The last few days have been pretty darn good for my guests on the Lower Yuba River. So good that we have not even put on a nymph or a streamer. It's been all dry flies. Due to a low snow pack, and lack of precipitation, the Yuba County Water Agency has dropped the flows again with a target flow of 900 cubes coming out of Englebright dam. Deer Creek is currently flowing at 106 cfs and dropping a little bit by the hour. Fishing pressure has been moderate, and if you don't like crowds, hike away from the masses.
Skwala stones are out in good numbers. The weather forecast will favor more adults to be active during this warm sunny weather. The trout are really keyed in on them in the late afternoons and will migrate into side water while looking up.
Lots of mating already going on, with females ovipositing their black egg clusters as they ride the bubble lines of foam downstream. Size matters, and many commercial patterns are way too big. You can see pictured above just how much bigger the female is.
The biggest surprise so far this year has been the amount of Skwala shucks near and downstream of major riffles. After the deluge of high water during the winter of 2017, I thought for sure we would see much lower populations. The bugs have proved me wrong.
When it comes to the mayflies, the weather can, and will greatly affect the hatch. Yesterday we had clouds, and the hatch was good. Today was bright and sunny, and the hatch was very sparse. I usually rig my guests up with a bwo, pinky, or pmd patterns to 5x to start out with, but if the hatch is not coming on strong, I will switch them over to 4x and the Skwala stone, and stick with that rig until the day is done.
Still lots of Gray Drakes out, but many go unmolested as they drift downstream, I'll see trout eat a few, but with how many of them are out, I'm a bit surprised.
The Gray Drake is from the swimmer family of mayflies. They will very rarely hatch midstream like a March Brown, or a bwo. They crawl out onto a rock and hatch just like a stone fly, leaving a shuck as evidence. Notice their big paddle tails that propel them around quite efficiently.
We've hooked into some bigger fish lately running 15 to 16", but they have not ended up in the net. Their girth is big compared to the smaller specimens, and during the fight they go ape shit putting on aerial displays and tail walking across the water. The bigger fish are smarter too, always looking to wrap you up in underwater structure.
My approach to fishing the Yuba this time of year is much different than other guides and anglers. I look at is as observing and hunting, while covering water, fan casting near to far, and choosing many different water structures to make presentations in. My guests today are avid duck hunters, and they thoroughly enjoyed my way of fishing the Yuba River. Brian, pictured above, with one of the bigger fish on that left his heart pounding for quite some time afterwards. So awesome to see!
Recent rains have greened up the surrounding land, it is truly beautiful right now on the river. Sunny weather lies ahead for quite some time, which equals perfect Skwala conditions. See you on the water...
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