Olympic Peninsula Summer Steel head

Seems like there are plenty of steelhead, sockeye, and trout to go around.  Because of larger than usual returns of steel head the usual spots are a bit crowded, luckily larger returns mean fish get into many more places.  There are still tons of spots that have good fish and are receiving little or no pressure.

On the Quilayute system the steel head are in that awkward phase right now, not quite fresh enough o be stone cold stupid, not quite hungry enough to be looking for bugs.  This makes them tough to catch except for early or late in the day, in three or four weeks the caddis hatch will kick in and these fish will start to stupid up fast.

Right now you have to be content with a morning bite, or, a trip down south.  The glacial rivers south of Forks also seem to have good numbers, although the water is still a bit high and cold the fish will come well to a swung fly at any point of the day.  Don’t expect big numbers, but a fish or two to swing anglers has been the norm and the rivers have been down right lonely. 

Trout fishing has been good in a casual sort of way, enough medium size fish on top to make for a fun evening almost anywhere.

Summer Coho are right around the bend; we should have fishable numbers any day now.

All in all its summer, if you get up early and fish carefully a bright summer steel head and a handful of trout seem to be about what you can expect.

Joe casts at a huge summer steelhead, it does not bite.