Truckee River Fly Fishing Report

Jordan Romney Reports on 6.25.18

Truckee

Flows are really really good right now. Water temps are great in the morning and evenings and the fish are eating well. They started dumping water out of Lake Tahoe so the upper stretches of the river have swelled a bit. It has really just affected the Glenshire stretch in a good way. Flows in the mid river and lower canyon are perfect right now. The LT has been too low for me to fish. 100cfs with how crowded its been doesn’t excite me. Plus I’e heard that it isn’t fishing very well and the bugs are stunted. The best fishing is early right now. It will continue to be this way the entire summer. We are getting a short window of dry fly action midmorning. It seems that the hatches happen earlier higher up in the
river and a little later down low. There are several bugs out during this time. Small caddis are buzzing around, baetis, pmds, and a few sprinkled green drakes. The drakes have been out a little bit but the fish are more tuned into the pmds. We’ve been turning a few fish at early light on streamers. Check out the photo of this dead Paiute Sculpin. By far the biggest one I’ve ever seen. No wonder these fish can get so big eating these. As soon as there is too much light on the water the fish aren’t into moving far for a meal. I think they don’t
like to expose themselves and give their position away like that. Less light they feel better about chasing down a meal. Out side of that indicator fishing in riffles has been productive. The bite slows down a bit in the afternoon for a period while the water temps are increasing. This is a good time to blind cast a bit dry.
Try and ant or golden stone pattern on cut banks or soft edges. Make the meal easy.

The sundowner right now is really good. My wife and I fished it the other day and the fish were popping like popcorn. There were a ton of yellow sallies out but I don’t think fish like the taste of those very much. They are really into the caddis, especially the pupae. It is a really good time to try a dry dropper
in the surface film.

Quick story: I hooked a pretty good fish while doing a demo for my guests. I tried to hand off the rod to
them but they insisted that I land it. Away I went chasing this thing downstream. I crossed the river and
still had to run down. I got to a point where I had to swim back across to land it. Luckily I was wet wading so I had the option. Check the photo!