On Tuesday I went to the Yakima expecting decent weather but found it
just stayed cloudy, got windier, and got colder as the day wore on. The
morning was all spent nymphing and I got about a half-dozen trout and about the
same number of whitefish on either a Skwala or a #18 PT dropper. I got a
few bruiser whities, one was a fat 17” fish that was the biggest I’d
hooked in a while. The BWO hatch started sporadically at around
11:30 and then was thick from 12:30-3:30. At the beginning I was picking
off what few risers I saw but that soon change. It became like Cliff’s
experience, I had fish rising everywhere and had probably my best day ever on
the Yakima. At
one point I had a fish rising 3’ off my legs, you could literally drop a
fly with no line out and catch trout. I lost count quickly on fish
in the meat of the riffle and began looking for the fish in the skinniest water
I could find. After a few normal fish in 5-6” of water I got one 14”
rainbow to rise in about 4” of water. I then started hunting
big fish because the average fish were just too easy. I got a few 15-16”
fish and finally got a very nice 18” rainbow to rise. That
was the best trout I’ve landed on the Yakima in a few years, he was exactly the
size of the opening on my net and I know I haven’t hit that in a while. All
these fish were on #22 BWO Comparaduns. I only had three of these with me
and on one the hook finally just broke. I then fished another until the
tail fell off but that didn’t seem to matter, the fish still took it.
They were not overly selective if you got it over their heads with a decent
drift.
Yesterday morning I hit the Narrows
to see if any Coho were left and to scout around for searuns. I didn’t
see any Coho in their usual spots so I walked the beach down to Pt. Fosdick and
started fishing my way back up. I only got one fish but it was an 18”
cutthroat that was obviously spawned out, a bit on the thin side but very
healthy looking.
Off to Tampa
on Monday to visit family and do some fishing in the bay, hoping to get my
first redfish.
Tim
|
