May 5,2015 Fishing Report

May 8, 2015 Lost River Outfitters Fishing Report

Nice rainfall last night! It freshened the air, the wildflowers are heaving a sigh of relief, and if you get high enough up, you can even see the new snow on the Pioneers!  There have been years where May and June rains have saved us, let’s hope we are on track for one of those years!  Magic reservoir drawdown has begun.  Outflows are 924 cfs.  The reservoir has dropped nearly 8 feet already.  The upper Big Wood at Hailey is flowing at 677 cfs this morning, but only 237 cfs are going into Magic at Stanton.  Camas Creek is flowing at about 27 cfs, so it does not look like Magic will benefit much from any runoff.  Most of the upper Big Wood is already in the canals, and the water below Glendale is already diverted.

We have stuff to report, but most of it will come from past and future fishing adventures.

Salmon River

We finished our steelhead season from the Beckwith’s Lodge in Stanley on April 19^th.  My son Blake and his wife Kelly joined us for the weekend.  Kelly was the top rod catching two deep water steelhead, a bull trout, and a nice cutthroat, with innumerable whitefish to boot.  She mastered the upstream double spey with the switch rod.  The switch rod nymphing is a great method for slow, stubborn cold water river fish.  It is pretty easy to learn.  We moved into the steelhead lodge on March 24^th this year and out on April 21^st.  With the fish coming earlier every year we could have been there March 10^th.  My first trip up on February 20 produced three steelhead.  We don’t really like fishing them when they go to gravel to spawn, so finishing early was fine with us.  The Salmon River is now closed to steelhead fishing.

Magic Reservoir

I really enjoy coming back from Stanley to bob around in Magic in my float tube.  Two years ago the smallmouth fishing was spectacular.  Last year the triploid rainbows won top billing.  So far this year Magic has been stingy for me and spotty for others.  I expect that will change and hope it does soon.  It is close, a great afternoon or evening break.  The loons, grebes, mallards, geese and various other waterfowl makes for some interesting bird watching.  Stripping streamers is usually my best method on a tip or full sink.

 

Lower Lost

The Lower Lost is flowing at 225 cfs. It got bumped up to nearly 600 cfs while Susanne and I were guiding it. We still caught fish, but we had to increase the size of our nymphs.  It will hatch baetis and midges on any given day and will wake up the feeding.  Some spawning is still happening so take care not to walk on the redds and let the rainbows finish their jobs.  Nymphing with a double zebra rig size 18-20 on 6X fluorocarbon tippets is very effective before the emergence, which usually happens mid day.  In the fast water rocky reaches a stonefly nymph is very effective on 3 or 4X tippets.  If you encounter a hatch heavy enough to bring fish to the surface try fishing a size 20 black zebra under a size 14-16 adams or purple haze.  Tippet to midge should be short, about 12 inches, and fine, 6X.  Sometimes they even eat the dry fly!

Big Wood

Closed until Memorial Day Weekend.  Will probably fish in early June this year. The warm temps and consequent rains have brought the Wood up as well.

Silver Creek

Closed until Memorial Day Weekend.  Hopefully some of the diverted Big Wood waters will improve flows this season.

South Fork of the Boise

Closed until Memorial Day Weekend.  Flowing at 600 today. 

Little Wood above the reservoir

Closed until Memorial Day Weekend.  The Reservoir might be worth a look from a tube on a warm day.

Carey Lake

Bluegill, bass, and some perch have been caught.  The bird life in the spring is cacophonous.

We still have the petition to change the regulations on the Upper Lost and Copper Basin in the shop.  No word yet, but would like to continue the effort until that great watershed is protected.  Stop in the shop and put your John Henry on it!

The Idaho 2 Fly fundraiser for Idaho men with cancer is scheduled for June 13^th at Ron Sali’s 96 acre pond in Eagle.  The lake is full of big largemouth bass and trout.  The entry fee is $500.  The money goes to a great cause.  It is fun fishing, and a very inspirational event in an amazing setting. If you are interested in participating we have flyers at the shop or you can call my cell at 208-720-3813.  Dick Wilson has done a great job with this event and the two Idaho retreats for men with cancer.

We still have room for Yellowstone fishing trips this June and September.  Best dates are June 10-15 or September 16-18.  But we can accommodate any dates in June or September.  These are three-five day fishing trips.  We stay in cabins in West Yellowstone in June and Silver Gate in September.  It really is more than a fishing trip, but angling for native species in the waters flowing off the top of the continental divide is pretty special.

Spring merchandise is arriving at the shop daily.  Our fly tying room is stocked full.  Stop in and share your latest fishing tale. 

Fish far and fine,

Scott Schnebly

Lost River Outfitters  

Good Old Boys & New Tricks

It’s time to start knocking things off the “to do” lists and getting ready for summer. Spring is around the corner and the sun seems to be announcing its arrival a bit more each day. So this week I decided to get a few things done I had been meaning to for a long time.

TO DO: Doctor

Monday: I went to the dermatologist which I had been meaning to do for the last few months.

I came home and realized that Rala, my female golden retriever had NEVER been fly-fishing and was already a year and a half old!

With Tonks, my previous golden, I trained her using all the commands from the books, she could do directional hand signals, long distance retrieves and a bunch of other things that are really only useful for a duck hunting dog, and not something I really needed as I have been duck hunting 5 times total in my life and Tonks was gun-shy to boot.

So with Rala, we (my wife and I) chose to teach her commands and skills that we used every day first. She was running alongside a skateboard at 4 months, she learned high five to untangle from her leash, she plays with toys and entertains HERSELF for hours at a time. But she still had never been fishing. Well, time to check another thing off the “to do” list.

TO DO: Introduce Dog to Fishing

Tuesday: Rala and I head to the Boise River together. She finally gets to see what those funny wet clothes (waders) that smell like fish are for that she is so curious about each time we come home from a trip. AND SHE LOVES IT!

She gets to go swimming, plus she gets to be next to a human in the water! Happy dog! So after a few battles leaving her tied up and teaching her to be OK with being left behind, I let her heel while I have the leash attached to my belt. She is a smart dog and watched what I was doing intently but didn’t seem to care as nothing ever happened. Then, the indicator sank! I struck and there wiggling back towards me- flowing with the current- as I frantically strip in line, is a STICK!!! (As an aside, if you have never been in the woods with a golden retriever before you cannot understand, so let me paint a picture for you: a new mother shows half of the joy when meeting her newborn child that a Golden displays for a good stick in the woods.) Rala was amazed - now our activity included swimming, with a human next to her, and that strange ball of floating yarn can turn into STICKS! That night, I like to think she fell asleep thinking of her day.

However, my “to do” list was far from accomplished. Rala could navigate some parts of a river, and was learning some skills, but she hadn’t even met a fish yet. And furthermore, I needed to accomplish a few things for myself.

I have spent my entire life on fishing adventures across the west and have had a great time with friends, family, and clients. However, I have never fished solo much and I have especially never gone “destination fishing” alone before.

TO DO: Fishing trip.

Wednesday: I drop Kelly, my wife, off at work and come home to finish packing the car, fishing gear, 3 thermoses, 2 rods, and one dog with a new experience on the horizon. We arrive at the Owyhee in Oregon after getting my license and cannot find a single piece of- even poor- water to fish. We finally jump into a meager piece of water for the sake of training and because otherwise we were going to lose our only shot at a stretch of river to a couple of spoon casters. Needless to say it was frustrating, Rala wanted to RUN and SWIM and I could not fathom actually CATCHING anything out of this run regardless of all other factors. So we left and went driving. I decided to go all the way to the dam to look for potential runs and never found a stretch of water that was empty. We turned around hungry, frustrated and discouraged. My only plan was to return to some water Kelly and I had fished the week before and claim it as my own until the fish started rising and then fish it. We got lucky, the spot was free (it was the second to last spot I know about on the drive out)! I parked the car and ate lunch so that we could calm down and to give the river a rest in case the water had already been fished.

Feeling reinvigorated but not optimistic of my chosen spot (bluebird sky and moderate wind is not good for midge activity), we wandered off downstream. I brought Rala’s leash but she was free of it and wandering at her leisure. Halfway on our walk to the nearest other fly fishable water a car pulled up between us and our spot, well that’s not very nice or lucky, I think. But Rala is friendly and curious and ran up to the fishermen, perhaps a father and son team, with glee. I walk up and talk to ‘em. “We was just gonna head straight out from the car and upstream”, the younger one says, as they pull out spin rods. I negotiate with them and we find that our fishable waters have no overlap and we all continue merrily toward our preferred water.

As we approach the run I notice a few dry flies starting to emerge but have yet to pay them any mind. I have a dry and a dropper on, of course, because the Skwalas are supposed to be coming off soon, right? As my two fly patterns continue to fail me and Rala is getting less and less patient- tied to a willow- not being allowed to romp free everywhere I decide I should read the signals of the river and make a fly change. Actually a tippet, fly, tippet, fly change (which is why I was reluctant in the first place since tying four knots whilst telling a puppy to STAY is a challenge).  I finally get all the tab ends clipped off the knots, I look up to see a nice gust of wind blow across the riffle and spray white across the drift. DARN, I was too slow, there isn’t a single fish eating dry flies in sight and it’s an obligate right handed pool- so I have to fish switch. Oh well, I’m out here to fish, so I throw anyway, a #16 parawolf adams with a trailing LRO midge emerger into the feed line- and everything disappears! Perhaps because the rod was in the wrong hand, or perhaps because nothing had happened up to that point in the day, but I had forgotten why we were even at the river by this time and eventually remind my brain that I am fishing, and strike.

And there connected to the end of the line is the most silvery shiny wiggly funny smelling stick anyone has ever pulled out of a river - and Rala meets her first rainbow trout. This is better than a stick! It’s sentient and tries to get away splashing!! Now I have a fishing friend! I let her off the leash and start canvassing the water properly short to longer left to right working from inside to the outside seam. Rala watched the fly every cast for the next three riffles and was rewarded several more times by wiggling fish! 

 We moved up to the spot our car was parked and it was a great decoy, we still had the run to ourselves. We jump in and I start casting to very SPARSE rises in the slow water, however Rala has noticed something else entirely: mayflies, exactly like the pattern I have tied on are beginning to emerge from the water and fly away. Once as I am watching a drift come back towards me I look over and she is rising up from the nose nearly as tall as I am onto her hind legs sniffing an emerging mayfly. Here is where she finally makes a connection and starts “hunting” emergers.  As they break the surface and start to dry their wings, Rala pounces and its “bobbing for mayflies.” Between the naturals and the artificial producing fish, Rala learned that afternoon how to be a fishing dog, who says you can’t teach an old dog new tricks?

Rala "hunting" emergers (Ctrl+click to follow)

As the day wrapped up I found a few more large browns (which was the point of the trip). Rala’s enthusiasm for each fish was proportional to its size and fight, which made me just as excited as she was. Periodically throughout the afternoon, I would look behind me and she would be swimming out to an object in the middle of the river. From observation, there appear to be two distinct reasons to swim to something in the river. The first is to retrieve it, and the second is to stand on it. The caveat is that all things in the middle of the river must be examined for these two possibilities. Occasionally I would hear water dripping off of her coat and look back to where she would be searching diligently to see if a fish we had released in that spot had returned yet, even lying down a few times to wait for the fish to return while watching my fly from a distance. 

The evening started to approach and we left, earlier than normal but Kelly would be worried as I was out of cell range. As Rala and I left that day I felt a surprising amount of pride in that little dog. A different SPECIES from my own, yet we communicated and learned from each other and in two days learned how to co-exist on flywater together. As I drove, I went over in my head what the next steps toward teaching her to be a fishing dog were: river crossings, log jams, rapids, reading currents and more.

As I fell asleep that night I know that we were both thinking of our day. I was so proud and giddy I think I fell asleep giggling telling Kelly stories from our day.

Rala with her first white fish

TO DO: make a garden and yard.

Tomorrow…

Owyhee Brown Trout

Yummy!

Watching, always watching

Tight lines!

-Blake Schnebly