Reflections On A Perplexing 2024 Dry Fly Steelhead Season

October on the Clearwater River, Idaho

 Each year brings hopes and dreams as to the propects for dry fly steelhead success.  2024 turned out to be a year of decent winter steelhead returns on the Willamette system with the best numbers since 2004.  The surprising numbers of winter steelhead ascending Willamette falls prompted me to put some time into chasing them on the Willamette system.  I was able to hook into several wild winter steelhead on Winter's Hopes and General Practitioners on heavy irons while fishing a dry line on my long rods in March and April.

Dry Line Steelhead taken on 5/0 General Practitioner variant.  3/15/24 (17'7" 9/10wt Godshall Custom)

On a mild spring day in early April, I decided to fish a skunk-themed  Bivisibomber and while talking to my wife Wendi on the phone, a steelhead attacked the fly near the dangle.  After a spirited fight, I was surprised to find the steelhead to be a winter kelt and smaller than I thought, but the thrills she provided on a day of low expectations was a great surprise.

Dry Fly winter kelt 4/5/24 (17'11" 8/9wt Godshall Custon)

On a late April day, I came across a couple early summer runs that approved of my simple, McMillan style muddler and I was able to land one of them after a hot battle.  Surprisingly, this was the first steelhead I had ever landed on a muddler.  I know muddlers are a staple fly for many folks, but I don't fish them as much as I should, for some reason.

Early Summer Run that ate a McMillan style Muddler.  17'7' 9/10wt Godshall custom

As spring progressed, I noted that the summer steelhead numbers over Willamette falls were shaping up well also.  Viable numbers were showing by April so I began fishing my homewaters in earnest by then.  Gear fisherman were getting into a few early summer runs in April and May but things seemed to be getting off to a slow start,even for the deeper running crowd.

I finally raised a local summer run to the surface in late May to my latest version of the "Freebird".  This steelhead was of the one and done variety and would not come back.  Water levels remained at high summer levels for most of the season which called for adjustments in areas I was fishing and my game plan changed accordingly.

My first solid hookup for the summer came in mid June as an average sized summer run gulped a night dancer themed Freebird fished on a broad smooth flat.  I got this spunky hatchery hen within twenty feet of me when the hook pulled out.  I was hoping that this steelhead would have signaled things to come, but surface fishing remained slow.  Steelhead rises were infrequent and mostly non-committal which seemed inconsistent with the good numbers of summer steelhead that continued to come over Willamette falls.  Catch reports by gear fisherman became more regular as more and more local anglers started fishing their local waters again, realizing there were actually steelhead to be caught.  After so many lean years with small returns, the excitement of a good summer steelhead run quickly caught on.

Freebird

I finally landed my first local summer steelhead for the season in late July when a robust hatchery hen attacked a Freebird with a big explosion and was instantly off to the races.  I was able to pull the spunky fighter into some quiet water along a gravel bar and after getting some photos, released the hard won prize as I have grown lazy with retaining steelhead in recent years.  This steelhead served to break in my 18'5" 8/9wt  Night Dancer themed custom Steve Godshall built rod.

First local dry fly steelhead landed for 2024.  Taken on #4 Freebrid.  7/21/24

August continued to be a month of sporadic surface responses from the local summer steelhead.  Rises were inconsistent with just a couple surface steelhead hooked and lost.  Surprisingly, water levels continued to be on the high side of normal for summer, so many of my typical haunts could not be fished except for short windows when the Army Corps decided to lower river levels.

In early September, I decided to take a trip to the lower Deschutes and invited my 17 year old grandson KJ to come along.  KJ has developed a passion for fly fishing over the past few years and he quickly became proficient with casting and catching trout on the Willamette and McKenzie.  I had given KJ my Cabela's TLR 11' 7wt and JW Young 3 3/4" Pridex so he could try his hand at steelheading.  

The Deschutes was also experiencing a good return of steelhead and salmon with strong numbers coming over Bonneville dam.  As we made our way up river, we periodically came across gear fisherman heading home after "catching their limit".  Steelhead and salmon could be seen rolling and splashing with regularity through the day.  Fishing success was so regular that you wouldn't hear the typical whooping and hollering when folks had a fish on.  The catching became so ordinary that folks were just hauling fish in with minimal fanfare. The crowds were in evidence, but to be expected with the first banner return of steelhead and salmon in a few years.

We chose spots to fish not so much based on what we preferred, but more on where space was available.  As evening approached, we found ourselves in a stretch of water that fished a swung fly well and was devoid of fisherman.  KJ got in below me and I started up a hunderd yards above.  Steelhead and salmon continued to roll and splash all around.  By the time I worked out about 3/4's of my 68' Boss long head, and steelhead charged at my #6 Bivisbomber.  A few more rises followed and I was unable to hook into the player.  I couple more steelhead came up with repeated rises as I continued down, and again, I was unble to hook into to these playful steelhead.  As I got closer to KJ's position, a fourth steelhead came to the surface and I was finally able to feel the pull of a steelhead against my 16'6" BW Walker.  After a brief tug of war, the average sized steelhead was able to escape the hook.

KJ was able to witness my hookup with a dry fly steelhead and I decided to cut off the #6 grinch themed Bivisibomber and handed it to him to try his luck.  We resumed our positions and went back to vying for any other willing steelhead that might entertain us.   A few minutes went by and then I noticed KJ's rod bent under the weight of a steelhead fighting.  I reeled up and waded down to join KJ in enjoying his first experience in hooking into a dry fly steelhead.  As the steelhead got closer, I began coaching KJ in trying to lead the steelhead towards shore so I could help tail it for him.  Just as I was visioning getting a photo of KJ with his first dry fly steelhead, the line went limp.  Sadly the leader broke off in the tippet section.  We still celebrated the blessing of KJ's first dry fly steelhead hookup as that steelhead provided all the thrills one hopes for with getting a steelhead to rise.

KJ and I headed back to the same run the following morning.  I experienced multiple steelhead coming to the surface with repeated rises, but could not get them on the hook. 

We then moved to a run further downstream and I started in above KJ.  We were tighter to the bank so I was making compact casts as I was working out the 73' head of the Vector xl line on my Meiser 17' 10/11 CX.  I had about 2/3s of the long head out when a gulp came to the #4 Grinch and a Steelhead was instantly tight to the reel.   After a short run, the steelhead readily came towards me when it decided to take off on a blistering run, producing a beautiful scream from my 1920s vintage 4 1/2" Perfect.  After a few more back and forth maneuvers, I was able to the steelhead towards the bank as I grabbed the leader.  KJ was able to witness the flight then got a few pics of gramps with the hatchery steelhead of 8-9lbs

In late September, I took a trip to the Bulkley River, BC with friend Mike Bell.  Mike was gracious enough to do all the driving on our long trek to northern BC while I had a the luxury of relaxing and tying flies during the drive.  I cautiously watched the weather reports as we approached our destination with forecasts for rain in the coming days.

We finally arrived in the Smithers area and got settled into a cozy Air B and B that Mike's wife Janice found for us.  I reached out to some local contacts and folks were indicating that the river was running low and the rain would be welcomed to bump river levels and freshen the mood of the steelhead.

Mike and I were bank bound so I had gotten some intel on access points to some water I had accessed by boat on prior trips.  Day one found us on a familiar run not far below a popular boat launch.  With 2024 being a banner return year, we were fortunate to find this prime water open.  Water levels were on the low end of perfect and Mike and I anxiously got to work with our custom built 18' rods built by Steve Godshall.

We covered a good amount of water as this area lends to fishing one long run that transitions right into another long run.  I confidently fished a dry fly all day and Mike fished his beautiful wet flies in the surface film with a dry line.  We ended the day after fishing another beautiful run at the another access point a few miles downstream.

On Day 2, we set out to repeat the same routine as the day before.  We found the river fishable, but definitely on the rise with the rain overnight.  We found small bits of moss getting caught on our flies at an annoying rate due to the rising water washing debris downstream.  We intended closing out the day on some water below Telkwa but found the river totally blown from the Telkwa river downstream.

The weather forecast was calling for increased rain with predictions of an atmospheric river coming down.  That evening, Mike and I came to the sad conclusion that our trip timing to BC was less than perfect and we would be heading back to the US the following day.  We made quick plans to finish off our week on the lower Deschutes river since fishing seemed to be good when I was there earlier in the month.

We spent 3 days on the lower Deschutes and it seemed fishing had gone dead.  Neither of us had any hookups after our sessions of hard fishing with our long rod setups.  I did bring one steelhead to the surface but I could not get it to commit to actually eating my fly.

As the fall season rolled on, dry fly fishing on my homewater remained slow, with only the occasional steelhead raised to the surface.  I finally hooked into a dry fly steelhead on October 11, 2024 while fishing a run close to home.  The steelhead took a #6 night dancer themed Bivisibomber and just as I was strategizing drawing the steelhead close enough to grab hold of my leader, the steelhead made a run and got tangled in some submerged branches below me.  I waded down in hopes of being able to get the steelhead untangled, just as I caught sight of it writhing under the branches, it took off, breaking my tippet.

I was able to take a quick trip to the Clearwater in mid October and hit the river for a couple days with my father in law Jim Jones.  Local gear anglers reported that the fishing was good up to the time I arrived to fish, just my luck.  I had one rise near Lenore, but I was not certain if it was a steelhead or one of the tired chinook rolling in the same area.

In late October, I had a brief hookup at dusk, towards the bottom of the Burnt Creek run on the North Umpqua.  I was again fishing a Night Dancer themed Bivisbomber.  I was making steeply angled casts with my 17'7" Godshall built rod and I was not able to see the rise in the near darkness, but just felt my line come tight at the dangle.  I lifted the rod and felt some heavy headshakes before the hook pulled out.

I spent a few days on a couple high desert rives in early November and briefly hooked one steelhead of modest size in the very top/head of a riffle coming into a long, slow pool.  The steelhed took a #6 Night Dancer themed Bivisbomber in the shallow water, took off on a couple short runs, then spit the hook.

The remainder of November and December yielded no other dry fly steelhead encounters.  With the largest summer steelhead returns on my homewater and many other summer steelhead rivers in 2024, I was puzzled and disappointed with the less than consistent dry fly satisfaction I had gotten over the course of the season.  I have experienced many years with much smaller returns and had much better dry fly steelheading than what I had in 2024.

I have wondered if there being less fishing pressure on small return years had something to do with the more consistent dry fly success I have had during those leaner times.  However, I have to admit, the fishing pressure on the Willamette was really not bad at all in 2024.  Due to so many years of paltry returns, it took awhile for many local anglers to get the memo that there were actually fish to be caught!  Viable numbers of summer steelhead came over Willamette falls by April 2024, not to mention a good number of wild winter steelhead that tend to run late and overlap with the early summer runs.

Boat traffic on the Willamette wasn't bad at all as a couple popluar boat ramps were out of commission and outfitters were still not running very many regular trips through the usual stretches.  The Willamette was running at higher than typical levels for most of the season, but conditions remained pretty consistent and I was able to settle into routines with my fishing.

Due to the closure of the Leaburg hatchery, the upper McKenzie saw an unprecedented number of summer steelhead being caught above the dam, up to Blue River and beyond. I only made one trip to McKenzie for steelhead in spite of all the reports mainly because there are fewer runs that fish well with a long line and Willamette is just too convenient to access.

All in all, 2024 proved to be one of my least productive dry fly steelhead years even in spite of decent steelhead returns.   Steelhead are a mystery that keeps me coming back through thick and thin. 

 

Dry Line Steelhead - Ghetto Style

 

Winter is the time of year when I actually fish subsurface a fair amount.  Cold, colored, and relatively higher water levels put me in a state of mind to embrace the unseen but tactile vibes of fishing wet flies on a dry line.  The winter season is typically very lean for me as to actual steelhead encounters.  When fishing wet flies on a dry line, I have recently gravitated to General Practitioners tied on either a Partridge Code M up to 5/0 or vintage Mustad 7970s, in size 1.  These heavy hooks do their job in getting the fly down, but they could never match the efficiency and effectiveness of sink tip systems.  My favor for GPs has to do with aesthetics, but also due to the fact that the long tails on these flies help to buoy up the heavier rear end of the big hooks that include the weight of the bend and point.

On a recent day on the water, I found conditions to be favorable, with a good level as the river has been on a slow drop with the dry weather.  The water I like to fish is a big, broad run with largely indistinct features.  It starts with a minor riffle than continues to broaden and slow with the main current on the far side.  This is perfect water for the longer rods that l have been favoring for the past several years.

On this day, my strategy was to start off with a shorter 15'2" 9/10wt rod built by Steve Godshall.  This rod is part of a conversion set up that can also be fished as a 17'7" 9/10wt by switching sections around.  I was just in the mood to fish the brisk, "short" rod for my first pass through the run.  This rod is perfectly matched with a Beulah Aerohead 9/10 line (56' @ 640gr) and the taper design on the Aerohead allows for great line speed to help cut the cross winds that occur in this spot.

I started off with a orange GP tied on a sz 1 Mustad 7970 as the river was running fairly clear, with sun on the water.  I worked through the riffly section at the top and felt anticipation as I came into the heart of the run where the water slows and the inside is just the perfect speed.  I was remembering this area where hookups were experienced in the past.  I fished each cast, thinking a pull was sure to come at any moment.  I actually got into a winter steelhead on a dry fly through here in a prior season:

As I passed through the sweet section, the currents on the inside broadened and slowed to a snail's pace.  I decided to continue working down in case a lethargic steelhead may be resting in the soft water.  In areas where I feel my odds of a steelhead encounter is marginal, I tend to move through relatively quickly, taking more steps between each swing.   

With the nearly static flows in this broad, featureless section, I decided to switch flies on a strange impulse. I thought using a fly with more intrinsic movement might have some appeal in the slow water. I remembered that I had a single pink MOAL (rabbit leech) in my Altoids tin, along with my assortment of GPs and Winter's Hopes.  This particular fly had a rather circuitous journey:  I went through a phase of tying and fishing MOALs from 2010 to 2013.  I had dry line steelhead success with those obnoxious flies on coastal rivers I often fished.  I even sent some MOALs to Bill McMillan and he had good success with them on the Skagit. Black/Chanteuse MOALs were among the most successful colors for Bill and I, but I never found success with pink versions, even though gear fisherman do very well with their pink worms.  From 2014 onward I gravitated back to flies tied on standard hooks especially Winter's Hopes and my stockpile of MOALs have sat in my closet largely unused since then. 

I may have developed a complex about fishing MOALs since they are not a traditional pattern and all the talented tyers on Speypages tie dry line flies in a much more gentlemanly manner.  Anyways, back to that lonely pink MOAL:  I had been fishing a favorite area on the Willamette last summer and as I got out of my Geo Tracker to begin an evening dry fly session, I noticed a patch of pink on the ground.   I figured to pick up some litter and assumed I would find a discarded corkie and yarn with some leader material.   I found the "trash" to actually be a pink bead headed MOAL.  As I took a closer look at the fly, I realized it was a fly I had tied years ago.   I recognized the way the fly was tied and that confirmed it had come off my vise at some point in my dark past.

I pondered over how the pink blast from my past would have ended up on the ground along a favorite local steelhead run and I surmised that I may have gifted some flies to someone, or it may have come from someone who purchased my flies from a couple fundraisers that I donated to some years ago.  The pink MOAL was slightly faded from being out in the elements for who knows how long, and the rabbit fur was matted from either being run over by vehicles or being stepped on.  I threw the bedraggled fly into the center console of my Geo and later sharpened the Gamakatsu trailer hook before throwing it in my Altoids tin with my other winter flies.

Ok, back to the slow section on the winter steelhead run:  I have developed a new, weird habit of tying a Lefty Kreh non-slip loop knot on the end of my 12# Berkley Big game tippet that is large enough to loop flies on and off, eliminating the need to retie every time I change flies.  This process allows my flies to be oriented in a pleasant manner, without causing wear to fly heads and continually shortening my tippet over the course of a day.

I looped the pink MOAL onto my tippet and went to work. I made several casts and swings from the same position as it takes some time for rabbit to soak up water and sink.  When I felt that the pink worm on a fly rod was adequately soaked, I made steps down to cover water.   The flows were slow enough that each swing progressed at a very leisurely pace. With the bulkiness of rabbit fur, MOALs tend to sink slowly, so my fly choice was nicely compatible to the water I was fishing. 

There are often annoying cross winds through here, so some casts just don't always fully turn over and land on target.   I simply let those sloppy casts go, where the unintended slack allowed the gaudy fly more time to sink before coming tight on the swing.   

I was about 25 yards below what I felt was the prime bucket of the run when towards the end of a swing moving at a barely discernable pace, my line stopped and I felt a subtle pull.   I slowly swept the rod towards the bank and came against solid resistance.  I soon felt some movement and head throbs, then the unseen creature seemed to give in and allowed me to reel it right to me until the butt of the leader came through the tip top of the rod.  I began to question if I hooked into a jumbo squawfish or trout rather than the chrome prize I was seeking.  I was strategizing leading my opponent towards the bank then it decided to identify itself with a quick burst and a jump, showing positive ID as a steelhead of 10/11lbs.

Ms. steelhead decided on stubborn tactics, so she maintained a strong battle in close with a series of short runs, twists and turns.   These dirty tricks made me thankful for the trailer design of MOALs which give steelhead less leverage to get dislodged from the hook.  I was eventually able to get a hold of my leader to lead the steelhead to the shoreside photo studio. After a series of mug shots, I made sure to fully revive the valiant fighter and sent her on her way to produce more progeny of a similar nature. I showed the photos of this steelhead to Bill McMillan and he confirmed that it was a female that had spawned earlier in winter and had spent some time cleaning up before heading back to sea.

Dry fly steelhead are my favorite, but I have no complaints about getting winter steelhead on a dry line,  even with ghetto styled flies!