The Northern California Fly Fishing Board

When I arrived in late January, the drought had all rivers low and gin clear. Then, in a complete turn around, the rains came 12 days later and blew out the coastals. I was able to fish the Russian for the first time, as that normally muddy river was low and clear. I heard it had been fishing well a few days before, but saw no fish hooked that day. I did have a humorous sea lion experience, though. With the steelhead often traveling along the shorelines, the sea lions create quite a commotion when chasing them in shallow water. The mammals displace a lot of water in the shallows, and with the water coming up and over their streamlined bodies, they create “domes” as large as the top half of a VW Beetle. The smaller domes in front of them are the fleeing steelhead. While fishing in the river, I heard a loud splashing behind me. I turned to see a sea lion closing in on a fish. For a moment it raised its head above water. I bellowed “HEY”, and it looked at me. Wagging my forefinger at the fish killer, I shouted, “You leave that fish alone!!” The critter stopped and looked at me. Ha! The steelie escaped. “You heard me, you leave that fish alone”, I scolded, wagging my finger again. He continued looking at me a moment longer, and then was gone.

Mission accomplished.

I normally fish four of five rivers in February, three of which have hatcheries. With the historical runs depleted, the additional hatchery fish make for a higher success rate, but this year the rivers did not readily give up their steel. I got killed on the American. Only one fish landed in 4 days. I tried a number of spots that I’d never fished, to no avail. There were few fish being landed. Runs that would normally be overrun with fisherman had only one or two guys fishing them. The Mad and Trinity were tough too. I caught a few on those rivers, but nothing like the past 7 years. On the positive side, I had a super time fishing with a number of friends, but we all would have liked to have landed more fish. Only Jay Clark (“littlehoover” on the NCFFB) had a decent day when he hooked 4 and landed 2 in one hour, while swinging on the Mad. (I was nymphing.) The next day we swung the river all day without a bump. Even the bait guys were complaining about the fishing there.

By the last 3 days of my trip, I’d decided to lower my standards and fish for trout on the Lower Sac and then, perhaps, try Baum Lake. I was bummed. I stopped in The Fly Shop in Redding before getting my hotel room and heard that with the past few days’ rains, fishing had picked up on the Trinity. I made a bee line for Weaverville. Fishing hard the next day, I landed 2 fish. Not bad. Then, nothing the next 2 days.



Bruce with a nice Norcal Steelhead