Fall 1998 Oregon Trip

Great expectations always precede these trips to my old stomping grounds on the West Coast.  And as always, the trip ends up being a mixed bag when the results are tallied.  A long first day's drive brought me to the bluffs above the DONNER & BLITZEN River in the Steens Mountains.  This territory is probably as remote as one can possibly get from the metropolitan areas of the state, and I was really looking forward to hiking the trail upstream from Frenchglen to catch a bunch of nice rainbows.

However as fate would have it, a gloomy and wet cold front passed through the area that morning, and it was too unpleasant to consider a hike under those conditions.  So I made a couple of halfhearted casts near the campground - without success - and drove downstream looking for better weather and better water.  Neither materialized.   I hadn't realized that this river is basically an irrigation ditch from the Steens until it gradually spreads into Malheur Lake.  So I left the area with little reluctance.

Traveling across Eastern Oregon towards Roseburg and my folks place, I did have a chance to wet lines in some new creeks and streams.  None were spectacular, but all were interesting.  BUCK CREEK where my dad and some of his cronies camped from time to time was exactly as he described it.  Lots of eager little rainbows that cared not how the fly was presented, but happily bit at everything tossed to them.  Later on the LAKE FORK of the North Umpqua, I caught tiny jewel-like browns on even tinier flies.   Had no success on the CLEARWATER tributary, but almost drowned when I stepped on some apparently solid pumice that turned out to be like loose quicksand. 

Further down the NORTH UMPQUA I managed to dislocate a finger and severely bruise my lower back when I went down hard slipping off a moss covered rock.  The finger went back in place easily, but the back took a few days to recover.

Nevertheless for the first time in my life I finally figured out how to catch decent sized rainbows on this difficult river.  The inholding fish all seem to lay in deep channels where it seems improbable that any fish could hold, but they really are there.   So that afternoon I was successful in hooking and landing numbers of fish from 6-16 inches - all on a dark stone pattern sized #14.  It's hard to believe that I've fished this river for almost 40 years and had not until now figured out how to get at the better fish.  The steelhead of my youth were a different matter of course.

Anyway to make a long report shorter, I enjoyed similar success around the WINCHESTER section of this river, caught numerous smallmouths on the SOUTH UMPQUA (these would only take a golden stone - who knows why?).   Spent a couple of hours a day in these pursuits before finally heading back to Colorado.  Along the way fished for an hour or so on the MACKENZIE and landed only two redsides - and that being a double on a nymph rig of caddis emerger and dark stone.

Fished the DESCHUTES at Warm Springs with my brother one night and for four hours the next day on my own.  Hot weather had continued the caddis hatches, and the fish eagerly came to the surface for them, especially right at dark.  Otherwise one had to fish riffle water (for the opportunistic feeders) during the day or right along the edges.   Nymphs worked moderately well.  Probably caught and released 30-40 fish or so.   Most were small, but all were scrappy.  These trout know how to use the force of the river to their advantage.  Lost a couple of larger redsides but overall was somewhat disappointed at the sizes this year.  But if the little ones survive, it should bode well for Y2K and beyond.

Back to Vail OnLine , the Main Fishing Page, the 1998 Diary, or check on stream flows.