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Good Yesterday I had the opportunity to get a day of fishing in on the Smith River with fellow angler and friend Colton Schwenning. It's been a wild winter season to put it mildly. We've had an unprecendented amount of rain, leaving most coastal rivers completely blown out for weeks on end. The Smith, which can rise and drop within a 24 hour cycle, has become our saving grace for a chance to swing up the much coveted winter run steelhead. Yet that is no easy propostition, especially on the Smith. The river is notoriously challenging to fish. It guards its secrets well, and I'm not just talking about the fish. Half of the battle on this system is finding the right water for swinging flies. The Smith is an incredibly deep river and has some extreme hydrology. Having an assortment of heavy sinking tips to really get that fly down to where the fish are is paramount to success. What do I mean by heavy tips? I like 13.5 ft of T-17 for most of the runs I'll cover in a given day, but I've gone up to 15ft for when I really want to dig em out! Back to the other day. Bad weather was imminent. We could see the storm churning off the coast as we descended into Crescent City. We fished the lower river first, both hoping that after the recent rise and drop we might intercept a fresh push of fish coming out of the estuary. After an hour we decided to save ourselves the hassle of jockying for good water on the lower river and go above where the guide boats can access the river. The rain started coming down heavy and the temperature was falling rapidly, but the river was in perfect shape. It had fallen just below 12 feet at the Jedediah Smith park gauge and was holding color beautifully. Nothing can raise the spirits of a weary steelhead angler like the emerald glow of this river. We fished our way up the middle fork and lucked out on scoring a few choice runs to ourselves. Suddenly the rain turned to snow. It came down in big fluffy flakes through the canyon and soon it was hard to make out the ridgelines. We fished until our hands were frozen and we were soaked through and through. It had been a good day. You don't always find them, but it's the pursuit and anticipation that make this sport so special. It can take you to places that you would never find yourself in otherwise. Always in the back of your mind is the memory of the last time one grabbed and the hopes that some day you will find that big scary fish to remember for a lifetime. I have open dates through March for guided steelhead trips on the coast. There is still lots of great fishing ahead!  Colton firing another cast to the far bank on the Smith River.  Braving the elements. Steelheading in winter is like working for the postal service. Rain or shine.  A perfect Smith River hen. Fish like this are what its all about.  Snow day on the Smith. |
Okay Conditions were chilly and breezy for the Cal-Shingle group last Friday. The fish just weren't into it until things started to thaw out a bit. After lunch the grab turned on and several nice fish were brought to the net. We're starting to see hatches of March Browns (size 14ish). Coaxing a monster rainbow to hit your dry fly is an absolute blast! |
Good Tom April forwarded this photo of his guest LB's big fish today. Lots' of LBs on that fish! |
We have just set our dates for Spey Camp 2017 on the Lower Klamath River. We are expanding our offerings to include shorter 2-night camps as well as our signature 4-day, 3-night camps. The 2-night camps are scheduled for Friday/Saturday/Sundays with arrival mid-day on Friday and mid-day on Sunday. The price for the "weekend" spey camps is $1495 vs $1795 for the regular 3-night camps. Each camp is limited to 6 anglers. We will add additional dates if these first four scheduled camps fill up.Camp #1: July 21-23, 2017 - 2 nights: $1,495 (Fri-Sat-Sun)Camp #2: July 26-29, 2017 - 3 nights: $1,795Camp #3: August 4-6, 2017 - 2 nights: $1,495 (Fri-Sat-Sun)Camp #4: August 9-12, 2017 - 3 nights: $1,795For more information, visit www.SpeyCamp.com! |
Here are some photos of the Sundial Bridge today. Releases from Keswick Dam into the Lower Sac reached 79,000cfs the last few days. To keep things in perspective, typical mid-winter flows are under 5,000cfs and our summer flows are aroun 15,000cfs in a wet year! It was amazing to see the river rushing through the trees for 50 yards on either side of the main channel.No one is really sure when the Sac will be fishable again. It's looking iffy at best through mid-March. If the rains stop soon we could possibly see a high yet fishable flow in a few weeks. The big question is will the river clear up enough to fish even when it drops. Stay tuned! |
One of our guests is looking for a fishing buddy to split a Trinity River steelhead trip on February 28th. This would be a nymph/indicator trip with Brian Kohlman. The rate to join this trip would be $237.50. The trip includes all gear, flies, lunch, and shuttle. |
Good Beautiful sunny weather at Eagle Canyon this weekend. Fishing was a bit technical at times, but wasn't anything whiskey and some patience couldn't help overcome! Small rubber legs & emergers was the hot ticket this weekend.  Armand with a monster!  Father+sons posing w a nice one! |
Good The water is as dirty as I've ever seen it at Eagle Canyon right now, but somehow the fish can still see the flies! There is about half a foot of visibility right now, but with clear spring water coming in, I think we'll have a couple feet of visibility by tomorrow. Our guests today hooked good numbers of fish on brown rubberlegs size 8, egg-sucking leeches size 4, and flashback PTs and copper johns size 14. Action was slow in the morning but really picked up around 10:30am. The scenery is amazing now that the sun has finally come out for a few days. |
Gino just had a couple of prime dates open up next week on the southern Oregon Coast. He now has Thursday and Friday February 16/17 available. The rivers are dropping into shape and fishing should be good. These are Gino's only dates left open in February. |
Good We hosted the Oakland Casting Club today at Eagle Canyon. We had a great group of guys that ran the gamut from total beginners to competition casters. Everyone hooked into fish and had a good time. Glen (see photo) said "Our group had a fantastic time. Thank you for your hospitality." Andy told us "there were lots of hook-ups and huge rainbows to hand through-out the day. A #10 chartreuse bunny leech produced incredibly well in the last hour of the evening." Glad to hear it and we hope to have your group back again soon!  Glen caught this one on a size 20 midge! |
Good Randy and I spent the last couple of days guiding guests John, Barrett & Dean. We had the river to ourselves most of the time and enjoyed some better-than-expected weather. Everyone landed adult fish and Dean hooked one that was one of the biggest Trinity fish we've ever seen! We're catching fresh winter-run fish right now with just an occasional downstreamer in the mix. The river was starting to color up a little bit this afternoon - stay tuned for current river conditions.  John with a nice one  Dean at the end of day one |
Okay The Trinity continues to fish fairly consistantly for Winter Run Steelhead, most of the fish that I have encountered over the past week and a half have been in the 3-8 lb class, a mix of wild and hatchery with the vast majotity being wild. Some days we hook 4-6 somedays we get spanked, been averaging about one fish per angler per day. which I think is to be expected when fishing for Winter Steelhead. The Great news is that a fair number of fish that have been landed lately by my clients have come on the Swing !Tight Lines ! |
Great Last week was superb... |
Okay The fish aren't jumping into the boat right now, but there are fish to be caught on the Trinity River. I spent the last two days with clients Dan and Pete. We solved most of the worlds problems and managed to land three nice adult fish while we were at it. We also landed a nice brown and a rainbow. The best fish was Pete's 8# hatchery fish this morning. The river is in great shape, albeit pretty high down around Junction City. Traffic is a little heavy on the upper floats. The water clarity is excellent - almost too clear. Snowmelt runoff is pouring in from every tiny creek and the scenery is amazing right now.  Masked Man Pete  Dan |
Good We hosted the Shasta-Trinity chapter of Project Healing Waters today at Eagle Canyon. Here are some photos! |
We just had a cancellation at Eagle Canyon for early February. We now have openings on February 6, 7, 8 and 9 for groups of 2 to 8 anglers. These are our last wide-open dates available this season. |
Good Here is a photo from Peter Santley's trip with guest George today. They landed a couple of adult steelhead today. |
Good Fishing report from our guest Dave:Our party of 3, Cicely, Robin and Dave had a fun day with decent conditions, water clarity was OK in spite of recent storms. There were periods of dead calm where it was super tough to get bit. As usual fish got more active when wind picked up.We hooked a lot more fish than we landed with some epic fights ending in defeat. Dave managed to land this chunky monkey 12 pounder.  Cicely  Dave again  Dave's big fish of the day |
Good Katie and I just got back from the Sacramento ISE Show. Thanks to all of you who stopped by to say hello! We're down to just a few openings left for the 2017 season.Openings for groups of 2-8 Anglers:Feb 9Openings for 1-2 Anglers:Jan 31Feb 2, 17Mar 27Apr 10-11 Here are a couple of photos from last Wednesday at Eagle Canyon.  Marc from Sacramento  Rain or shine! |
Good Fished the Trinity for 3 days with two different sets of clients. Fished from Steelbridge to Pigeon Point. Averaged about 3 hookups per day with most guides reporting similar numbers. We lost several large fish over those three days, but the pursuit was a lot of fun. The fish are in and they're selective. River was blowing out even above Weaver Creek on Wednesday, 1/18. If you're fishing the Trinity tomorrow (1/19), may the force be with you.... |
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