By Lucas Holmgren, The Mountain Times
Pacific Northwest veterans know that winter can be a beautiful season in Washington and Oregon. Yes, the rain can be torrential, or relentless, but the breaks in between are worth it. If you’ve got layers and appropriate rain gear that truly covers and protects, the winter season can be an outdoor paradise.
For those who have been “hooked” by the almighty steelhead (an ocean-going rainbow trout), winter is when thousands of winter-run steelhead start to return. With a few showing up early, most of the return happens between Christmas and early April. An Internet search of “WDFW hatchery steelhead smolt plants” will show you how many fish were planted in Washington rivers and a lot can be discovered by researching hatcheries near you. Hatchery smolt plants are juvenile steelhead that will out-migrate to the Pacific and return in a few years. They have a clipped and healed scar where their adipose fin once was. Wild steelhead will have an intact adipose fin. In almost every river, harvest of wild steelhead is prohibited, so make sure you know which is which.
The exciting element of winter-run steelhead is the widespread opportunity. For lower Columbia River tributaries and coastal rivers from northern California through southern Alaska, almost every river and sizeable creek gets a return of steelhead. However, they are called “gray ghosts” for a reason.
Here are a few tips about when to fish for winter steelhead based on weather. Techniques are better left to the fishing magazines and Youtube videos you’ll find. These tips apply to winter
steelhead, but also trout and salmon.
Rain can be your friend, but heavy rain can ruin the fishing.
Afternoons in cold months can be the best time of day for getting a steelhead to bite.
Dramatic weather changes and temperature changes are either REALLY good for fishing, or more likely, really bad.
If you look at a water gauge graph on a river and it’s peaked recently and is now on a steady drop, that’s a good time to go.
If it’s been cold but stable for several days, fish will often start biting again. If water temperature suddenly drops several degrees overnight, you can still catch fish but may need to fish slower and smaller lures/baits.
These are a few general concepts regarding water temperature and weather. Winter is unpredictable but can bring about some of the best fishing of the year.
Best of luck out there! And if you’d like to listen to stories and interviews about fishing on a podcast I host, look up the “Salmon Trout Steelheader” Podcast on your favorite podcast app.