Gorge Fly Shop Blog: Columbia Gorge Fishing Report (December 14th)

Fishing Report

This week should be amazing for local steelheaders! Every river in the Northwest flirted with major flood stage and are all now slowly coming back into shape. Fishing was very good before the floods, and should be fabulous as the water recedes and rivers become fishable.

Steelhead fishing is going to be great this week. We have already heard great reports from the few rivers that are in shape this weekend. Guys reporting multiple fish mornings, hard takes and very powerful fish. Keep an eye on the flows and hit the rivers as they are dropping into the high end of normal flows. It takes a bit of practice and experience to figure out what those are for individual rivers, but trial and error is the best way to learn. We have heard that there have been several mudslides reported on our area rivers, which likely makes them unfishable due to lack of visibility. Nothing has been confirmed here except for a slide on the Nehalem River, which I saw on the evening news a few days ago. We will keep our ears to the ground and post anything later that we hear about.

High water conditions mean bigger, darker flies with heavier sink tips. I would likely be fishing a Rio MOW Heavy 10’ T-14 sink tip with a Howell’s Signature Intruder in Black and Blue if I were fishing today, but I am in the shop writing the fishing report getting text messages from friends telling me how epic the fishing is today. I will certainly be hitting it hard on my days off this week as I hope you do too!

Rainbow trout fishing on the Deschutes should be really good this week as higher water gets bugs and fished pushed around. Trout and steelhead both get really riled up when they are forced to move. My best fly after a big high water is a big san juan worm in wine or bright red. Fish it deep under an indicator along with a zebra midge, BWO emerger or a #20 pheasant tail and you should be able to wreck some trout this week.

As always, we are happy to talk fishing any time. Give us a call if you have any specific questions on local rivers, gear, and tactics, or if you just want some encouragement to get out of the office.