Tough start to the season

yesterday me and a few friends took a day trip to a small stream int he coast range for opening day,we ended up doing alot of hiking to scout out new water,it was brutal but we did find some cool new spots. The water was moving pretty fast still and the fish were not very willing but i managed to catch two pretty little cutties and i hooked two others that didn't stay hooked and also missed a few bites and one of my buddies  caught one fish and hooked another.  It was a rough trip for me. my hat cam failed witch ruined my short film,a drop of water  screwed up my only fish pic of the day i managed to take before said camera failure and i lost almost all of my nymphs and indicators somehow plus my tippet..also lost my net. despite all of the screw ups it was still a fun day hanging out and catching a few trout also watched a huge march brown hatch come off in several stretches. here are the very few pics i managed to take before the cam failure

Andrew trying to entice fish to bite his nymphs

andrew re-rigging

upstream view

failure of a fish pic

a new fly rod

Today in the mail i received a new combo, a 5wt rod, a 4/5 reel with a scientific angers gpx line, a tube and even an extra rod tip.. it is from the fly shop out of redding, ca and is their  signature line of gear.the reel is a ross reel stamped with their logo on it and has an excellent drag system, It does not stick when  the drag starts and stops  its very smooth witch is something i need when battling large trout in some of our larger water bodies. the rod is a 9ft 5wt 4pc rod, a dark forrest green blank with green/ black wraps and silver hardware and a dark wood reel seat.. the cork is high quality and feels perfect when casting. the rod loads perfect and shoots 50 +ft of line with ease and lays it out nice and soft..  could not have asked for a better setup

season ender?

friday and saturday marked the end of my season chasing lake dwelling cutthroat in the coast range. I went twice last week, once on friday with my friend noah out of kayaks and once on saturday with mmy friend brad out of the float tube. both were fun trips and  nobnody  was skunked either.  the first day noah caught 7 fish on bait and i caught 4, 1 on a soft hackle and 3 on dry flies. We even went up the mouth of the creek then shot down the current witch was a blast. Saturday we arrived early and fished a few hours before the civil war (ducks Vs beavers)   we both missed several fish throughout the trip but each managed a nice fish before leaving. ill put a picture up for now  to hold everyone over

14 inch dry fly cutthroat caught while casting to rising fish

some stillwater action




the reservoir

 



a landlocked coho salmon that fell for my micro sparkle leech

 



one of brads cutthroat he caught while gear fishing

  yesterday i came home from the lake, this time not frustrated and not skunked. It started out in the morning   at the gravel boat launch  and  it was the first time me and my buddy brad were going to float around the reservoir. I was using a float tube and him, a pontoon. We launched off   headed to the upper end of the reservoir and trolled alogn the way. i was trolling a heavily weighted black krystal bugger he used a different fly and his gear rod we trolled all the way there  only to have one bite .  we floated around i casting flies,him using his lures..for what seemed like  4 hours  without any hits action started heating up for brad. He caught and released several nice sized cutthroat  while i was still getting skunked, i started to get frustrated and decided to try something new. I tied on a thingamabobber strike indicator and set it a 7 ft.  then i tied on  a fly i came up with, a micro sparkle leech size  12. First cast within seconds i had a fish take my fly, i set the hook  and my line was tight...yes! i thought to ymself as the fish tugged and tried to escape.. i netted the fish  (approx 11 1/2 inches)  and realized it wasn't a trout, but a landlocked coho salmon  result of  outgoing offspring of trucked in adults from the creek that decided to call the reservoir their home and the creek above, their spawning grounds. Anyways, we got a picture  and i released the fish only to get a bite the very next cast, i had several bites that were  missed while brad was still catching a few on his spinning setup. after a while of taking a lunch break and re rigging with a smaller micro leech (size 14)  i casted to a rising fish and hooked up, this one slightly smaller then the other but still  put up a fight.  After that fish it died off  pretty quick and the time neared 3pm. we headed back to the ramp and called it a day, one without a skunk for me finally!  (i'm new to stillwater fly fishing)   it has a great day, now thta i partially have the fish figured out it hink i will have better luck saturday, but it's suppose to snow/rain up ther ein the hills so it will be tough!

out of internet

Sadly we have run out of internet for a while due to being behind, but i have been catching alot of fish lately. Yesterday the creek produced 13 fish including 2 13 inchers   pictured above. Sorry for the inconvenience  we will be back to regular weekly posts within a month or less

trophy resident coastal cutthroat on the fly

I woke up this morning  to go fly fishing,  got dressed, filled my backpack with snacks and tp  and waking myself up for the 2 mile walk along the creek ahead of me. I slipped on my waders,  made sure i had my fly box, tippet and everything else i need to get some fish then got in the car and was dropped off at my starting point. My original access point has been blocked due to  construction wich is kind of aggrivating  because  that means i had to get in the creek and wade down quite a ways to get to my original starting point.  i sat my backpack down and watched for a minute before casting observing  the water.  I took some line out,  waded in and starting casting.  Halfway through the drift my strike indicator stopped ,went underwater and took off. From that  point i set the hook  FISH ON!  I was excited to have hooked a fish on the first cast But it jumped and spit the hook. But i stayed possitive and  checked my leader and flies before casting again. I got nothing on the following cast but the one after that i got a very solid strike.  Stripped some line and lifted my tip up to set the hook and fish on!! The fish didn't jump but it stuck to the bottom like a 2 oz weight!   It took about 20-30 seconds for me to  get the fish off the bottom and from that point i proceeded to bank the fish and take a picture then release the fish it was around 8-9 inches. After catching that fish i decided to fish one of my favorite spots, although i had missed 3 strikes there last time and the water is alot lower now i figured i could  get one or two. I nymphed the seam and pocket of the spot and  had ntohing, not even a nibble so i decided to get my backpack and move downstream  to  the pocket stretches. I call it the pocket stretches because every other small stretch of water is fishable pocket water. There is a transition from slow almost non moving creek, to  faster pocket water with plenty of small seams,riffles and pools to fish.  The first spot i approach is a very deep swift water spot with depths up to 12 ft! so it is difficult to fly fish.  I resort to a method called "walking the dog" where i stand at the very top of the run, let some line out and drop my stuff letting it get a drag free drift  through the deep run then swinging at the end and repeat. This technique  got me one fish,around 11 or so inches from this spot and then it was time to move downstream. i fished numerous pockets with nothing to show  for a quarter mile of walking and fishing, So i moved downstream  to a spot i figured fish would be hiding during the low  summer flows.  A riffle that flows under some brush and timber  near an undercut bank. First cast and bam!  got a nice little scrapper and threw him back. From that point i was getting skunked and alot of the water i was fishing was very low. So i decided to pass up alot of spots and fish about a mile down creek at a spot that stays at a good steady flow year long. After arriving   even the spot  that should have been  higher was a bit low, but still fast,oxygenated  and had   2-3 ft of water so i  put my backpack down and dropped a line. Third cast i got a bite and hooked the fish, he jumped once and tried to wrap around a rock but i banked him, took a picture and back to the drink the little fella went!. After releasing that fish i  immediately casted again and got a very good bite. I set the hook and it felt like a snag the first second then it shook its head a took off downstream  and never looked back. I let it take line for a bit until my backing started to show and some small fast areas with big rocks perfect for breaking my line were about 20 yards below the fish. So i stripped some line in  to keep it tight and ran downstream to catch up with the fish. I fought it for about 3 more minutes in the same general stretch of water  and somehow managed to land this very very large resident coastal cutthroat trout. I took a couple of pictures of this beast and released him to fight another day then made my way back home to tell the tale of my big trout to everyone.

another day,another suprise

Went down to the town portion of my favorite stream to do some fly fishing, fshed below the city park  and caught 3 fish in the first few stretches of water and noticed other fisherman..  i have rarely seen anyone fishing here  so it was kind of a shocker but they seemed to be doing catch and release like me so that was good to see.   caught a few more fish and headed upriver  missing a few strikes here and there, had to replace a few flies because the teeth on the cutthroat tear flies apart fairly quick.  After heading up further i spotted 2 more fisherman,..now i know for sure my internet fishing reports on the website oregonfishingforum.com    have led to more fishing pressure in this stream, there were also 2 local highschoolers  down under a bridge with 2 little kids  trying to catch and keep..   i recognized them  so i went down to fish and chat, they only had one small fish on the stringer and were having trouble catching fish (they were using big spoons and spinners)  so i decided to cast, ended up outfishing them all with my rainbow prince nymph  i got from bigyflyco.com  this is by far my favorite nymph for indicator fishing, its a badass attractor pattern and has caught over 10 fish for me these past 2 days.    they begged for me to give them my fish  to eat but i refused and released them all, including the biggest fish of the day that took line and gave me a run for my money,      they kept pushing it upon me to give up the fish i was catching but i said no and keep releasing, eventually the bite died off in that one pocket since i had caught 4 fish there, so i  moved upstream  caught 1 more and called it a day and went to work i will be taking my dad down to the city park tomorrow and try to get him his first fish on a fly rod.

coast range river fly fishing

Fished a small coast range river for native cutthroat trout with a few of my friends today,   i had hit this same stream 2 days i a row before this one landing more then 3 fish each time on a dry (the weather was good)  but today it was a bit colder outside and fish were barely rising,  we fished dries for hours  with no success when my friend Dave says "this spot looks perfect for nymphing, i'm going to nymph". He tied on a very effective attractor pattern with a smaller dropper fly and casted. At the end of the drift on the first cast his indicator went under water and he set the ho fast and hard. The fish put up a hard fight for a short amount of time before i tailed it like a steelhead and handed it off to Dave so i could take a picture of it in his hands.  We Got a picture then released it,  as soon as that ended he tossed me the same 2 flies he used and   helped  guide me   with nymphing since i am a beginner at fly fishing,   i got the mend down and we  headed upstream to another deep spot perfect for heavy flies with extra weight and a long ass leader.  i casted, let it swing at the end and bam!! i set the hook and  the fish snapped me off, it was later discovered my surgeons knot was not tied very well. After  few more missed strikes we moved downriver to one last spot for the day, awesome looking water with a green color too it, perfect shelf at the drop off,  nice holding water. We fished there for quite a while with dave getting one missed fish, then he ties on a dry fly and heads to a more shallow pool,  fished it fora while and got a strike and missed it again!  action was starting to heat up at the warmest part of the day and it got exciting. I headed down below dave to a small run no deeper then 2 feet.  second cast i got a bite and missed it again.. these fish were catching us off guard!  i soon decided to go upstream to a nice nymphing slot i had my eye on,It gave me the feeling.  first 7 casts got nothing but stayed confident. then, at the end of my 8th cast at the middle of the drift my indicator went under and halfway across the stream before i stripped some line and lifted up to set the hook. My line was tight, fish on!!!! i yelled as Dave turns around to see my rod doubled over and a beautiful little cutthroat jumping,  as i got the fish in i saw he had taken my smaller bead head  rainbow prince nymph variation i was testing out and it had excellent results getting more then 3 bites on a small stretch of water. after getting a picture of the fish we released it  and  soon  headed upstream after rose hooked and lost 2 fish  in the spot me and Dave got nothing. First cast my indicator goes down hard! i set the hook, feel a head shake and gone!  do it again,  the aggressive fish goes for it again!! and i missed again.. little bastard was mouthing it not eating it! at least that's what i think.. anyways he took it again this time  really hard! i set the hook only to see a flash and a line without a double fly setup  come out of the water..  another failed surgeons knot.. AHH!!!  i tied on another flashy prince variation with flash wings instead of traditional white, and got hammered the first cast, miss it again..from there on out we had no more fish and called it a day. a great day   although we didn't catch alot of fish  fishing in general is a good day in my book. especially hen it's spent with friends. The picture on top is me and the second one is Dave with his beautiful native coastal cutthroat