Current Fishing Report

I guided the Grunbaum family over the last few days and even though the temps were in the 20s and 30s the fishing has held up. We hooked and landed Steelhead everyday, mostly nice bright winter run 4-6 lbs.and an occasional Fall fish in full spawning color. There is still plenty of time to book a trip for this season. If the season so far is any indication, I anticipate that we will have a good number of Steelhead in the system through early March as well as the occasional Brown.

Here is an Eagle Canyon fishing report from our host Cory Drenon:Fishing has been good.  On clearer days, early and late have been the most productive when the sun is off of the water.  Various leech type patterns in sizes 10 and 8 have been working well.  When the fish get a little picky, small dark midge patterns have been the ticket trailed behing a larger mayfly or chironomid pattern on a very slow retrieve.  Just before dark, small flashy mayfly patterns such as the BLM nymph or lightning bug have been really effective.  Overall, the small 18-22 midge patterns seem to produce the most consistent hook-ups throughout the day.

Check out Dax's new video promo for our Winter Steelhead program:http://youtu.be/5zCa1q1HSrw

Gino says that conditions are lining up for a great couple of weeks on the southern Oregon coast.  Here is a photo from Gino's trip two days ago.  Try to get up there soon if you can!  Gino has Jan 13-15 and 21-27 open.

The Trinity River has been challenging the last few days but it's producing some great fish.  Check out Jack from Woodland with his best fish of the day!  The water is crystal clear and very cold.  I had my first skunk since early October on Saturday, but then we hooked three on Sunday and six on Monday.  We've spent a lot of time swinging flies, but the fish have been coming on nymphs under indicators.  There are a lot of bright wild fish in the lower part of the river.  Up around Lewiston and Douglas City a lot of the fish are hanging out in frog water and not in the prime riffles and runs as much.  There are already quite a few downstream fish that have already spawned.  We could use a weather system to get the fish to move around again.

Jack with a great buck steelhead

Abby got the party started with a sucker

Dave with a wild one

I fished the Trinity with Bob & Paul from Sacramento today.  The river was crowded, but there are plenty of fish and we managed to hook a few.  Paul had never been steelheading and he managed to hook two very nice fish.  One was on the swing with a 5wt spey rod and the other was on a nymph under an indicator.  Bob sealed the deal on a very nice buck that ate a size 18 micro mayfly.  We had ice in the guides for an hour or two in the morning, but it turned out to be a really nice day.

Bob with a nice steelhead

Lanny & Ken from the Sacramento area fished Eagle Canyon today.  Here are some pix!

The winter steelhead season has arrived!  Flows are dropping into perfect shape as I write this report, but alas...I am still back East visting family for the holidays.  I will be on the Coast right after Notre Dame beats Alabama in the National Championship game, and be chasing chrome until the first week of March.  Timing is everything, but bookings are limited...you have to pull the trigger if you want to lock in a guide opportunity.  I have some windows left in my calendar at the moment, but expect them to fill in in the next few weeks. The coastal rivers of Southern Oregon and Northern California offer the ultimate challenge for true steelheaders.  Come up and fish the Chetco, Lower Rogue, Smith, and the intimate smaller beautiful rivers that we explore on the Coast.  Learn about what conditions to look for and how to predict them, specific riggings to use during all conditions, and the best on water speycasting instruction in the region.  We have a stack of Sage spey rods, Rio lines, every tip imaginable, and our custom tied flies ready for our clients to use.  We use rafts, jet boats, trucks, and our hiking legs to access the rainforest lined rivers of this magnificent coast. On behalf of the Confluence team, I wish all of our dedicated followers the best of all that life has to offer in 2013! 

I had a great day on the Trinity today with Jay and Devin from southern California.  We floated the Junction City area.  There is a lot of snow around, even down there.  It makes for a very scenic float, especially on a bright sunny day like today.  The fishing was very good today.  Jay and Devin caught 4 adult fish apiece, all but one of them bright, fresh wild fish.  These fish were in great condition and fought very hard.  The brown rubberlegs was the fly of the day.

Devin with a wild buck steelhead

Jay with another wild fish

The brown rubberlegs was the ticket today

Katie & I will be hosting a trip to the Bow River in Alberta this September.  The Bow River is near Calgary and is famous for big rainbows and browns.  I have fished the Bow in early September in the past and had fantastic fishing.  It is typical to do a variety of dry fly, streamer, and nymph fishing throughout the day.  20+ inch wild trout are common on the Bow.  The dates for the trip are Sept 5-9, 2013.  We will be staying at North Bow Lodge, a comfortable fly fishing lodge right on the Bow River.  We will have four nights of meals & lodging and three days of guided fishing.  The price is $1695 per person excluding airfare to Calgary.

I stopped by Eagle Canyon this morning.  The lakes are still off color due to the big storm that ended yesterday.  There is about 18 of visibility.  Despite the poor visibility, it only took me about 5 casts to hook and land a nice fish.  The lakes actually fish better when they're not crystal clear.  2-3 feet of visibility is about perfect.  Just clear enough for the fish to see the fly easily, but not clear enough for the fish to feed heavily on natural insects.  With murky water, be sure to try bright colored flies like the one in the photo. 

Bright flies work well when the water is off color

If you're like me, you probably have some older spey rods in your arsenal.  Sometimes it's difficult to find a recommend line match for these discontinued models.  I've often wondered what type of Scandi line to get for my Sage European model 6126, or what type of Skagit Flight head is recommended for my Sage Traditional 8136.  Fortunately, I located a PDF on the RIO website that has line matches for a lot of these older rods.To view the PDF, go to our www.SpeyRivers.com website, then to the Gear page.The PDF lists rods made by Bruce & Walker, Cabelas, Daiwa, Echo, Elk Horn, Fly Logic, Gary Anderson, Hardy, Loomis, Loop, Orvis, Rainshadow, Redington, St. Croix, Sage, Scott, Thomas & Thomas, and Winston. It shows current line recommendations for all the older Sage rods like the VPS, Fli, VT2, European, TCR, Traditional, and Z-Axis.

Eagle Canyon is the perfect place for private groups!  We have hosted corporate groups, family groups, and many fly fishing clubs.  Many of our guests have found that a trip to Eagle Canyon is a great way to reward their business clients with an exciting fishing adventure.  We have special rates for groups of up to 8 anglers who would like to reserve Eagle Canyon for their own exclusive use.  In addition to fishing for trophy rainbows that average 7 pounds, we can arrange for a delicious catered BBQ lunch, equipment rental, and fishing guides to assist your group.  Please download our Private Groups information sheet for more details!

I guided Brady from San Francisco on Tues., Brady has embraced the Spey rod and in a few short years has become quite proficient. We swung up three nice wild winter Steelhead in the 4-5 lb range. The big rain event we had a couple weeks back moved most if not all of the Fall run into the upper river and / or their individual tributaries. The up side is that it sucked up a batch of bright wild winter fish !The fishing remains solid on the Trinity and even with the cold water temps FRESH WILD WINTER STEELHEAD will still move to grab a swung fly.The next storm system coming in this Thurs night through the weekend has the potential to put quite a bit snow on the ground and could impact travel and access to the river so be sure to call ahead !

I actually got to wet a line myself today at Eagle Canyon.  I arrived at 8:30am and fish were visible feeding on or near the surface.  Rarely would a minute go by when I didn't see a fish roll.  I started out with a brown rubberlegs size 8 and a size 16 pheasant tail under an indicator.  This rig usually does the trick.  I spaced the first fly 2 feet under the indicator and the 2nd fly two feet below the first fly.  I made about 4 casts, leaving each one out for about 2 minutes.  No luck.  I switched the bottom fly to a chartreuse sucker spawn, which is for unknown reasons one of the best flies at the lakes.  Again, no interest. Since fish were visibly feeding near the surface, I took a different approach.  I tied on a size 18 pheasant tail with no bead and no flash to a long 5X leader.  I put floatant on the leader all the way to the fly to keep the fly up near the surface.  This is called greasing the leader.  I made one long cast and did a retrieve as slow as I could stand it.  30 seconds later I had a fish on, a nice 5# rainbow.  I landed the fish and pulled my size 18 pheasant tail out of its jaw. Here are a few pointers and observations that pertain to fishing Eagle Canyon, especially on a cold mid-winter day: #1: Change flies and techniques frequently.  Take my experience today.  It took me 15 minutes, two fly changes, and one change in technique to hook a fish.  There are a lot of fish in the lakes.  If you try something for ten minutes and it doesn't work, try something else.  In ten minutes you can be sure that one or more fish has seen your offering.  Change flies and/or techniques.  If you see fish feeding near the surface, make sure your fly is near the surface.  If they're not feeding near the surface, get your fly deeper.  Try big flies, small flies, wacky flies, flies with beads, flies without beads, flashy flies, drab flies, you get the idea? #2: The fish at Eagle Canyon are not stupid.  Believe me, if we could make them be stupid all the time, we would.  On Opening Day and throughout Opening Week the fish are pretty easy to fool, but they adapt quickly to their environment.  They learn from getting hooked.  Early in the season they fall victim to lots of big flies and fast retrieves.  The fish learn to avoid large flies that are moving fast.  They also learn about tippet.  Early in the season you can fool fish with 2X tippet.  By now we are one month into the season and the fish are smarter.  It is often necessary to use 4X and 5X tippet, especially when fishing small flies.   #3: You can expect different behavior from these fish at different times of year.  Mid-winter, the water temperatures are colder.  The insects available to the fish are smaller and less active.  You may need to try smaller flies (size 16-20) and fish them on a very slow retrieve or under an indicator.  In November and again in late February through mid-April, temparatures can be warmer.  The fish are more active this time of year and so are the bugs.  When the water is warmer you will see more fish cruising and rolling since they are feeding more actively and aggressively.  They also venture into the shallow water more when the lakes are warmer.  Today, by contrast, it almost snowed on us.  The water was cold, but fish were still midging and could be caught using the right fly and technique. #4: We don't feed the fish in the lakes.  Since we don't feed the fish, it's a safe bet that the fish are ALWAYS feeding on something.  It's up to you to figure out what it is.  The fish in the lakes feed on natural insects and other critters like pollywogs, leeches, snails, and baitfish.  That means you need to match the hatch.  Sometimes these fish will eat wacky flies like purple woolly buggers or chartreuse egg patterns, but more often it is necessary to fish something that imitates a food source that is currently available.   #5: We can't gaurantee success.  We can gaurantee that the fish are in the lakes, that the fish have been properly rested before you arrive, and the rest is up to you.  Just like fishing any other destination, there will be days when you solve the puzzle and catch fish, and there will be days when the fish get the upper hand.  On a cold winter day, hopefully these pointers will help you to solve the puzzle.    

We tried the Douglas City area today.  It was a beautiful sunny day and there were no crowds.  We found adult fish in three spots and hooked five, although 3 of the encounters were pretty brief.  Steve and Roger both landed nice fish, though.

Steve's big buck

Mike and Martin made a lot of really good drifts today and they finally paid off in the last hour of the day.  Mike got things going at 4pm by landing a 28 hen.  He and Martin then landed another adult fish apiece before it got dark.  We fished in the Junction City area.  The water is crystal clear and the fish are spread out.

Mike with a nice fish

I guided Greg and Greg today, both from Sebastopol.  They both landed a couple of nice steelhead, plus some trout.  We caught fish on all types of nymphs, from size 18 baetis nymphs to size 6 rubberlegs.  Greg J landed a nice steelhead on a streamer fished on a sinking line.  It was a productive day.

Greg J

Greg G

Greg J with a nice brown

I fished the Lewiston area today with Dave and Van.  Dave hogged all the fish, landing 4 nice adult steelhead.

The Trinity is a beautiful place to be right now if you are a steelhead angler, no matter how you like to fish. The middle and lower river are still a bit high, but you can still find places to stand and swing to fresh steelhead making their way up river. The river color is a beautiful steelhead green...magnificent. It's only going to get better this coming week as the fish get settled into holding water. Be prepared for crowds, the Trinity is one of the most popular steelhead rivers in the states. However, everyone gets along quite well for how busy it is. Take what the river gives and respect other anglers and its all good.