The Caddis Fly: Oregon Fly Fishing Blog

Each January I head over to the Central Oregon for my annual winter Trout trip. Last year we decided to target the river’s plentiful Bull Trout for the first time. While I have had the pleasure tussling with bullish fighters as an incidental catch as I nymph for trout, I had never taken [...]

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It doesn’t seem long ago that she was my little tag-along on fishing trips and I worried more about keeping her back from the bank then catching fish when we would hit the river.  We’ve taken lots of trout trips but I admit it, I’ve been greedy with my salmon and steelhead fishing.  The rivers [...]

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Trout Creek to Harpham Flat, Nov 5-7: Eight of us set out last week from Eugene to the high desert to chase steelhead on the Deschutes River. Ethan Nickel Outfitters ran the program to celebrate the end of the ‘09 guide season and we came along for the ride, enjoying Ethan and Kyle Duke’s hard-won [...]

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Right now is my favorite time of the year to be on the Deschutes. You probably thought it was getting to be a bit late for Lower Deschutes steelhead didn’t you? Well so did everyone else, which leaves the lower section of river pretty much void of fisherman and still full of fresh steelhead. The [...]

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One of my favorite old fishing clients called me a few weeks ago. “I just booked Hickman for a couple days and I want you to be my guest!” It wasn’t a suggestion. It was an order. “Sure thing, Les. Thanks a ton!”
I hung up the phone and felt the twinge of reservation. It was [...]

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So – I had been hearing these wild reports about twenty fish days. From credible people. Steelhead, not trout. Then there were the fly fishers who would only say that “they had a good trip and yes, they did catch a FEW fish”.
It was almost more than I could bear. So, [...]

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Steelhead are tough to catch on a swung fly. We who live for this soulful pursuit are fighting big odds. So why would we want to make it even harder on ourselves by skating dry flies? Because seeing a big, sea-run rainbow chase down a dry fly is freakin’ cool, that’s why!
So when I [...]

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