Current Fishing Report

The Trinity river is fishing fair to good for steelhead.  We hooked a bunch of half-pounders but no adults on Monday while fishing with spey rods.  Today we nymphed the upper river and landed 3 nice adults and a really big brown trout.  It was one of the nicest browns I've seen in the net.  We are supposed to experience the storm of the decade starting this afternoon.  I expect the river to be blown out through Saturday and possibly beyond.  More wet weather comes in next Monday/Tuesday, but hopefully the river will be fishable by then.  Check back for more info.

Dave with an amazing brown trout

Craig made a lot of good drifts to get this fish

Dave with his biggest steelie of the day

I guided Jesse and Greg before the storm hit the north state.  We fished the Junction City area on Monday and caught several half-pounders and one very nice native steelhead.  We fished the upper river on Tuesday.  Both Jesse and Greg landed nice fish in addition to several more half-pounders.  The river is blown-out now - so check the flows before making the trip.

Randy Hamann shared US National Weather Service Eureka California's photo.4 mins ·

The recent rains have the Steelhead moving once again, fishing has been good for some and tough for others. Water temps remain in the fifties and my clients continue to land Steelhead on the swing! The river below Pigeon Point has been blown for much of this past week, the rest of the river has been a little high at times but the color has remained good.The forecast are calling for a significant storm coming in mid week, check the flows before you come, we should start to see the leed edge of the Trinity River Winter Run sometime over the next couple of weeks. 

The Trinity is still in good shape and fishing decent.  Dale had a great day yesterday, hooking 3 fish swinging, all very bright acrobatic steelhead.  Other days have been tough.  Fish will be moving around this weekend, so swinging flies is the best technique.   There aren't spectacular numbers of fish this year on the Trinity, but there are certainly enough around to make it worth the effort...especially if you are a true steelheader.   There was a mega storm predicted, but the river is still in great shape today.   Check the flows before you come up.

We have been receiving some much needed rain up here, albeit not as much as forecast. The river has bumped up a little and is in great shape, the fishing has been ok, there are fish around but not in great numbers. I think most of the summer/fall run has pushed on and we are waiting on the winter run to start showing. The water temps have been holding in the low 50s and the swing fishing has remained solid.

Today was a special day on the Trinity River. David swung up two fresh adults. His first ever West coast steelies. The first was a wild hen that acrobatically leaped and tail-walked all over the show. It was truly an epic battle. There are fresh fish starting to enter the system after the last push of rain we've had. It was a great day spey casting and we were rewarded for our perseverance and dedication to swing angling. Things are looking up on the Trin at the moment. 

Katie and I just spent the day with guide Ed Tamai on Oahu.  Conditions were tough with high winds and overcast, but we still got some shots.  I connected with a great fish - my first Hawaiian bone fish.  These are beautiful fish and they are big!  The sight-fishing opportunities are also much better than I had anticipated.  We did a little bit of blind-fishing, but only because of the marginal conditions.  With less wind and more sun you could sight fish all day.  Katie even had a shot at some tailing bonefish today. Ed was a fun and knowledgeable guide.  He says the best time of year is when the water is warmer, from April through October. 

You can now bid on Opening Day 2015 at Eagle Canyon.  Our eBay auction is live and will wrap up at 5pm on November 29th.  Opening Day is January 3rd and the fishing will be fantastic.  The winning bidder and their group of 8 anglers will be fishing for trout from 3 to 15 pounds that have never seen a fly before.  Bidding starts at $1000, our normal rate for a group of 8 anglers.  View the eBay auction page here.

The Trinity is blown out today below Junction City, which is good news unless you wanted to fish down below there today. The river really needed this rain event. Fishing will be absolutely superb next week as the river drops into shape, and sets up an excellent first week of December. I just opened up my calendar to work that first week.The upper river will still fish this weekend, but expect it to be insanely, mega crowded.

My clients Dan and Doug from the DVFF club both landed steelhead on their spey rods today.  We did a beautiful albeit wet float today and didn't see a single other angler or boat all day.  The river was on the rise a little today - hopefully the rain keeps coming!

Well the fishing over the last couple of days has picked up with the passing showers, the rain that we have received so far has done little to raise the flows in the Trinity but it seems to have raised the spirits of both the fish and fisherman. Fish are once again moving around and the fishing has picked up. Hopefully the weather patterns  have changed and this is just the beginning ! Here are a couple of picks from the last couple days.

9lb buck on the swing !

wild beauty

Fishing was better today on the Trinity.  We had the river mostly to ourselves and hooked several very nice steelhead.  Bill from Danville landed a great fish, one of the biggest so far this season.

Bill King with a big one

Fishing is good right now on the Trinity River but the catching is a little challenging.  If you are hooking 1-2 adult steelhead a day you are doing well, or maybe better than average.  The fish have settled into their runs and are tucked tightly against the boulders and logs.  Swinging flies has been particularly slow the last few days.  Fortunately there are still a bunch of half-pounders in the river that provide some action when the big fish can't be found. Three days of rain in the forecast starting tomorrow should help a great deal.  I have seen plenty of fish downriver and a spike in flows should get them moving again.  Next week could be pretty good if the river rises substantially. 

In less than a week, the Sac transformed from dirty brown to steelhead green and the visibility has improved significantly.  The action isn't as hot as it was in October, but my clients Lloyd and Lee had lots of hook-ups and landed several quality fish.  The fish are still crushing the egg!  There's no need to hold off on booking your trip any longer!  

We're back to hooking multiple adult steelhead each day, although just barely.  My clients Rob and Bill from San Mateo hooked 3 adult fish each in a two day trip, plus about a dozen half-pounders.  Crowds were very light today.  Steelhead are pretty spread out, but if you are persistent you can catch some very nice fish.

I just finished up a five-day stint on the Trinity River. Fishing has been up and down. My week started well with multiple hook-ups on adult fish each day and ended up pretty scratchy. Thankfully there are a lot of half-pounders in the river this year. They provide some action when the adults aren't around. The last two days I floated way downriver and while we didn't land any adult steelhead, I was encouraged by seeing good numbers of fish on my float today.  Hopefully they will be coming up into the Junction and Douglas City areas soon.

Jim always catches fish

Leslie Ajari and clients fishing a nice piece of water

My clients swinging a great run

The Sac looks like chocolate milk this morning.  There was zero visibility at the Posse Grounds and it was just as bad at Bonnyview.  I'll check again later this week, but for now I would not plan to fish the Lower Sac.

I had an epic day with Jason from Iowa, who is the first steelheader I have ever guided from Iowa. After 10 minutes of learning how to speycast, he hooked a giant wild hen. After another 20 minutes, he hooked a nice wild buck. It seemed too easy, so I had him skate a dryfly, and after another 20 minutes a steelhead crushed it...but alas, Jason violently ripped the fly out of its mouth....never to interrupt a steelhead trying to eat your skated dry fly. This of course will never happen if you don't skate dry flies, so Jason rules for his willingness to try. He hooked 5 overall yesterday. We saw only one other boat.Conditions are perfect for swinging flies on the Trinity right now. Good water temps and nice weather prevails. The River is extremely crowded in some places, and not crowded on others. Some stretches of river are void of fish, other stretches have decent numbers of fish. Rain would be nice.

Best Spey fisherman in Iowa

We had some good fishing on the Trinity today.  Aaron and son Zach from Pacifica both landed their first steelhead.  Big milestone.  There were a lot of half-pounders in the mix, too.  The weather was delightful.  Come up and give it a shot.

Aaron sealed the deal

Zach with one of his steelhead