started in here with any type of intensity," guide Pat Dorsey said after trekking down to the inlet and back to the corral with angler Dan Dolquist, of Highlands Ranch.

Problem is, water has been dribbling out of Spinney Mountain Dam at only about 60 cubic feet per second, not enough for a respectable spawn run and far from ideal.

"I like 125 cfs," said Dorsey, 43, who has labored to know the South Platte and its fish so intimately that his 2005 book, A Fly Fisher's Guide to the South Platte River, is considered one of the best books ever written about any river.

On Wednesday, other fishermen arriving from downstream smiled and shrugged. Nearly everyone agreed higher flows were needed to bring in the spawners. But hardly anyone complained with the springlike weather shift.

Dorsey elected to try upriver, in the middle reaches of the Dream Stream, which spawn-minded fishermen often overlook.

When few spawners are in the river, you can always count on resident fish, mostly cutbows, in the middle and upper stretches.

In the past few days, those residents have been feeding on midges. Most days, from late morning to about 2 p.m., tan midges have been hatching and skittering on the river's surface. Fish have been rising to them.

More consistently, though, they've been eating midge larvae, which can present some challenges.

Casting to the water seldom works when midges are drifting underwater and trout have taken up firm feeding stations. The trick is to drift an imitation right into a feeding fish's mouth.

Fortunately, Dream Stream fish aren't spooky. They see so many anglers, they probably think of them as cattle. Unfortunately, many of those fish have earned high educational degrees after being stung by hooks.

Dorsey positioned Dolquist over a nice fish he spotted feeding, but nobody else could see. The fish ignored them.

"You've got some micro-drag on your line," the guide said. Let out about 18 more inches of line. . . . That's it. Now hit! Hit!"

The result was one happy angler and one healthy 18-inch cutthroat trout swimming away a bit smarter after release.

The dumb ones are on their way.

dentryed@RockyMountainNews.com