Time: 4:00PM -6:00PM

Location: National Forest

Elk River 08/07/2023 Photo Album

Jane and I set up camp and did an out and back hike for an hour during the early afternoon. Once the tent was erected, I prepared to fish. Temperatures were in the low sixties with dark threatening clouds for much of my two allotted hours, although it never rained. Flows were higher than normal for the first week of August. Jane dropped me off next to the stream to eliminate hiking time and maximize fishing time, and I fished back to the campground. Before I embarked on my brief fly fishing excursion, I assembled my Orvis Access four weight, and I began my effort to catch fish with a peacock hippie stomper and gray size 14 stimulator.

Before I could make my first cast, I was forced to bash through some tough branches, and then I clambered over large, slippery boulders. The Elk River in this area actually flowed through a narrow canyon, and the character of the stream alternated between plunge pools and whitewater. Wading along the edge was an exercise in caution, rock climbing and branch avoidance.

Typcial Deep Shelf Pool

I positioned myself below an attractive swirling shelf pool for my first cast, and nothing responded, but on number two cast I spotted a swirl, and my fly disappeared. A swift set followed, but I felt no weight and, thus, assumed I was victimized by a refusal. Wrong. I stripped in my line and discovered it was devoid of flies and displayed only a curlicue; the telltale sign of a bad knot. I uttered some unmentionable words and knotted two more of the same flies to my line.

I Love the Speckles on the Tail

Finally I began to fly fish in earnest, and I landed three trout over the next hour. My catch included a cutthroat, a brook trout, and a brown trout. I was a rainbow trout short of a grand slam in one hour of fishing. The cutthroat measured around twelve inches, and it displayed gorgeous pastel coloration. The brook trout was barely over my six inch minimum, and the brown trout was a healthy twelve incher. The cutty grabbed the hippie stomper, while the brookie and the brown attacked the trailing light gray deer hair caddis. I swapped the stimulator for a caddis early in my fishing venture.

Pleased with This Brown Trout

By 5:30 the action stalled, so I converted to a tan pool toy hopper with a trailing beadhead hares ear. These flies were out of favor, so I added an iron sally to achieve more depth in the plunge pools, but the ploy was not effective. I reached a place, where I was “walled out”, and this forced me to scale a bank to the road. Once I was along the shoulder I looked back down to the canyon, and I could not bring myself to attempt another bout of extreme exertion. The quality of the fishing did not justify the effort required.

I hiked back to the bridge near the campground, and I prospected upstream, but the results were disappointing. I tried a Chernobyl ant solo, and in a last gasp attempt, I added a cinnamon comparadun, after I spotted a pale morning dun over the water. By six o’clock I was wasted, so I returned to the campsite for refreshments.

Monday was a slow start to my much anticipated trip to the Elk River. The main deterrent to more fish was the very challenging wading conditions. When I gazed back at the canyon near the end of the day, I was actually astounded that I fished as much as I did. Landing one trout of three separate species was also a welcome outcome on Monday, August 7, 2023.

Fish Landed: 3