Hoot Owl On The Spokane

Its turning out to be a poo sandwich of a water year across the Northwest.  High water temps are effecting just about every drainage.

Unless you didn't know cold water fish have a hell of a time with survival in rising water temps. Optimal temps are below 60 degrees and as you move up, there's less dissolved oxygen in the water. Catching and playing a trout in the upper 60s is a bad move and 70's can be a death sentence even with proper catch and release principals in effect

Take a look at this chart for reference

The Spokane River is no exception.  Right now there are portions of the upper river in the Spokane Valley that are well beyond the 70 degree range.

Due to the aquifer influence on this river system, trout do have some refuge in the recharge zones that are keeping the water temps in the lower 60s...but heres what you need to consider in these conditions.

If you just HAVE to fish on the Spokane River right now, get your butt out of bed as the sun comes up.  Hoot Owl restrictions should be in place but official restrictions haven't been put in place yet.  As anglers we have to be the most stanch advocates for our water and fish, and we should self regulate to fish only in the early morning.    In my opinion, the evening portion of hoot owl hours is a joke, because the water hasnt had the time to cool overnight.  

Go buy a cheap thermometer and monitor the water temps.  If you hit 65, get the hell out of the water

Dont be a trout snob and go rediscover warm water species.  Bass are amazing targets right now, as are crappie, bluegills and dont get me started on carp.  

If you're reading this, you owe it to the fish to tell other anglers what's going on.  Avista's going to drop the river to it's absolute minimum flow out of the Post Falls dam and it's going to get even worse for the fish and the watershed.  Fish are going to congregate in the the cool water recharge zones and it's just not fair.   Did I mention carp fishing is amazing?

Think about it, we have a recovering river after 100 years of mis-use.  Lets give it a break while hell's kitchen keeps it's oven blazing.

The Heart of Spokane...

Heart Connections from Kimbo on Vimeo.


I cant be more excited about how the Spokane River community is taking more and more action to restore the lifeblood of our town.  

The river needs more advocates.  Advocates are the voices of restoration.  More restoration means more fish and a healthy river.  Win, win, win.

Get more info about the Spokane River Forum by clicking HERE

Ma Lady's On The Sticks....

On our first date almost a decade ago, I asked the question

"So, do you like to fish?"

"Oh yeah, I used to fish all the time with my dad"

Check that off the list, this girls awesome

It's almost become a running joke in our near 8 year marriage, she's never gone on the river with me.   But really, who could blame her.  I live on the lunatic fringe of fly fishing, reveling in getting up at 4am to fish in cold water all day.

Non the less, I was determined.  Just get on the boat, and you'll have a great time.

Finally yesterday she hopped in the raft for our first rafting/fishing adventure

About a half mile into the raft she says...."I want to row"

Now to put it plainly, the Spokane River is not one to begin your rowing career.  But alas, there's no way to get experience than putting your hands on the oars and getting after it

It wasn't perfect, but she's a quick learner.  The art of reading a river's hydrology takes time to get a handle on but with good instruction from the river's new Riverkeeper, Jerry White....she's off and running in her river rowing career

I'm a happy man.    Here's to more great adventures with my lovely wife from here on out.

Now to get her to double haul.

Alaskan Rainbows in the Spokane?

The picture really doesnt do this fish justice.  It's the top end of what you'll see on the home river.....deep thick shoulders, huge head and jaw and the telltale red stripe of native trout to the Spokane.

More than anything on this particular fish, was the pronounced and detailed amount of spots that went from nose to tail.

Looks a lot like the leopard rainbows out of Alaska.  But no, it's not.  This guy lives 5 minutes from my house.

The Interloper...

That aint no redband....

The Spokane is a notoriously bad dry fly river.  Plumes of caddis will hover over great water with nary a break in the surface.  The native Redband Rainbows of have a strange adaptation to give the middle finger to most dry flies.  Every once and a while you get one or two to loose their mind and break from tradition, but it's rare to the point that usually, I dont even bring dry flies with me

With the dog days of summer in full swing, I too eschewed my traditional routine and brought a dry fly rod rigged with a Chubby to see if the fish were looking up, at all....in the hopes of intercepting a hopper.

Well the faux hopper was blown up, violently by this interloper to the Spokane system

It makes sense why this rarity rose up to smash the fly.  Westslope Cutthroat tend to do that

Occasionally one of these is found in the Spokane River.  High water events push them from the North Idaho streams,  past dams and into the lower river, but it's a journey that doesn't happen often

Big and healthy, my guess is this guy had been in the river a while.  God, I wish there were more of them.

Down on the Banks of the Spokane

Hey Lady, I found yer bra.

The Spokane River always surprises you.  It's banks are littered with the remnants of the metropolis it flows through and always, always I am ready to go around a bend or to the next run and find a body

Two years ago a friend on a guide trip he was running found a body taco'd around a log.  The only logical thing we could say wasnt about finding the body, it was when we were going back to throw flesh flies after they recovered the body

Joking, just joking.

That aside, the stuff you find is unreal.  Years back I found a stack of death certificates.  Another fisherman found an antique pistol in the water near downtown.  Maybe that's the one that will solve the  timber barron mystery of decades past.  That shit's evidence mang!

You can always find the lone shoe

They never come in pairs.  Flip flops are the most prevalent but if your lucky, a basketball shoe.

Beer can after beer can.  Blankets swept high in the trees by the spring floods.  Tampon applicators, 40 oz malt liquor bottles, clothing, random bags of chips, hair spray bottles, golf balls...you name it, construction debris....you name it, it's there

But the amazing thing, the trout dont care.   They still eat, jump and live a wild life amongst the trash of city

Latah Creek...

I drive across this little stream every day on my way to work.  It hides a past of extreme productivity and now bears the burden of dams and agriculture.

Latah Creek, likely named from the Nez Perce word for "fish" was once a very important natal stream for salmon and steelhead reproduction.

It's other name, Hangman Creek also denotes a past of violence as in 1854 a band of Palouse Indians were hung along the banks of the creek.  Growing up in Spokane, that's the name everyone knew it by and only recently did the official name revert to it's more PC name.

Still, I look at this little ditch with a tinge of sadness.  The Upper Columbia system was built for salmon and steelhead. 

Livingston Stone, the United States Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries, wrote in his 1885 annual report about his observations of the Spokane River fishery in 1883:

“The Spokane always has been famous as a salmon River … Indians from all quarters assemble in the fall on this river and at the mouth of the Little Spokane to get their winter’s stock of salmon.”

This little creek that I drive over now takes an onslaught of silt from the wheat fields and agricultural lands to the south where it's headwaters originate.  Huge sandbanks, and I mean HUGE sit at the termination point with the Spokane River.  Its absolute quicksand and blows out the Spokane River for miles on a hard spring rain or in runoff. 

It's easy to think about how fish jammed up the big brawling Columbia River, then into the Spokane River and finally into this little creek.  The creek was the sanctuary they needed to reproduce, along with the Little Spokane and various other streams in the system.

Now, it's a ditch with zero salmon, steelhead and very few trout.  It runs super hot in the summer and stays a variable color of brown year round. 

As we work to restore this creek and others like it, my motivation to help comes from the thought of what was.  Our efforts to get it back to what was may never fully happen but its always better than what is, right now

There are hundreds if not thousands of these little creeks across this country.  What are you doing to see they stay healthy and or are recovering to their former glory?

A Side Benefit of Fishing The Spokane....

Oh the glorious Spokane River

When you hook up, you get to work on a skill set that you don't have the opportunity to perfect on other rivers.

In this case, dodge the floating bleach containers as the redband rainbow runs circles around it. 

Then, get your recycle on....

Dont Stare Into The Glowing Orb...

Because it makes it tough to locate your fly in the flow. 

There's your fly fishing tip of the day.....

Just keep on checking back in for these type of fishing revelations.  You can thank me later.

Today's Haul

You see some crazy stuff when you're on the Spokane.  Today for a quick trip, I tried to pay attention to what I saw on the ground, so here's today's haul.

14 Poweraide bottles
4 Mountain Dew 2 Liters
1 half of a a laptop computer
1 human hand
2 worm containers
1 beach ball, deflated
7 flip flops, but never a pair
3 Shoes
1 A-Track player
2 empty jewelry boxes
10 different varieties of beer, but nothing over the $6 for a six pack kind
some sort of carpet
1 human foot

And oh yeah, a couple of these....thank god.

The Tale of the Tagged Trout...

Last Sunday to beat the winter blues, we hit the Spokane River  for a couple hours. 

What we got was one hell of a fish tale.

In the last run of the day, the indicator slammed down and I was fast connected with a fish.  Typical winter rainbow fight in cold water and to hand came a beautiful redband rainbow native to the Spoke.

Just behind the dorsal fin, this fish had a little jewelry

Since 2007 in different sections throughout the river, different factions of Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Avista Utilities and The Bonneville Power Administration have conducted population assessments on Spokane River Trout.

On this particular trout, I rubbed off the grime off the tag, found the number 1023 and called the Spokane office of the WDFW. 

A few days later,  Chuck Lee the fishery biologist from the Department of Fish and Wildlife informed me a little more on this fish's life as well as their system of population surveys.

This particular pescado was previously found by Chuck within 300 yards of where I found him.  At the time, it was 14 inches and approximately a pound and a half.   Since that day, my guess is that the fish was somewhere between 15 or 16 inches and close to 2 pounds.  

Some of the other findings that I found very interesting was that the majority of fish in this section of the river are found continually within 500 meters range of when they were last surveyed. 

In recent years, there are rays of hope for the river.  Escapement from different sections of the river seem to be minimal.  There seems to be a nice level of different age classes and at least in the lower river, good levels of spawning recruitment.

Browns are comprising a very, very small portion of the population in the lower river.

The Upper River from Idaho through the Spokane Valley behaves completely different from the Lower River West of downtown.    The middle river through downtown is it's own system as it is bound by different damns and impoundments.  There are threats to the trout population throughout.  From dewatering of spawning gravel to the legacy of hard metal mining poloution to non native fish introduction like Smallmouth bass, the trout are a tough bunch and we need to know more how to help them.

That's what Chuck and his team are dedicated to.
 
Hopefully the 10 year period of population assessment on the entire river will give us a better picture on the native Redbands in the Spokane.   Given more opportunities to thrive through understanding, better flows, stream-side restoration and cleanup, these fish should have a fighting chance.

An Eternal Question...To Drink or Not To Drink

Yesterday on the river, we were posed a pretty damn serious question.

"When you find unopened booze on the river, do you drink it?'

Now here's a 1994 Sav Blanc from the Caterina Winery that I found in a picnic backpack, fully sealed and corked. Obviously it was lost on the river, floated along and found a home.  Recent high water dislodged it and brought it to the run we fished. 

So there it was, staring me in the face.  A family dinner that night would have been the right time to sample it's contents.

Previously all I have found on the river was a derelict, tossed aside Natural Light.  The question there was easy....hells no

But here's a 18 year old bottle of wine from a great wine maker.

Shit, what to do?


If you have suggestions and or stories just like this, shoot me an email and I will repost on the blog.

While Cars Fly By Overhead....

OMR connects with a native Spokane River Bow.

It will always amaze me how people ask me wtih a tinge of disbelief

"You catch fish down there?'

Why yes, yes we do....

Foreground...Background, Spokane River

Foreground--A beautiful nymph run that I pulled a few beautiful, wild redband rainbows out of.

Backgound--no, that isnt a nuclear plant.  Just the place where Spokane's "Sheet" is reclaimed.  We locals call it the poo plant.

Urban fishery huh?  Yep

Murph Dog...River Enthusiast..

Someone else in my household also loves her river time.  Almost looks like she was posing for this one.

Trout, Beer and a Little Bristol Bay...

So if you're buying, I do have a hankering for the Northern Lights Crystal Bitter

Just saying...

But back to the point, if you're in town, you probably should go to this meeting, member of TU or not.  I am excited to hear the perspective of Dwayne Meadows, Bristol Bay National Outreach Director of TU Alaska.

See you there.

Hey Dad, Take Me To The River...

Well, he didnt actually say that, but I could tell that's what he was saying while he was "talking" to me.

After a long weekend of pretty intense teething pain, Big C's first trip the the river was great.

The wife saddled up the kiddo in the backpack, Murph Dog bounded around and I threw a few casts into some great water.

One thing's for sure...

I'm a pretty lucky dude...

Spokane River Poachers, You Suck Ass

Not an elusive creature, the Spokane River Poacher is easily found.    In a highly visible, highly trafficked area on the Spokane (Peaceful Valley), you continued to fish even after Wayne from Maine told you that:

1.  It's illegal to fish with bait

2.  It's illegal to fish with barbed hooks

and here's the kicker

3.  It's illegal to retain wild redband rainbows in this part of the river. 

Also, double points for teaching your family a good angling ethic.  Dont think you'll do a good job in releasing the fish, if you planned to do so as you wrench them up the 20 feet from the water to the deck of the bridge.

And lastly, good luck explaining the the sheriff as Wayne did a fantastic job documenting the offense as well as your license plate number.

Good gawd, get a clue folks.

If you're out on the Spokane and notice poaching activity, please call this number and hopefully one of our good crime fighters will respond in a prompt manner.  Our offending party left before the law arrived.

Spokane Poaching Hotline-- 509-227-6560

More Crazy Spokane River "Occurances"...

A.K.A.....weird ass shit you see while fishing the Spokane River.

Yesterday I took the opportunity to head down to my home waters for a quick jaunt through the pocket water of the Bowl and Pitcher.  Part of Riverside State Park, it's full of mountain bike and hiking trails...it's truly a great place to escape the city and at times can make you forget you're amongst 500,000 other humanoids.    So yes, its a gorgeous place and I feel lucky to have it 5 minutes from my house.

To get to the other side of the river, there is an iconic hanging bridge that goes over the river and allows access to the best wade fishing for about a mile stretch of the river. 

Now here's where it gets weird.  Across the bridge I go, up the trail to where it connects to a network of main trails.  Taking a right, I damn near ran smack into a car just like this.  A 1992 Ford Tempo

Knowing the history of our river, I always feel like I am on the cusp of finding a body....in the water or not.  I know it's going to happen.  Staring back at me is this car on a trail, I thought it was my time to smell the stench. 

Now a bit of background to where this car is.  To get to this location, it would have had to access this particular access road from about 3 miles away, break 3 gates to get through, drive on the Centennial Trail for quite a ways and then past the night patrols of the park rangers.  All in all, it took some work and gumption to pull this one off.  If someone was stole it and was joy riding...I can think of about 400 other places to dump a car that wouldnt have taken near as much work.

Needless to say, I approached the car with a serious degree of trepidation.   I could already see one window busted out.  Was someone hiding in the bushes ready to ambush?  Was Sasquatch behind this?

Turns out nothing of interest was in the car, just some kids toys thank god.   I jumped on the phone to the ranger

Me--"um, do you guys know you have a early 90's Ford Tempo parked up here above the hanging bridge?"

Ranger--in disbelief..."WHAT?"

Me--"Yep, just parked here...might want to come check it out"

Ranger--"Well holy sh&*t, we'll be right there"

Off I went to fish, still in disbelief of where this prime example of American automobile engineering had made it to.

Thankfully, these guys were all I found for the rest of the day.

Any other great Spokane River stories you'd like shared here....send them my way via email and I will post it up.  Thanks!

Things You Hear While Fishing the Spokane...

Plain and simple...The Spokane River attracts weirdos.  It's an urban river fishery, but good gawd do you see and hear some funny shit.

Case in point:  After finishing a particularly successful post work session on the 'Can...my buddies and I were walking from the river towards the car on a pathway when we walked by a mother and her two little kids.  As we get by her, she says "Hey, you guys remind me"

Us..."really, what of?'

Lady " you remind me of A River Runs Through"

Us  ---staring back blankly....not sure what to say

We waited for her to finish the full title of the movie. 

"It" never happened.

So we walked away......thanked the lady for the compliment and filed under crazy shit you hear while fishing the Spokane.