Doug Rose Flyfishing

I have slots left in my July 2 $50 Wednesday clinic on the Calawah. I am also doing a “cutthroat in freshwater” clinic at Waters West in Port Angeles on July 26. You can see the rest of my summer clinic and seminar schedule on my Summer 2008 Newsletter.

I had a shot at fishing the Queets last week, much earlier than usual. I wasn’t really thinking about fishing the mainstem proper but, rather, concentrating on the fans of clean water off the mouth of a couple of its major tributaries. Sometimes cutthroat and summer steelhead will hold in these plumes, especially if the river is fairly low but still carrying run-offf and glacial till. Well, I didn’t get a chance to try it on Friday, when the river was as good as it gets this time of year, and by Saturday the warm weather had really kicked up the flow. It was bank full in the runs. I didn’t think it was worth the candle, as they used to say.

I did spend some time on the upper Clearwater, which is in great shape at the moment, as well as a couple of its upper tributaries. I was looking for resident cutts, as it’s too early for sea-runs, but didn’t find any. I also fished the Salmon without a bump. So, you see, guides and writers don’t always catch fish.

The best summer steelheading lately has been on the Sol Duc, although there are also  fish in the Calawah and lower Bogachiel. Like the Queets, the Hoh was flirting with being fishable with flies late last week, but the warm spell over the weekend knocked it out again.

Speaking of being out of shape, I want to mention again that Lake Quinault is still a mess and may very well be until at least fall. It got stirred up after the December floods, and the silt still hasn’t settled out. It’s getting gradually better, but there are  still only about 18 inches of visibility.

The problem with the lakes in eastern Jefferson County isn’t glacial silt–its algae. Anderson, Gibbs, Teal and Leland have all been closed due to toxic algal blooms. These are among the eastern Olympics most popular lakes. By the way, I wouldn’t even walk a dog around the lakes currently, because dogs have died from drinking the damned water.

Lake Crescent would be my pick for a lake right now. It is in fine shape and, as always, hardly anyone is fishing it. Use flies that imitate the lake’s juvenile kokanee and fish early or late in the day.

I drove up the Elwha Road yesterday. It was a pretty green, but still high and it will get higher and dirtier with the warm weather over the weekend. Waters West’s Curt Reed, who knows the river well and fishes it as much as anyone, has already taken a few fish when it was in marginally fishable condition.

I read a quote from Syd Glasso recently in which he said that the most common mistake fly fishers after trout make when visiting the Olympic Peninsula is that they come too early. That’s very wise counsel. Things will get better in July, and even better in August.

A few summer steelhead have made it back to “the ponds” on the Calawah. I’ve heard of gear and bait fishermen taking them, but the bulk of the run has yet to arrive, and they aren’t spread out through the system by any means. There are also hatchery steelhead in the Sol Duc but, again, not a lot of them. Both rivers are low and fairly warm. Although the Calawah/Bogachiel gets a substantially larger run, the  Sol Duc may be a sleeper under the current water conditions.

I have been mostly fishing for resident and fluvial cutts on the upper parts of rivers, which are in great shape right now. I took a nice honest 12-incher this morning from a great big tank hole on one of the Quillayute System rivers. I don’t usually like to fish deep, calm spots like that unless there’s surface action, which happens mostly in the fall when baetis and Dicosmoecus bring big sea-runs to the surface. But I had spent most of the morning wading and looking for steelhead slots and pockets to fish later in the summer, and had done little actual fishing. So I decided to give the pool 10 casts. The best part was that I got the fish on a gorgeous Red Ant that Don Kaas had given me.

The day before I wore myself ragged trying to find little resident cutts on the upper tributaries of the Clearwater and didn’t catch anything but skinny little juvenile steelhead. I don’t like to do that very long, so I went home.

For the last quarter century, I’ve focused much of my June fishing on beaver ponds. Indeed, people who know me well think I’m something of a beaver pond fanatic. I’ve taken brook trout to 3 pounds and many 16 and 17 inch cutts in beaver ponds over the years. Tomorrow, I’m going to hike into a pond I found last fall while I was grouse hunting with my Lab, Lily. I don’t know if it has fish or not, but it’s big and has a good flow through it, and access to a fish-bearing stream downstream. So I’m crossing my fingers.   

Actually, the best fishing on West End rivers lately has been for spring Chinook on the Sol Duc. Quite a few have been taken this spring, and I even saw a photo of a 30-pounder, an extraordinarily big fish for the river’s largely hatchery run. Springers aren’t exactly the easiest fish to take on a fly, of course, and the Sol Duc’s are notoriously difficult. But if you are going to be on the river anyway, stop by Waters West and pick up a few of Don Kaas’s Lab Rats. They work on Sol Duc fish.

When I interviewed Jeff Delia for the summer newsletter, he told me that he was seeing lots of young-of-the-year shiner perch and sculpins in northern Hood Canal about 10 days ago. If your sand lance and herring patterns don’t get you into fish, try some flies that look like these creatures. 

The most interesting fish I have seen lately was a tuna on the beach north of Kalaloch. On one of the big low tides we had a couple weeks ago, my wife and I hiked down the trail to the tidepools. We saw six eagles in the air above the beach, and when we came to a rocky cove two more flapped off the sand. I could see a bloody carcass. I figured it was a seal or dolphin, but it turned out to be an albacore. I though that was really early for tuna, but I checked the WDFW website, and it said they can show up in June.

I have slots open for my Calawah and Sol Duc river clinics in July. If you are interested, check the Summer 2008 newlsetter. The June “My Favorite Trout Water” trip is also still open. You can read about it in the “fishing” section of the general website.

I will be doing a slide show on July 10 in Tacoma for the Puget Sound Fly Fishers; it’s a general overview of all the fly fishing options on the peninsula. On the 15th, I’ll be at South Sound Flyfishers in Olympia; my talk there will be on cutthroat in Olympic Peninsula rivers and creeks.

Needless to say, the $50 gas discount is still on for anyone who lives outside the Olympic Peninsula and books a West End trip with me.

Jeffrey Delia has lived, grown oysters, photographed and fly fished northern Hood Canal for more than 30 years. He is one of the most insightful, creative and experienced saltwater cutthroat fly fishers in the Pacific Northwest. His Delia’s Conehead Squid and White Ghost are two of the most productive cutthroat and salmon flies for Olympic Waters. Indeed, my friend Marianne Mitchell calls the Conehead Squid “that magic fly.” Earlier this spring, Jeff caught a 13 pound wild steelhead on a yellow version of the Ghost in saltwater on a 4X tippet while fishing for cutthroat.

Jeffreys flies and photos are available by contacting him at deliajeffrey@yahoo.com or at 360-765-3795.

In this interview, I asked Jeffrey how summer cutthroat fly fishing in saltwater is different from other times of year.

Question: Do you find cutthroat in different types of water and in different places in the summer?

Jeff–Over the years, it seems we’ve noticed that the fish move to the deeper part of the estuaries and the mouths of bays in warm weather. You will still see them on the surface, but it will be in deeper water. And we’ll often catch them right on the bottom. I suspect they are deeper because it’s cooler. Also, in some of the estuaries on big minus tides you can wade out to sand bars in summer and there will be fish in the deeper channels between the bars. In Quilcene Bay, I’ve caught big cutts in 30 or 40 feet of water while fishing cut-plug herring for kings. (more…)

Well, here’s the Summer Newsletter. It contains the usual description of the best fly fishing opportunities available this time of year, and my guiding and clinic schedule. In addition, I have a new essay on the Elwha that you can find in the “essay” section of the blog. I wanted to have a review of Les Johnson’s new book, but my publisher hasn’t sent me one yet. I’ll write the review as soon as I see the book, but I know it will be superb. This issue’s interview features Jeffrey Delia, one of the Olympic Peninsula’s most innovative and experienced saltwater fly fisherman. Jeff is the creator of Delia’s Conehead Squid and White Ghost, which I believe are two of the best saltwater cutthroat patterns around. You can find Jeffrey’s interview in the “interview” section of the blog. Speaking of flies, the newsletter’s summer fly pattern is the Gray and Orange, a Syd Glasso pattern that was the precursor to the Orange Heron. It’s a great summer cutthroat and steelhead fly.

My book was supposed to be available this month, but it won’t be out until until late August or early September. You can take a look at the cover, however, in the “publications” page of my website. The oil painting is of an autumn fly fisher on the Sol Duc, and it was painted by my good friend, lunch partner, and fellow Spey fly fancier, Jack Datisman. Jack did the painting of the trout about to hit a fly in my book Color of Winter, and he also painted the wonderful painting of Dick Wentworth’s 22 pound steelhead about to hit his Mr. Glasso Spey fly that hangs above the checkout stands in the Thriftway in Forks.

If you haven’t been reading my blog lately, I am currently knocking $50 off my guided trips on the West End for anglers from outside the Olympic and Kitsap peninsulas. The price of gas is obscene, and I hope this helps make it a little easier for you to book a trip with me. The discount will be in effect until the price of gas at the 76 station in Forks is below $3.75.    (more…)