Fishing

The past two weeks has been hard fishing with one or two fish per day per boat. The bank fishers have had a hard time of it too. Friday night saw a pretty good storm come into the Klamath /Trinity Valley with snow flurries and cold rain and some snow. The good part is that it did not dirty up the river or make it come up much.  On my way back from Sacramento Saturday I saw hail, cold wind, rain, slush and snow. Coming over Buckhorn Pass it was snowing but not sticking to the road. In Weaverville there was snow alongside the roads but the streets were clear.

Junction City down to Pigeon Point there must have been eight drift boats working the stretch and as many bank fishermen. I only saw one fish being landed but that is not to say that there were not more, I just didn’t see more.

Below Pigeon Point, there were about 4 to 5 cars parked along side the highway in different locations with bank fishermen working the river. It was a mix of bait and fly fishers working the river.

Del Loma, I only saw two cars and one drift boat fishing this area. After I got home I talked to Patrick of the Del Loma RV Campground and he said that most of the fishers in his camp were having a difficult time catching fish. There was one fisherman George from San Diego that had caught 2- steelhead and lost another but caught no salmon. George brought up his whole family for the Thanksgiving week just to fish. They did have one nice fish to eat though. George caught his fish using roe and spinners. I know this sounds discouraging but most of us thought that the storm would surely bring in more fresh fish.
Dave Graham from Suzie Q fished below his house and said that him and is brother saw lots of “sore tails” holding in the big pool below his house but not very many Steelhead. Dave did say that he caught a one nice hatchery and one native steelie on Saturday and his brother landed a nice fat ½-pounder about 20in.

Willow Creek, two drift boats were working the run from South Fork to Big Rock fly fishing and they were catching lots of small ½-pounders and trout but no adults when I talked to them. This was about noon today.
Hoopa, there has been some native steelhead holding below Mill Creek and Beaver Creek but no fishermen working the river down there. My best guess is that some time mid week there should be some more fresh fish coming into the Trinity.

The river came up ever so slightly and the water is cold and clear with about 6 feet of visibility. The cold water and rain have started the moss flushing out so that is good because you will not be spending all your time cleaning your line.
 
Klamath River, down at Weitchpec the Klamath was in fair to good shape with some ½-pounders and small adults being caught. Up at Happy Camp there have been reports of Trout and ½-pounders with a few small adults being caught.

Trinity River Hatchery, Fall Chinook, 1,554 to date, total ‘10- 3,477; ’09 total 7,500; Coho Nov 11- 407, total 1,710; Steelhead ’10- 41, total 101.
 

River Flows and Conditions

Trinity Lake is 66.5ft below the over flow (1/2ft increase) and 62 percent of capacity (1% decrease) at 2:00pm today. Inflow to the lake is 965cf and 765cfs is being released to Lewiston Lake with 395cfs to the Sacramento River.
Trinity River at Lewiston releases are 370cfs, water temperatures 48.8, air at 41 degrees.
Limekiln Gulch is 4.58ft at 215cfs. Douglas City is 6.1ft at 369cfs, water temps are 46 degrees, air 39 degrees.
Helena/North Fork is 9ft at 475cfs, water temps 46, air 37. Cedar Flat is 3.7ft at 802cfs.
Willow Creek 1,093cfs, water at 46 air 50.Hoopa is 13.1ft at 1,900cfs, water 46.4.  Trinity at Klamath is 5,520cfs.
Klamath River releases at Iron Gate Dam are 1,020cfs. Seiad Valley is 3.2ft at 1,950cfs.
Happy Camp estimated at 2,090cfs. Somes Bar estimated at 2,750cfs. Orleans is 5ft at 3,620cfs.
Klamath at 101 is 10.8ft at 8,550cfs water temperatures at 47.6 degrees

Temperatures

Temperatures in the valley last week were 60/38 degrees with 1.1 inches of rain, to date 17.7 inches. Weather next week in the valley predicted to be 47/24 degrees, with rain Monday and snow showers Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday clear, Saturday, Sunday, Monday showers.