At the April 1^st meeting of the Trinity Adaptive Management Working Group (TAMWG) they adopted the Record of Decision (ROD) for a Dry Water Year flow and that is the information I used for last weeks’ report. On April 16^th the Trinity Management Council (TMC) recommended a different water flow for the Trinity River for 2013.The new flow regime for 2013 is April 21 start flow ramp-up from 300cfs to Apr. 22 to 2,000cfs, then Apr. 23 to go up to peak flows 4,500cfs for May 2, 3. On May 4^th to start ramping down to reach 450cfs by June 13^th. There will be several descending limb plateaus for river studies. For a complete flow schedule go to www.trrp.net and go to the water flows page.

Note: for clarification on salmon limits; four (4) salmon per day of any combination but no more than  three (3) adults with a total twelve (12) Chinook salmon  in possession with no more than nine (9) adults.  The intent is to allow fishing for three day weekends and/or holidays. You must remember that if you stay or camp for a long period of time (2 weeks or more) you have to make sure you don’t over fish you possession limit. That means you have to eat or give away part of you catch so that you do not go over your possession limit during you stay.

The total number for In-River quota sports fishing 2013 is 49,006 Fall Chinook. The Lower Klamath gets 24,500 of which 3,675 are for below the 101 Bridge and The Spit. The Upper Klamath is 8,330 and the Trinity gets 16,170 total or 8,085 for both Upper and Lower Trinity River. Last year sports fishermen were not able to catch their full quotas of Fall Chinook salmon. So if you plan on coming to the Klamath or Trinity Rivers to fish for Fall Chinook salmon I would recommend that you plan your vacation and make your reservations now. If you plan on using or trying to book a fishing guide I would not recommend that you wait for the last moment or you just may not be able to book one.
 

Fishing:

I have not seen such good March steelhead fishing in many years for the Willow Creek area. Up until the Spring Water releases people have been able to catch and release 2 to 6 adult steelies per drift. The problem that is there were very few hatchery fish (no keepers) because almost all the fish were native with some to the 10 to 12lbs range. My best guess is that many of these fish were going to the South Fork of the Trinity or up Willow Creek. After this last week I surmise that we are also seeing some of the summer run Steelhead fish because Friday I checked with my fishing buddy Ed Trujillo and several of the fish he caught were very fresh steelhead, fat and bright silver.     
Fishing: Old Lewiston Bridge Area: Cemetery Hole, Bucktail Hole and Poker Bar. No one was fishing this section so I don’t have any information about fishing this area.
Indian Creek Lodge and the Canyon Areas: Steel Bridge, Indian Creek Hole, And Douglas City Bridge, there were only a few fishers using this section of the river and they were only catching a few trout and an occupational Brown.
Del Loma Area; Little French Creek, French Creek Hayden flat and Big Slide Hole. The boys from San Diego were back fishing the area and they were only able to get a few hook ups in that area so they were going to try Grays Falls for some springers and I didn’t hear how they did as of dead line.
Hawkins Bar to Willow Creek Area: “D” Fishing Guide, 530-629-3554. Like I said earlier we have not experienced this kind of steelhead fishing for some time. Ed Trujillo and his buddy Dean went out fishing Friday and they caught and released a total of 6 Iron Heads, one being 10lbs. Two were down runners and the rest were fresh fish. I expect that we will be seeing some high water by tomorrow so that means fishing will be over for a while.
The Mid-Klamath:  Weitchpec / Orleans are still blown out from the high water on the Klamath.
Trinity River Flows and conditions: Trinity Lake is 19.1ft. (0.3ft decrease) below the overflow and 87.6% of capacity (4% increase) at 2:00PM today.
Inflow to the lake was 1,887cfs and dam releases are 2,600cfs+ to Lewiston Lake with 1,646cfs going to Whiskeytown Lake and then on to the Sacramento River at Keswick.    
Trinity River: Lewiston Dam releases are 955cfs water temps 50, air is 74 degrees. Limekiln Gulch is 5.1ft at 493cfs. Indian Creek Lodge estimated at 514cfs. Douglas City is 6.3ft at 523cfs, water temps 53.4 air is 76, Junction City is 1.9ft at 540cfs.  Helena is 9.7ft at 750cfs with water at 54.8. Cedar Flat is 4.3ft at 1,190cfs. Willow Creek is estimated at 1,843cfs, air 78, and water 00. Hoopa is 14.3ft at 2,870cfs, water temps 57 degrees. Mouth of the Trinity at the Klamath is 9,440 cfs.

Klamath: Iron Gate Dam releases are 1,220cfs. Seiad Valley is 3.7ft at 2,520cfs. Happy Camp estimated at 2,924cfs. Somes Bar estimated at 4,720cfs. Orleans is 6.6ft at 6,570cfs. Klamath at 101 is 12.2ft at 12.2K cfs & water temps of 55.8 degrees. Smith River is 7.9.ft at 1,860cfs.

Temperatures in the Valley last week were 78/38 degrees with 0 inches of rain, total to date 53.2 inches. The Weather in the valley next week is expected to be 77/45 degrees. Mon-Fri, sunny; Sat, partly cloudy; Sun, mostly sunny; Mon, sunny.