It was a typical Spring day in the Willamette Valley with spitting rain, warming sun and a mid-day March Brown hatch on the Middle Fork of the Willamette River yesterday. The water had just jumped from about 400cfs to about 1200 out of Hills Creek dam and conventional wisdom suggested we should have fished the McKenzie. But hey you never know right?
Fishing was terrible in the morning! Dredging with Golden Stone Nymphs and Mega Prince in spots that have produced trip after trip for years, yielded very little action. Around 1pm things started to look up, finally the thingamabobber started to drop in obvious buckets!
At 2:01pm the bugs started and depending upon wind, rain, and sun, were around for about 90 minutes. In the two or three spots we found fishing rising, the fish weren’t particularly selective. Several March Brown patterns worked well. Nymphing continued to produce until around 4:30pm when things slowed to a stop and we arrived at the Black Canyon ramp.
Best Patterns for the Middle Fork: Mega Prince Size 8, Golden Stone Nymphs in size 6 March Brown Sparkle Dun 14 and Purple Rooster size 14
Leaders were 9ft 4x and tippet 4x Rio Fluoroflex.
Kudos for honest reporting and sweet fish pics!!
Thrilled to see good news! The day before on the McKenzie was horrid, with hail stones outnumbering hatch 10,000:1. The hail on my line deck sounded like a drum roll on a snare drum. Spring in Oregon.