White River Report 04-11 Through 04-13

[BFTMASTER]

Left Tulsa Wednesday Night and arrived at Rivercliff Cabins around 11:30. Water was off and really low, so my traditional night fishing arrival night, did not work out very good as it has in the past years. Next morning awake to approx. 2 units or 1200-1500cfs. Loaded up the boat and headed up to the State Park area. The clouds from the storm had not left yet, so it was rather brisk and windy. The overcast skies are my favorite for fishing the white. I don’t know why but I always have pretty good luck when it is overcast. Started of bouncing 1/8oz white jigs. First couple of drifts produced some really decent rainbows for the livewell. It was hard to keep the wind from pushing us into the rocks across from the State Park. We kept having to start the motor to straighten out the drift. On the forth or so drift, I was casting up near the shore and bouncing the jig through the boulder gardens into deeper water when I got nailed. This fish set the hook for me and almost took the rod out of my hands. Immediately, the fish took off toward the front of the boat and jumped right in front of my buddies. I was taking it easy because I only fish with 2lb. test. Finally, after several heart pounding runs that I thought for sure he was going to break me off in the rocks or logs, he came along side the boat. Such a beautiful Brown Trout! His colors were bronze to copper and darker but yet more vivid than many of the other German Browns that I had caught in years past. He measured about 19.25 inches and weighed 2.64 lbs. That is really a baby when it comes to Brown Trout, but to me a trophy memory and an exciting one at that. He swam away cool as could be…like nothing ever happened. The very next drift, in the same general area, I hook and turn another Brown. This one was much bigger. He made a good run and then rolled right on top throwing the jig and letting all four of us see how big he was as he went back to his lair. His tail looked as broad as a broom, and his mid section resembled my upper leg. Everyone in the boat agreed he was at least 6-7 lbs conservatively and probably closer to 8-9lbs. But who will ever know? It is things that happen like that, cause me to purchase hundreds of dollars in fishing equipment. The rest of the morning was rather uneventful, except I was catching a good amount of chunky rainbows that seemed to want some exercise after not having much running water this year. At lunch time we visited the State Park Store and talking some great guys working in there. They showed us some buoyant spoons made by Thomas. We bought several and headed back out on the river. These spoons really seemed to work great in the cloudy conditions, especially if you threw them up shallow and just reeled them med. fast back to the boat. In the deeper water the fish would hit the spoons on the initial drop. These spoons were great and everyone (all skill levels in the boat) were doing well with them. I will always have a selection of spoons in my box from now on. Later in the afternoon we started catching some really nice rainbows on Rapala cd-5 in the Brook Trout and Rainbow Color. I would cast them out into deeper water, count to ten and lightly jerk them as I reeled all the way to the boat. In the late afternoon we anchored above the shoals at Cane Island and let some of the guys finish their limits with Sunrise and Pink colored PowerBait. Day two we concentrated on fishing jigs and drifting. The river ran about the same. The sun was out though, and the spoons did not seem to work as well, perhaps to much bling as well as white jigs were completely shut down. We caught some nice browns drifting from the last shoals at the State Park down to Cane Island. We saw a couple of monsters holding in the shallows, but they were not interested in our jigs. Ended the day with some fat 15-17” rainbows that fell to Sculpin/ginger and Brown/Brown 3/32oz. jigs. Day three we wake early excited to get up to the state park, but there was no water!! Spent the Day around the dock trying to match the hatch on the flyrod. Unfortunately, the little white caddis flies were bouncing up and down on the water and the fish were tearing them up…only problem was I could not make mine bounce on the water like that! We did okay with powerbait and a few on jigs, but nothing like the days before. All and all a great trip with good friends, good food and great little cabin.

Special Thanks to Eric and Connie with www.rivercliff.com they are so laid back and easy to deal with and have really done some great things to the cabin.

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Tight lines to all

--BFT