February 17, 2022

Hey guys, I am back from the south, loaded up with vitamin D, all rested up and very ready for the season! The shop is loading up also now, only with new inventory daily and the phone is ringing. If you haven’t gotten your motel or guide dates yet and want to; I’d suggest locking something in soon. (Some very prime dates just recently opened up when our confirmation letters went out and we had a few cancellations.)

Right now, I’ve only got a few days booked in the rest of February if you’d like to get out and get in on some pretty decent action overall without the crowds and my personal open days as of this moment in March and the first half of April are March 2, 4, 6, 7, 8 & 30. April 4, 5, 17… We have other guides with scattered availability through-out the season so just give us a shout! (231) 745-3529

Got out a few times this week with mixed results… Joe joined me on Monday for a VERY cold day that he insisted on keeping. (1 degree when I woke, 7 when we left and a high of 18 while out! ;^) A solid river bottom of anchor ice, shelf ice and a river that resembled much more of a slushie from the local 7-Eleven than it did a flowing body of water for much of the day kept us from fishing very effectively however.

That being said, we still somehow managed to make contact with 3 or 4 Steelhead thru the openings in the slush that resulted in two pretty good battles, but none of those to hand and several trout we did land including a PB for Joe with a solid 21 1/2″ buck brown. Toss in a hot lunch and some great conversation for a pretty darn good time out on the water despite less-than-ideal conditions!

Joe and I had seen an absolute ton of fish in the crystal-clear icy water that did not cooperate, and I was determined to go back out the next day and exact some revenge. To that end my buddy and fellow river guide Rich (Richard) Spicer and I got out, gave it hell and came up with zero! No trout, no Steelhead, nothing but a few tasty ale treats and a couple of good venison brats to show for it. We did get out a bit late because of a video appointment I had, but if there was a good “bite window” it was either before we got started or after we got off. Both the woods and water were completely quiet…

Of course, we couldn’t leave it at that so decided to make a full day of it on Wednesday and cover a longer stretch of mid-river where Rich and friends have been doing well, and it worked out a little better! We saw two different Otter kill sites with slides and the works (One had an eagle feeding on the carcass that flew off.) quite a distance away from each other, lost a few Steelhead, but landed about a half dozen, caught some nice trout, ate some great steaks, enjoyed a few ales and, oh yea, we rescued an Eagle!

About half of that action above was in the pouring rain, but with temps in the mid 40s most of the day that didn’t bother us much. We probably should have caught a few more fish, but if I’m being honest, after I caught my little girl, I spent more time on my phone than I did fishing first making a short video, then answering questions about our eagle rescue encounter on social media, text, messenger and email… I basically left it up to Rich and he did not disappoint!

I made a “new” video of that encounter today that is a slightly longer version, a much higher resolution (If you turn it to it.) and shows much more than the original one I slapped together on the river. (Forgive the little bit of language near the end…) I’ve gotten a lot of thanks for this and truly appreciate it but honestly, I think Rich did the hard part by not only holding the camera for it, but actually releasing the trap that it was caught in so anyway, kudos where they are due and thanks for being there with me bro! (Good job putting the smack down on some fish while I was busy not doing so also! ;^)

All of the fish from Wednesday were on beads in the size 10/yellow spectrum (Available in the shop now as well as other float fishing accessories, rods and center pin reels. Use only where legal.) and the ones we hooked on Monday were all on flies. Orange, Oregon cheese and chartreuse eggs were all used as well as small black stones, brown stones and hex nymphs. Spawn has been producing of course as has drop back plugging, but I haven’t talked to anyone pitching. My buddy Walt said he got one on the swing the other day as well so, the moral of the story is, go! Get out and have some fun fishing however it is you like to and enjoy all of this we sometimes take for granted…

I haven’t had a chance to look at the water today, but as our graphs we have linked on the site here show it is coming up some from the rain and melt off. (Luckily it got well below freezing again in short order, so we didn’t lose everything.) My “guess” is that it’ll be fine and fishable yet, but I’ll know for sure tomorrow. Anchor ice and shelf ice were pretty much gone, but we may develop a bit more shelf depending on how the levels stabilize. I’ll update this on our social media sites if needed…

Our Shop Hours are currently still in winter mode, (Closed on Tuesday, 9am – 5pm Wednesday to Monday) but we’ve just hired one new shop employee and are slowly bringing back our others. By the first of March or at least the very first part of March those hours should be well expanded and apply seven days a week rather than six.

As always, we can’t thank you enough for your support and till next time, tight lines…

-Steve-