An Early Goodbye to Spring Fishing

This was a really interesting steelhead season to say the least.  There were fish early, but then the water went up, and up, and up.  Fishing was all over the place.  Some days were great (double digit fish) and there were even a few skunkaroos.  It's been unseasonably warm (just like everywhere else) and last weekend really put us over the top.  We had record highs in the 80s and the Salmon went from a fishable 2000 cfs to about 5000 cfs this morning.  Paddy had to cancel all of his trips this week.  On Saturday, Mark McCoy, a Stanley resident and member of Micky and the Motorcars was floating the Salmon and fishing and drown about 100 yards from Paddy and Carl's teepee.  You can read more about Saturday's accident here.  This was just another reminder that the water is always in charge. 

Last night Paddy and I went to Mormon Bend to pack up the teepee and I took the video below at Shotgun, a rapid about 5 miles downstream of their camp.

The river has gone up even more since last night.  Needless to say, I think steelhead season is over.