Portland, Oregon Metro Fishing Report – With the only game in town already shut down (Bonneville Pool sturgeon fishing) and the Willamette still high and expected to go higher, metro anglers are again on the sidelines until water conditions improve. In just one day, anglers over-harvested their “quota,” by double in fact. I don’t know what ramifications that’ll have for future opportunities, but a 1-day season is far from impressive, even though the catch rates were.
That said, there have been winter steelhead, both wild and hatchery, caught at Meldrum Bar recently. The fishing has actually been pretty decent. I guess that’s something we should have expected, given the overall improvement in returns we’re seeing in the NW corner of the state.
Meldrum Bar aside, there isn’t much else to pursue in the metro region. Most anglers are still headed west, for the last part of the early season steelhead program, also about to wind down. Don’t fret, however, quality broodstock steelhead will follow shortly, with some nice, mostly natives already being caught down there.
Metro anglers can of course lean on the Sandy and Clackamas, there’s good news forthcoming from those systems as well, so just keep reading below.
Find the full report and forecast for Members on this page here for the Columbia and Willamette Rivers.
Clackamas River Fishing Report – As you’ve heard us repeatedly state, the Clackamas looks as if it’s going to be a good fishery this season, it’s still a bit early for good fishing however. That said, there are some nice ones coming from this watershed already.
The water on the Clackamas remains a bit high for anglers to fish confidently, but the worst news is that it’s headed back up and out of reach for a while. Anglers didn’t have much of a chance on the current drop, but those who fished the edges of the heavier flows with bigger baits or soft beads were at least in the game. That “game” ends today, however, as heavy precipitation has the river headed back up as of this writing (Thursday, 1/2). Thankfully, it’s still early, but it should be a good January when the weather calms down.
Sandy River Fishing Report from Jeff Stoeger – “I want to wish everyone a Happy New Year, I hope it was safe and you were able to spend quality time with family and friends.
Well here’s this week’s report. The Sandy was running just over 12 ft and has dropped to just under 11 ft. The river will drop to about 10.5 ft with the freezing level dropping to about 3500 ft. Then the next storm front will make its way on land. The rain is expected to start up again and will cause the river to climb up to almost 13 ft.
I went by the Sandy yesterday and it was high but had a nice color. I had a couple of buddies who fished Wednesday morning for 3 hours around Dabney. They said they saw four sleds working the flats in Dabney and also saw 3 drift boats floating from Dabney down with a half dozen trailers parked in the boat parking for more guys floating from Oxbow down.
Find the full report and forecast for Members on this page here for the Clackamas and Sandy Rivers.
North & Central Coast Fishing Report – Small stream steelheaders are about to wrap their season, at least for quality fish. The “fresh” fish will enter spawning mode in the coming 10 days so fresh fish will become harder to find.
In the meantime, anglers have one last crack at good numbers of early returning steelhead on the North Fork Nehalem, Necanicum, Klaskanine, and Alsea Rivers, as well as Big and Gnat Creek along Highway 30. After January 10th, silver-sided steelies will still be harder to come by on these systems.
But that leaves quality broodstock and wild fish to be had on some of these systems, as well as a bevy of other systems that we’re all familiar with.
Those systems include watersheds such as the Wilson River, where action for mostly wild fish has been pretty good. The river just now came into shape and is headed back “out” in the coming days, with additional precipitation hitting the north and central coast as we speak.
The Trask, Nestucca and certainly the Nehalem have all been a little too high for productive fishing in the recent week.
The lower Columbia, let alone the mighty Pacific Ocean has been too wild and wicked to enable fishers and crabbers access to its bounty. Weather may give a reprieve next week however, at least for crabbers on the lower Columbia, where the commercial fleet has yet to drop their pots.
Find the complete report and forecast for Members in the Northwest Oregon section.
SW Oregon Fishing Report – Contributor Jeff Rome reports:
Conditions are still not good.
I hate to sound like a broken record, but fishing conditions remain quite unfavorable for pretty much everything. Lots of steelhead rivers have receded down to non-flood levels but only briefly as another wet rainstorm is expected this next weekend to keep them unfishable for at least another week. The ocean will be treacherous with winds and blustery conditions. It’s time to take down the holiday lights and decorations, tie up some steelhead rigs, spool up new line on your reels, and organize tackle boxes while anticipating lots of tight lines with fresh feisty steelhead when the rivers get back into shape.
The Applegate (part of the mid-Rogue system) is open to hatchery steelhead now, but like everything else, will not be fishable till at least late next week.
All sections of the Rogue River are high and flowing strong. The lower section sustained several days of flood conditions and will be near flood levels again this weekend. The dam is doing its best to keep the upper and mid sections below flood level but are still not worth the effort to try and fish for at least a week.
Be safe, be nice and enjoy! Tight Lines 🎣 – Romer
Jeff’s expanded reports, multiple lake updates, and forecasts including his past reports can be found here for Members! There is SO much more.
Good report