Since last week, I’ve been seeing a lot of Chinook and Coho salmon. Even at this time the river condition is not good, as it’s really low water. Usually small fish are spooked or scared off because of big fish in the river system. I don’t usually do fishing but I tried. Of course I’m not going to catch salmon. Today I found it depends on the fishing spots. In some deeper spots, there’re only black body salmon but in the other shallower spots there’re several trout.

I was fly fishing with #6 rod, and I selected a nymph and small streamer. I was casting into the fast current, with water temperature at 58F degree during the late morning. It’s still quite warm water. I didn’t need to wait for the fish to bite for a long time. as 4 to 6 inch trout quickly grabbed my fly. I could catch 8 to 10 inch trout in deeper spots in the fast current. However as soon as salmon moved into its spot, trout went to hide in the rocks. Me too. As soon as I saw their movement to my spot, I changed spots quickly and could catch another trout. It’s fun!

This rainbow trout was beyond 10 inches, and all trout I caught were EFL native fish. It was a nice fight, as even though I used a #6 fly rod, I could feel their pull and fight a lot.

It’s really interesting about the river conditions. Salmon, trout and another fish are all mixed now. It’s nature. We can’t draw the line about “fish season”. Yes, we can see summer and winter steelhead, returned salmon with certain timing. But at the same time we can see all mixed fishes in the river. I think anglers can aim any fish in any time of the year. That’s why I took #6 fly rod today. It depends on line weight, but it’s quite a versatile rod from a big fish to a small fish.

I could see many small fish in the pool. Well, the rainy time will be started from next week. Once the river level goes up, more salmon can come back. I’m looking forward to seeing another big fish in the river. Also young fish can go down to the ocean for the future to come back.