Skagit River 2009

Went fishing with Bawn and John on the Skagit River. Spent the week camping, first at the river campground and then at the lake. The stars were the highlight. With a new moon and a clear high-pressure weather system, the heavens were alight against a deep, dark field. I have few words to describe what I was seeing, but the milky way went on forever. Shooting stars and satellites whizzed in the foreground. A planet (Jupiter) hung in the south like a giant, glowing marble. It was hard to find the Little Dipper because there were so many stars. Eventually, I found the Big Dipper and from that identified the bright star, Vega.

Fishing was fun, but slow in numbers of fish. Hiked up the canyon to the upper Skagit. The water was very low. Caught one fish in each of several pools. Nice rainbows. Saw some bugs, a small green stone fly, a tan mayfly and some baetis, but nothing was persistent or regular. Very few rises. Nymphs worked okay, hare's ear, green nymphs, bead heads. I used a Type I sinking line with a sinking leader on a 5 weight rod.

There were more fish in the lake; fishermen trolling in boats did well.  From a belly boat,  I hooked a large fish on a damselfly nymph, only to lose it. Landed a 16-inch fish on a 16 bead head pheasant tail with a flashabou back. At dusk, there were steady rises in the pool where the river becomes the lake. Above the lake at The Bend, things were slow again. No mid-day hatch. Caught a chunky 15-inch rainbow with a parachute BWO.

Also, see last year's post for location, etc.