It’s about time. A good six inches of snow — and some seriously high winds — fell upon Trout Underground World Headquarters yesterday (Sunday), though if you lived farther down the Upper Sacramento River canyon it was raining instead of snowing.
A half-foot of snow and gusts to 35 mph made it a good day to stay inside.
Right now (Monday), it’s raining again, which means a lot of formerly white, fluffy snow is going to melt and run into the river. The long and short of it?
If you were planning to fish the Upper Sac this week, keep an eye on the flows. They could hit the “I’m just out here for the casting practice” levels in a hurry.
The Winter Game on the Upper Sacramento
To a fly fisherman (namely myself), the first big snowstorm also marks the transition from fall fishing to winter fishing, and the difference isn’t as subtle as you’d think.
While the big October Caddis dry might still draw strikes, the dry fly game from now focuses almost exclusively on the BWO hatches.
That’s not to say you can’t score heavy fishing summer-sized patterns; during the Upper Sac’s first winter season, Wayne Eng clued me into a stellar dry fly bite. The trout were sitting in knee-deep water along the bank, and I caught a lot of them on a #12 Beetle Bug dry — a method I’d have sworn was a waste of time during the winter.
I haven’t experienced a similar bite since then, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen again.
Hope, after all, is one of the pillars of fly fishing, and if you don’t believe your next trip will be as good as your best day on the water, then pretty soon there won’t be a next trip.
Still, dry fly success now mostly involves uncasing those technical fly rods, longer leaders, smaller flies and warmer fishing gear.
That isn’t a huge surprise, but the timing changes too; now you’re normally fishing through the middle part of the day, and the morning and evenings are flat tough.
Fortunately, with the days running short, the mornings and evenings aren’t all that far apart.
Meanwhile, At Trout Underground World Headquarters
Our new digs in Mt. Shasta now feature the “Winter Wonderland” look (assuming a Winter Wonderland includes one very wet, very happy Wonderdog).
The New Trout Underground’s World Headquarters Dry Fly Flotation Test Lab is closed for winter.
This means that fly tying season is firing up, and we’ve got a couple interesting surprises headed your way. Sure, my fly tying stuff is still hiding in one of the boxes filling my office, but that won’t last forever. At least, I hope it won’t.
Until then, see you (in winter clothing) on the river, Tom Chandler.
Technorati tags: Fly fishing, fishing, winter fishing, upper sacramento, upper sac, blue winged olives
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kbarton10 12.03.07 at 2:41 pm
Let me know if you start to run low on the hot chocolate, I may be able to get a resupply chopper in there between snow flurries.
Kevin 12.03.07 at 3:46 pm
With the entire American River watershed now open year-round, I can’t wait to see what some of my secret spots are like in the winter.
On a more sour note, we now have the dread NZ Mud Snail in the lower American. Spiffy.
Tom Chandler 12.03.07 at 3:50 pm
Kevin: It’s cool when the Powers That Be pursue a sensible, hands-off policy like year-round fishing where it’s appropriate.
As for the Mud Snails, damn. Sadly, it was probably just a matter of time. Hell, it’s probably just a matter of time at a lot of places; you only need one lazy/slob/ignorant fly fisher to make it happen at a half-dozen rivers on a single road trip.
An upcoming post…
Loon 12.03.07 at 5:30 pm
Tom you’re slacking! Get out there “The waters fine!”
ps: my girlfriend was recently in Japan… she was given a bottle of water. On it, right beside the Japanese characters it said “Bottled at the Cystal Geyser…Mount Shasta.” Its so incredibly absurd that we ship bottled water like that… even without considering the environmental impact, it would seem dumb from an economics point of view given the transportation costs.
taku 12.03.07 at 6:38 pm
Tom, up here in the frozen north, that looks like great duck hunting weather. And with your pond right there, all’s you need to do is put a water trough heater in it (keep one edge of the pond open) put out a few dekes, sit back in the hot tub with your favorite side by side, and shoot away as the mallards flock in, then the Wonderdog can earn his keep. Plus the steam from the hot tub will be a great blind setup. This is assuming you have a hot tub out on the deck overlooking said pond. If not, get one and use as above, the L&T might not even mind since the hot tub is part of the deal. I’ll even throw in a great duck breast confit recipe that even my L&T likes (and she doesn’t like duck). Good luck, look forward to the reports from the Pacific flyway.
Tom Chandler 12.04.07 at 6:51 am
Loon: Slacking, yes. I wish it were otherwise. And yes, the bottled water thing doesn’t make much sense (unless you’re a bottled water company). Then you find out that better than 80% of those plastic bottles end up in landfills…
Taku: Duck hunting? The bad news is that my “favorite side by side” is two open beers placed next to each other.
I mean, what are the odds of me wingshooting a duck with my .177 caliber spring-piston pellet gun? Especially after we’ve consumed our favorite “side by side?”
Still, it’s a marvelous plan.
Heddon17 12.04.07 at 8:04 am
Not only that, but bottled water actually costs more per gallon than gas (and in Siskiyou County that is saying something).
Most folks don’t realize that if you drink tap water using one of those Pur or Brita water filtration systems/pitchers, the water will be every bit as good as the bottled stuff and safer to drink to boot since tap water goes through much more stringent testing standards than the bottled stuff.
Not to mention that re-filling a plastic water bottle with filtered tap water will save you a lot of $$$ vs. buying more bottled water every time……..
Brian