Devan S.

Day 4-Bears, Bulls, and Burgers We arrived at our next stop late into the night. Didn't even setup camp. Slept in the car....this stop is way, way, way out in the middle of nowhere. Lots of slow dirt road and elevation drop to get here. Good thing it's dark and we can't see. We packed up for a full, hot day and head off at daylight. No intent to camp; day hike in, fish, and pack out. Did I mention the 95 degree forecast high? Rumor has it this place is rattlesnake and bear paradise. No rattlesnakes, although I could easily see it being a snake pit. We stopped and fished a hole or two going in. Caught some redbands but yet to see a bull. Along the ridge, we spot THE PERFECT HOLE. getting there proved to be a nice bushwack through a berry patch downhill. We had been hoot'n'hollering to spook bears but got complacent. We spooked something big in the patch. We never saw it, assumed it was maybe an elk at the time. Got down and started rigging up to fish. As we're about to cross the river I see the worlds largest groundhog on the other side. @Prifish confirms it is in fact a bear cub. We spook it off. Cross the river to get to THE PERFECT SPOT that's how good it looked

Day 3- Long roads and another Redband After failing at Eagle lake, we headed North to trek across the Oregon desert to the far Northeast part of Oregon. Along the Oregon/California is a another California redband. Goose lake is dry per Google maps. I can tell you it has water in it now. Lassen Creek was the target at the campground. Thought to head up stream. Ran into some gentleman from Washington doing a redband run trying to bag them all. We took off upstream. Only to run into a nice herd of red angus cows. We just kept lightly pushing them upstream in front of us. Honestly we did it. They are fish, pretty and checked a box and moving on. Lots of lonely desert miles between here and the next stop. As you may recall sometime back, I asked for places for Oregon Bulls besides the Metolius. Boy did I get a dandy.

Day 2/3 continued- Eagle Lake Pump the brakes. The train was just getting rolling when it ran off the tracks. That's a slight exaggeration. I had concerns. Eagle lake is just a big bath tub. It's a one stop shop. No other spot to catch Eagle lake rainbows. Gotta have em. We brought jigs. Figured long casts for deeper fish. I had planned we would rent a boat at the marina. 2 weeks prior to leaving I learned the marina wasn't renting boats and the trout had moved out to deeper water. We fished until dark. Ran into a guide at the boat ramp. He said even boats were having a tough time. Said we should get there at daylight. We did. Fished until 9am Friday with 1 single bite and one fish seen. Just could not get out deep enough. We considered buying pool floats to get out there. Instead we decided to move onto our real targets. The good news is Eagle lake is close to Reno, NV which is also close to another lake I want to fish..... Did I mention it's hot out here? Not alot of shade as you can tell.

Day 2- California concerns Day 2 starts with 4 hours if driving. Warning: If flying across the country to drive 2100 miles isn't for you then look away now. At the last minute, I found we would be dangerously close to the native range of McCloud river redbands with a bit of detour on the way to Eagle Lake. No major desire to get the California Hertiage Trout Challenge but considering we need 4 species for the Western Native Challenge we had a chance at 2 additional additions along the route. On the east side of Mt Shasta is mutlple small streams. All headwaters feeding upper McCloud river. Several streams are closed to fishing but there is a stream aptly named for its residents. A small stream with lots of brush but at the campground, there was a short section open with plenty of fish eager to feed. The best part was this stop was short. Maybe 2 hour drive out of our way. It look us longer to get rigged up than catch fish. We didn't see any other people around and had a couple mule deer visiting us at the campground.

Day 1-flights and drive time. The plan for day 1 on this trip was mostly travel. Wheels up from Springfield @ 6am makes for an early start from Cassville. Goal was to arrive into Portland and drive north to Washington. My Google searching indicated July wasn't the best time for sea run coastals and I had concerns we would struggle to stumble into fish in Puget Sound. It just doesn't fit our way of fishing. I got some tips from a Washington resident off a native Facebook group directing me to a small stream with resident coastals. Like literally gave me GPS coordinates. His information was a slam dunk. We each caught multiple 6-8" coastals. Wheels up and headed south for Northern California.

Pictures don't do pure redbands justice.

Quick update while we drive from Boise back to central Oregon for our last day and a little more relaxing. We have thus far fished Washington, Oregon, California, and Idaho. The Idaho wasn't planned for but we had a spare day and took it. We have missed 1 of our target species. We fished hard at Eagle lake but just could not remotely get close enough to where the fish were. We're closing in on 2000 miles driving with a bit still to go. More to come....

Some additional information.... McCloud River Redband We actually may catch instead O. mykiss calisulat vs. O. mykiss stonei based on where we plan to fish. New naming happened back in March 23 but at a high level still is a McCloud River Redbands. I don't plan on counting gills and scales so we are upstream of the falls and it is what it is. Eagle Lake Rainbow-This is a must have for the broader Western Native Challenge and is the one that has me personally most concern with getting stuck. Eagle Lake is big and we are going to be shore bound. My research indicates this is the most difficult time of year to be shore bound and catch fish. Really there is no backup here either. My current information says boats are not rentable at this time. Great Basin Redband-Should be able to pick this up while passing through Northern CA. Specifically looking at Goose Lake Redbands. This would set us up for completion of the California Heritage Trout challenge at a later date. It'll also break up a drive a bit without a lot of work. One of those when in Rome deals. Bull Trout-This is what the trip is really all about. Although we have a few days before we get to focus on it. Columba River Redband-This is really just something we will likely catch in the process of Bull Trout. If things go according to plan or better than plan and we have time we might push a little farther East and bag another state. Right now the firm commitment is Washington Coastals, California Eagle Lake Rainbows, and Oregon Bulls. We miss any of those and we will be re-shuffling the deck for later trips.

Leaving tomorrow.

Currently things seem stagnant. I'm in a funk and need of some small stream native therapy. Fishing this spring locally has been lack luster. Other than one good white bass smack down on Beaver tailwaters....I've lost my way. Therefore I intend to give a pre-trip report and maybe a slight time delay play-by-play of the next Western Native Trout trip with @Prifish Current Pre-trip planned statistics: Total time: ~155hrs Flights: 1610 direct miles airport to airport. Driving: ~30hrs est. drive time from wheels down to wheels up(1600miles) Hiking: 10-20 miles est. Streams/Rivers: 5-6 Lakes: 1 States: 3 minimum with a chance for 4 Species targets: Oncorhynchus clarkii clarkii, Oncorhynchus mykiss stonei , Oncorhynchus mykiss aquilarum, Oncorhynchus mykiss newberrii, Salvelinus confluentus, Oncorhynchus mykiss gairdneri. This listing is not absolute and subject to changes/adjustments depending on timing and success...should know more by the end of the week. *I have not done a whole lot of research/investigation for this trip like normal. I don't have a lot of backup spots and were going to be very close to several National Parks which are still indicating some closures due to snow so I largely don't know what we are getting into. To be continued........

I fished this morning too. Seemed like a lot of boats out and about for a Wednesday morning. We did not see any significant activity in my normal spots. 1 small 3lber, 3 green fish, and had one big striper that put us in a tree.

I've been out 3 times over the last 3 weeks and have yet to find anything on top. Its good to hear its finally coming around. time to break out the long rod and try for one.

Ventris has not changed.

I have been in a funk since roughly the first of February. I literally missed out on the walleye run....maybe caught 10 total when that was normally a days catch under normal years run. My only real catch was crappie in South Arkansas with a guide. I fished one evening last weekend up Kings for Whites. Saw plenty of catching but caught none myself. Moved to Tailwaters, put in at Holiday Island, fished all the way to spider creek and managed to catch 1 single 4-5 in. bass in leatherwood cove. Ran all the way to trout water to ensure I caught something and blanked on trout after 2 hours. I thought the trout water would break the funk....I have had many, many days of 10+ fish days in short timing on jigs up there. Nope, nothing, nada. How do you just short of guarantee to break the funk?

I've fished both lakes for entirely different reasons and neither lake for bass. That said both have there pros/con. At Grand, I always fished up "river" from Sailboat bridge. I'd say I caught more fish at Grand...not necessarily Bass but whites, crappie, and cats. At Beaver, I've never fished much below 12 bridge and caught different fish entirely Striper, Smallies, and Walleye. Probably caught less fish overall but likely better quality apples for apples. Water on Beaver(where I fished) is gin clear. Water on Grand(where I fished) was just short of mud comparably to Beaver. Scenery on Beaver is better(I haven't found a better sunrise than Indian Creek). Scenery on upper Grand to me is blah. All that said.....I do think Grand is likely a better Bass lake minus SM. If it was truly even and I really only wanted to bass fish....I'd go west.

I trolled around the main cove around the bait and there was lots of it. Nothing...I ventured back in a couple coves but found nothing. Before I knew it I was back towards the dam....found some walleye out there and called it a day.

I checked out Indian Creek Sunday and found tons of bait....but none of these big whites.

About the time I started to call 911 another boat ran over there and plucked him out I guess. I couldn't believe the number of boats that I saw out....big waves in that area.

I bank fished last evening looking for some of those whites. Nada. Although I did catch a half dozen smallies and 2 nice eyes. Also seen a sailboat sink in the dam basin and subsequent rescue right at dark.

In areas yes. Never smelled it at the lake but could see potential.

All single pole jigging with livescope.

Well spent Friday and Saturday fishing with X-Series out on Millwood and thumped the fish. We caught well over 100 crappie and probably 10-20 fish over 2lbs. and had a bunch of fish in the 1.8-2.0lbs range. For the day one we get hung up with multiple fish at 2.11-2.16lbs. and couldn't get over the hump. Day 2 my wife right off the bat caught 3-4 fish in the 2.2 range and in the last couple hours I finally ended up with 2.33lb big fish.

Friday night was empty....it was also cold and damp. Saturday was a zoo but not unmanageable. Of course I'm sure several stayed home due to flooding. We dumped in at houseman and went downstream to Beaver town. Fairly scattered out but at any of the normal spots there would be 3-4 boats. One section had 6-8....with a pontoon parked in the middle. Lots of people hopping around and had multiple people pull right up beside or in front of our drift and start fishing. In the afternoon we ran up to parker bottoms to look for trout and the trip back had several boats. By that time it was warm so I'm sure that helped. The NWA facebook pages and beaver tailwater pages have been pretty consistent with guides posting walleye limits for a month now. That brings out a lot of people looking but not necessarily catching.

Have not spent a lot of time up the kings lately and none of it matters now. However I haven't been finding any more than one here or there up river(well past the bridge) all males....haven't seen a female. Last week, prior to the rain, fished well after dark without a bite. On my troll back used flashlight to look around....didn't see a single set of eyes like I normally would this time of year. I just don't think it has happened full on yet.