Time: 10:30AM – 3:30PM

Location: Near Avon

Eagle River 04/06/2026 Photo Album

From March 27, 2026 until April 6, 2026 the Eagle River dropped from a peak of 470 CFS to today’s flows of 187 CFS. I contacted an Instagram friend, and she informed me that the river was clear, so that cinched my decision to pay a visit. Temperatures were projected to peak around 61 degrees, and I deemed the weather to be tolerable for spring fishing.

I arrived at my chosen parking space, and the temperature on the dashboard was 46 degrees. I wore my Columbia long sleeve thermal undershirt, fleece hoodie, North Face light down, and my raincoat to begin my day. Yes, I was quite bundled up. I rigged my Sage One five weight, and I ambled to the river.

Whoa! What a Start!

To start my day I chose to fish the head of a long pool with my favorite dry/dropper set up. It consisted of an amber chubby Chernobyl, a 20 incher, and an olive perdigon. I covered the upper one-fourth of the run with high expectations for twenty minutes, but disappointment was the only result. I migrated up the river along the right bank, and by the time I broke for lunch, I registered five very respectable trout. The morning catch included a thirteen and fourteen inch brown trout, a couple twelve inchers, and a stunning football of a rainbow. I do not believe it extended to twenty inches, but it made up for that with an abundance of poundage. The width of the monster far exceeded my hand. I suspect the length was around eighteen inches.

Slick Produced

I exited the river and found the path back to a bench overlooking the long pool, where I began. I munched my sandwich and warmed my feet and observed the pool, and I immediately noted sporadic rises in the lower half. I was now overheating, so I removed my raincoat and stuffed it in my backpack, as I formulated my afternoon plan. I decided to once again prospect the top one-fourth with the olive perdigon and a sparkle wing RS2. I hoped that the trout would key on the subsurface baetis nymph. If not, I was prepared to removed the three fly dry/dropper and switch to a double dry with a mole fly on the end.

Zoomed

Phase one of my plan proved to be ineffective, as no fish attacked the nymphs, even though I executed some expert drifts through the gut of the entering run. In short, the river structure looked spectacular, but my flies were not favored. I moved to the midsection and removed the dry/dropper configuration and replaced it with a peacock hippie stomper and a size 20 mole fly. I tied five additional mole flies on Sunday night in preparation for this very happenstance.

Better Sense of Width

The wind by now was gusting periodically and riffling the surface, but flurries of rises seemed to follow the gusts. The rises were fairly splashy but also sporadic. I was unable to spot a consistent feeder. I began firing downstream casts, and in a short amount of time, two fish flashed at the mole fly, but they elected to refuse. Uh oh. I have witnessed this scenario many times. Finally I made a cast and allowed the stomper and mole fly to drift downstream toward the tail, and I spotted a bulge near the hippie stomper. I quickly set and found myself attached to a very respectable fourteen inch brown trout.

Home of Brute Rainbow

My confidence in the mole fly soared, but that was the extent of my dry fly success. I spent close to an hour attempting to tempt additional risers, but I finally concluded that dwelling in the pool was a waste of time. I stripped in my line and waded to shore and climbed the bank to the path. I moved up the river and found my exit point from before lunch and cut to the river. My line still contained the double dry setup, so I quickly hiked to a wide slow moving section and paused to inspect for rises, but none were evident. I bit the bullet and returned to the dry/dropper. I retained the chubby Chernobyl and olive perdigon, but I placed a silver bullet in the upper nymph position.

The Large Pool

For the remainder of the afternoon I deployed the three fly system, and I boosted the fish count from six to eleven. At one point the flies got lodged under a large boulder, and I was unable to rescue due to unsafe water depth, so I snapped the nymphs off. If you are counting, that was two lost tungsten beads. I opted to replace the silver bullet with a beadhead hares ear and knotted a new olive perdigon to the line. The afternoon action was slow, but I did manage to land five trout. Three were under twelve inches but another chunky rainbow graced my net. This one was slightly shorter than number five, but it was also very husky. The afternoon rainbow emerged from a swirly eddy area behind several exposed boulders.

Perfect

At 3:30PM I was quite weary, so I found a path and climbed the bank and returned to the car. Monday’s outing was satisfactory, although the action was not as hot as several of my March stream visits. Nevertheless I reached double digits and two of my catch were spectacular rainbows in the sixteen to eighteen inch range and very thick. I also netted a pair of hard fighting brown trout in the fourteen to fifteen inch range. I enjoyed a bit of dry fly action, although my success rate was lacking. This was the first instance that the mole fly did not exceed or even meet my expectations. Was a size 20 too large? Perhaps I need to tie some 22’s.

Swirling Area Behind Exposed Rock Produced

Will I be able to fish the Eagle River again before run off commences in earnest? I will keep my eye on the weather and the flow charts just in case.

Fish Landed: 11