Fly Fishing on Whychus Creek Today.

I took a break from rod building today and ventured out on Whychus Creek below our house here in Sisters, Oregon.  It’s about 400 feet down a steep canyon to get to the water, but rather than climb down the hillside from my house, I drove over to a nice trailhead on the other side of the creek just across from our house.  It’s about a mile hike from the trailhead down a nice trail to the creek.  This area get’s almost no people fishing these waters so I was pretty excited to see how I would do.  The creek is a nice water level this time of the summer, and the water temperature was still nice and cool.  Because it’s small water and quite overgrown with trees, I selected my 7′  0″  4 wt Signature Series bamboo fly rod for the day.  Some of the smaller fish were willing to take dry flies but it wasn’t until I changed over to nymphs that I got into half a dozen  nicer fish in the 11″ to 12″ range.  I had the creek to myself and loved my time searching the creek for “fishy water”.  And…I also donated quite a few flies in the tree branches along the stream edge.  Here are a few photos of my morning adventure:

Here I am at the edge of Whychus Creek with my 7′ 0″ 4 wt bamboo fly rod.

Some nice pocket water where I picked up several good fish on nymphs.

Several little rainbows showed interest in my dry flies.

A beautiful 12″ rainbow that took a #16 Pheasant Tail Nymph.

Yep, there is my house about 400 ft. up from the creek at the top of the canyon.

Fishing Whychus Creek

We had a break in the weather yesterday and Mary Ann and I got the chance to fish Whychus Creek, a small local creek where some great restoration efforts have been going to help bring back the salmon and steelhead runs from years ago.  The water was a little high and off-colored from recent rains, but still very fishable.  A quick bug sampling showed a mix of small mayfly nymphs, a few caddis, and stoneflies.  Mary Ann and I both took our 7′  0″  4 wt bamboo rods, perfect for this little stream.  While we didn’t catch a lot of fish, we picked up a few on nymphs, including a nice 11″ native rainbow that took a #16 red serendipity.  Here are a few photos from our afternoon.

A view of Whychus Creek from the bluff above.

A view of Whychus Creek from the bluff above.

Off-Color water but still very fishable.

Off-Color water but still very fishable.

Some of the bugs we sampled from the creek

Some of the bugs we sampled from the creek

A nice 11" native rainbow I picked up

A nice 11″ native rainbow I picked up