Current Fishing Report

I got to do something a little different today - guide the lower Feather River near Oroville.  This is a fishery that I used to guide quite a bit, but always in the fall for steelhead chasing salmon eggs.  The river also gets a spring run of half-pounders and adults.  We found quite a few today.  Most of our fish were 17-20 with one nice buck 21 or so.  Even the 14 inchers were feisty.  Feather River half-pounders look like silver bullets and fight really hard.  If you're looking for a trip over here let me know and I will get you set up with a good guide.  The season goes from early March through mid-May.

It was a long first week for me on the famed Olympic Peninsula in Washington.  Like most rivers on the West Coast, everything was blown up here.  Today we finally had fishable conditions, just barely.  Taking advantage of a day off, guide buddy Ryan Davie and I floated one of most beautiful steelhead rivers on the planet on a rare sunny day for the OP.  Ryan landed a stunning, gigantic wild hen in the last run we fished.  If you are only going to catch one, that is THE ONE! Conditions will be perfect for this upcoming weekend.  I have no available days up here at the moment.  I might open up some days at the end of March and possible April after I get back from British Columbia.  Contact me if you are interested in fishing for the biggest winter steelhead on Earth.

Ryan Davie with a an absolutely gigantic wild hen

The Lower Sac fished really well again today.  We fished up in Redding today and there were few other boats and lots of nice fish.  We boated a lot of 18-20 fish today on nymphs, and landed fish on dry flies up to 16.  If you're itching to fish, don't wait! The best hatch today was the PMD size 16.  The fish were keying on tan parachute mayflies on the surface and brown and black mayfly nymph patterns size 16-18. 

Thanks to the Peninsula Fly Fishers club who had an outing today at Eagle Canyon.  Here are some of the photos.

The Lower Sac fished very well for us today.  The nymph grab from the morning through about 3pm was about as good as it gets.  We had good dry fly fishing in the mid-afternoon, too.  There is a mixed hatch of caddisflies, PMDs, and callibaetis that peaks from 1 to 4pm.

I just finished up a two-day trip on the Trinity.  When I arrived Thursday morning the river was chocolate-colored at Steel Bridge due to the heavy rains overnight.  I took clients Ted & Alex to Lewiston Lake for the morning.  We found some rising fish right away and caught a few on nymphs and one on a small dry.  Most of them were 15 fatties.  Lewiston Lake fish always fight really well.  We left the lake at lunch and spent the afternoon floating the river.  By mid-day the river was already cleared up and in great shape.  Fishing was tough, but we got a nice brown on a nymph and we swung up a half-pounder on the spey rod. Today was better.  It was a beautiful, warm day.  Alex got one big grab on the spey rod, but the rest of our action was on nymphs and dries.  Ted got a great brown on a nymph and Alex went 2/3 on steelies.  We also rose a few nice browns on dries.  It was a really nice two days on the river.  There is really good variety this time of year, and hardly anybody around!  We had a great hatch of caddisflies and March browns today.  I even saw a green drake yesterday.

It has been an amazing year on the Southern Oregon Coast for the die hard winter steelhead anglers who have put in the time and commitment to the Big Game over the years.  We had so many amazing moments this year on the Coast...what an amazing place.  Conditions were still pretty good when I took off from there a few days ago.  I am now on the Olympic Peninsula, looking at blown out rivers...damn.  Thats the game though, and the rivers here needed some rain.  Conditions should be pretty epic here in a few days.  I have a full calendar here, but might open up a few days at the end of the month before I head to BC.  The game continues...

Bill Shaw from San Diego with a 15lb plus steelhead

Bill Shaw, again, with another all time, insane fish

Wolfman casting under the watchful eye of his best friend

yeah, just another swung up chrome fish a few miles from the ocean

Wolfman hooked up on a lifetime fish

Wolf's absolutely perfect winter specimen

Here are some more photos from the San Jose Fly Caster's trip to Eagle Canyon back on Jan 19-20.

Here are some photos from a very rainy and windy day today at Eagle Canyon.

The Trinity fished really well for us today.  My clients Axel and Luis both landed multiple fish.  We hooked about ten adult steelhead and several more half-pounders.  There is a good mix of fresh upstream fish, wild half-pounders, and beat-up downstream fish right now. There is very little fishing pressure right now. We have a big storm coming in - fishing should be really good after the flows spike and start dropping again. 

Gino forwarded these photos from his guide trip with client Ted today on the southern Oregon coast.  It's been a great season over there - be sure to book early for next year!

That's a big one...

Here are some photos of our guests today at Eagle Canyon.

I guided Joe and Ryan from Bakersfield on Saturday, the fishing was a little tough, could be that the fish just had there heads down or there weren't many fish about. We still managed to land a couple of nice Steelie's including a stout wild buck that Joe landed. The weather was beautiful and all had a good time ! (hard to beat a day on the river)The weather is supposed to change in a big way by mid-week, should help mix things up a bitt. 

Nice Buck !

The Lower Sac fished well for us today.  My clients Tom and Barry from Bakersfield caught fish on nymphs and dries.  Tom started the day off with a 20 rainbow on his 2nd cast.  The dry fly fishing wasn't red hot, but it was pretty good.  There is a mixed hatch of caddisflies and PMDs.  We also saw some callibaetis later in the day.  Barry landed a 16 rainbow on a dry.  We even hooked four fish side-drifting dries Montana style.  With the low flows we have right now, it's not a long trip up to the top for the fish.  When they're looking up, you can do fairly well blind fishing dries.

We hosted the Shasta/Trinity chapter of Project Healing Waters today at Eagle Canyon.  What a day!  We had perfect weather and the fishing was about as good as it gets outside of Opening Day.  There were 12 participants and everyone caught at least one fish.  One of them landed 15!  Hot flies included black leeches on an intermediate line and black and red midges sized 18-20 with a white bead under an indicator.  One of the participants landed a fish that was at least 15 pounds (check back for the photo).  This is one of our favorite groups and we look forward to seeing them again next year.

Steelheading was very good on the Trinity River today.  My client Wes was well into double-digit territory on hook-ups.  No downstreamers today - all of the fish we hooked were fresh wild fish from 3 to 6 pounds.  They were great fighters, too.  Eggs and golden stones did the job.  Fishing pressure is pretty light, too.

We fished the Steel Bridge area today and had the river mostly to ourselves.  The highlight of our day was the dry fly fishing from 1 to 3pm.  Wes from Mill Valley connected with six or seven browns and rainbows on march brown dry flies.  The hatch was really good and we found rising fish in several spots.  The steelhead fishing was fair - the fish we caught were pretty sorry-looking downstreamers.  Golden Stones and egg patterns are the ticket for nymphing right now.

Had a great day out on the Southern Oregon coastal rivers recently. We timed it perfect late last week and hooked some impressive Nickel Plated winter run Steelhead. But now the rivers have received to much rain and it looks like we have to wait until the river systems clear and drop. Keep your eyes on the weather forecast, once we dry out a little these rivers are going to go off!  

Here is a great photo from earlier today at Eagle Canyon.

Coastal winter steelheading is always an interesting game.  The timing of the weather which dictates angling opportunities plays a big role.  When I got to the Southern Oregon Coast in mid January, I saw my favorite familiar rivers at an all time low.  The smaller ones I love to fish were just too low due to the well known drought we've been having.  The larger rivers however, provided some unique opportunities for the spey angler.   Prior to the much needed rain we just received, we were able to wade and fish in areas that were not previously available to us in normal conditions, which provided some incredible angling opportunities.  Sure, there were days that we didn't connect...but there were days that we were having big time multiple hookups on dime bright winter fish.  We were swinging flies on light tips with summer style flies in the lovely coastal sunshine, with little angling pressure on beautiful swing water.  There were times where we could see pods of these fish blasting and rolling through the riffles and tailouts we were fishing, then having crushing hookups.  It was more like flats fishing for tailing fish than river fishing at times.  Thats all done now, sorry if you missed it.  The good news is that the drought is over, which is great for many reasons other than just fishing. More rain is expected on the coast for the next several days, and some rivers are already blown out at the moment.  Such is the complex game chasing winter coastal fish.  All you can do is dedicate some time every year, and hopefully you can nail it at some point.  Our clients that return every year eventually get paid in some of these amazing angling moments we've had over the years.  You need to book early to get a shot at this venue...

Scotty and Gino during a chaotic moment as fish were all around us

Coulter getting bent, mega

This fish actually had some color, but beautiful nontheless

Pete Notz's epic wild hen

Pete Notz in the Zone

Michael from LA int the battle of a lifetime

this is a mega winter fish

Michael with his 33 inch hen

Rock star rep Jamie Lyle with a beauty