Father’s Day, 2009
I’ll say it: the Middle Fork of the Willamette is a seriously underrated fly fishing river. That is fine by me. In fact, I think it is the best wild trout river in western Oregon. It’s probably a tough call which is better, the Upper Mckenzie above Blue River or the Middle Fork Willamette between Oakridge and Black Canyon and/or Hampton. That debate is for another post.
I figured the Middle Fork Willamette had to be fishing by now. I really started getting amped up when I saw all of the bug life coming off: Huge green caddis, smaller tan caddis and a bunch of PMDs. I tried my trusty combination and missed a nice bite right away. A few casts later I hooked what was obviously a big fish, a big fish that didn’t pull his weight. It meant what that normally means:
Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperative. Every time the sun was on the water, the bugs would explode and the trout would get active. I caught a planter and let it go. I should have killed it but wasn’t in the mood. I came across a group of fish rising to some caddis and broke off a fly in a good fish. Oops. Once the sun was completely obscured the fish turned off. I decided to take a break too. It was then I realized that I hadn’t only forgotten my net in my eagerness to fish but the camp stove too. I built a small fire ring and was munching on crab cakes in no time.
Post lunch I switched my nymph to a stonefly pattern that this trout scarfed up right away:
After a fishless hour or two my mind was wandering, wondering at the capriciousness of the Fish Gods . . .
‘you know it is Father’s Day and I’ve worked hard at parenting this year . . . plus I’ve done a lot for Trout Unlimited . . . you’d think the Fish Gods would have mercy . . .’
My rod slammed down and this nice trout had eaten a #16 light wet Cahill:
Bug activity picked back up. There were PEDs on the water and I caught several more trout none more notable than this fish that viciously attacked my Cahill like a Great White destroying a seal:
It was awesome and left me trembling. Trout ate the green caddis, lashed out at some tan elk hair caddis and grabbed the Possie bugger but the fly of the day was definitely the light cahill. Light colored mayflies are only going to get more important as the summer comes on strong.
Every time the sun was on the water there were tons of bugs: big green caddis, tan caddis, pale duns and I got the feeling I was sitting on a bomb. I suspect the next consistently nice day we get, the river is really going to fish.
