O
olshiftybiscuits
Active member
December - February are, by far, the toughest months to be a Portland-based fly angler in pursuit of trout. The good news is from here on out, more and more options will become available.
Most of the streams west of the Cascades that have been mentioned in this thread are closed to trout fishing until May 22, but there are a handful of west side streams you can fish for trout year-round. None of them are great. Very few are actually fishable year-round because it rains so much. The Little Luckiamute and Luckiamute rivers, Marys River, Gales Creek and both forks of the Yamhill are the closest year-round systems in which you can reasonably catch fish. You'll need to go high up toward the headwaters to find trout, if you're downstream of farmland it's a lost cause. The entire Tualatin River system is open year-round for trout, but it's pretty much hot garbage. In my opinion it's well worth your time to drive the extra half hour to fish the Deschutes, rather than one of these.
To the east of the Willamette in that same general area, the Upper North Santiam is open year round above Detroit, as is the Breitenbush River although public access right now is blocked due to fire damage. Quartzville Creek is a cool year-round trout stream in this area, again very prone to blowout after a storm. It fishes under 300 CFS, and the gauge is easy to find on Google. All three of these streams are stocked during the summer, but they also hold wild fish.
Further down, the McKenzie and its tributaries are open year-round, but the McKenzie isn't fishable on foot and the tribs are either at snowy altitudes or blown out during winter. You can fish the mainstem Willamette and all of its forks for trout anywhere upstream of Albany. The Middle Fork and all its tributaries are open too, but the Middle Fork itself is the only one that reliably drops to fishable levels during winter.
For the next couple of months, the Deschutes will be your best and most consistent option coming from Portland, both because the river rarely blows out and because you can get there without having to drive over a mountain pass. When the passes are clear, you can make a day trip out of the Metolius or Crooked, too. The Fall is an overnighter this time of year. A good lake to fish all winter, again dependent on the condition of the passes, is Clear Lake off 126 near Sisters. It never freezes and they rent rowboats year round, just call ahead to make sure the parking lot is plowed.
In February, ODFW will start stocking the coastal lakes and low elevation lakes in more urban areas. Some of the coastal lakes are quite underrated, have wild cutthroat in addition to stocked rainbows, and aren't fished heavily at all. As a fellow fly angler, I'd advise against any of the stocker lakes along the I-5 corridor. They're gross. But take your pick of the lakes along the coast and you won't be disappointed. Most of these lakes have holdovers in them, and you can fish them with varying degrees of success all year minus the hottest months. A float tube or kayak is nice to have. Hagg fishes pretty well all year, and starts getting stocked heavily around the first of March. It's a big recreational reservoir full of families, kids, motor boats and bait dunkers. A decent option when nothing else is fishable. All of the tributary creeks that flow into Hagg hold tiny and fragile populations of wild cutthroat that you can legally fish for year-round but we're talking 3-5 inch fish.
In March, a few lakes on the east side of Mount Hood like Pine Hollow and Rock Creek reservoirs start to get stocked fish, and are usually accessible/thawed by then. In April, head back to the Deschutes for the best trout fishing of your life before everyone and their mother shows up for the Salmonfly hatch in May. A few restrictions start to lift in April, on sections of the Deschutes and protected local lakes like Laurance. 99 percent of our local lakes are year-round, so as soon as they're iced off and accessible they fish incredibly. Once May 22 rolls around, the closed streams open back up to trout fishing, too.
May - October, the opportunities are just about limitless. You can fish every single small stream on Mount Hood, they all hold fish and they all hold fish that'll shock you. Same goes for every single coastal stream that touches the ocean, packed with trout. Expect the average size to run 5-8 inches, but every once in a while you'll run into one well over 16. Sea run cutthroat fishing is amazing in the fall, but it's good all summer long. The lakes on Mount Hood will produce 100+ fish days trolling or stripping a wooly bugger. Most all of them are stocked, and they all hold wild fish, too. You can catch nearly every species of trout in the entire state within the boundaries of the Mount Hood National Forest.
But back to winter fishing -- if I could go back in time and give myself advice when I first moved to the area, it would be this: Spend your winter fishing the Lower Deschutes rather than fumbling your way up and down the mediocre year-round fisheries northwestern Oregon has to offer. I can't tell you how many days I wasted in pursuit of six inch trout battling terrible conditions and high water, when I could have been sticking half a dozen trophy rainbows standing in one spot on the Lower Deschutes instead. Even a trophy trout stream can get repetitive, so when the Willamette system is in shape, fish it. When the passes are clear, get out to the Metolius and Crooked. Otherwise, it's a Deschutes game this time of year if you want to fly fish for trout consistently.
Most of the streams west of the Cascades that have been mentioned in this thread are closed to trout fishing until May 22, but there are a handful of west side streams you can fish for trout year-round. None of them are great. Very few are actually fishable year-round because it rains so much. The Little Luckiamute and Luckiamute rivers, Marys River, Gales Creek and both forks of the Yamhill are the closest year-round systems in which you can reasonably catch fish. You'll need to go high up toward the headwaters to find trout, if you're downstream of farmland it's a lost cause. The entire Tualatin River system is open year-round for trout, but it's pretty much hot garbage. In my opinion it's well worth your time to drive the extra half hour to fish the Deschutes, rather than one of these.
To the east of the Willamette in that same general area, the Upper North Santiam is open year round above Detroit, as is the Breitenbush River although public access right now is blocked due to fire damage. Quartzville Creek is a cool year-round trout stream in this area, again very prone to blowout after a storm. It fishes under 300 CFS, and the gauge is easy to find on Google. All three of these streams are stocked during the summer, but they also hold wild fish.
Further down, the McKenzie and its tributaries are open year-round, but the McKenzie isn't fishable on foot and the tribs are either at snowy altitudes or blown out during winter. You can fish the mainstem Willamette and all of its forks for trout anywhere upstream of Albany. The Middle Fork and all its tributaries are open too, but the Middle Fork itself is the only one that reliably drops to fishable levels during winter.
For the next couple of months, the Deschutes will be your best and most consistent option coming from Portland, both because the river rarely blows out and because you can get there without having to drive over a mountain pass. When the passes are clear, you can make a day trip out of the Metolius or Crooked, too. The Fall is an overnighter this time of year. A good lake to fish all winter, again dependent on the condition of the passes, is Clear Lake off 126 near Sisters. It never freezes and they rent rowboats year round, just call ahead to make sure the parking lot is plowed.
In February, ODFW will start stocking the coastal lakes and low elevation lakes in more urban areas. Some of the coastal lakes are quite underrated, have wild cutthroat in addition to stocked rainbows, and aren't fished heavily at all. As a fellow fly angler, I'd advise against any of the stocker lakes along the I-5 corridor. They're gross. But take your pick of the lakes along the coast and you won't be disappointed. Most of these lakes have holdovers in them, and you can fish them with varying degrees of success all year minus the hottest months. A float tube or kayak is nice to have. Hagg fishes pretty well all year, and starts getting stocked heavily around the first of March. It's a big recreational reservoir full of families, kids, motor boats and bait dunkers. A decent option when nothing else is fishable. All of the tributary creeks that flow into Hagg hold tiny and fragile populations of wild cutthroat that you can legally fish for year-round but we're talking 3-5 inch fish.
In March, a few lakes on the east side of Mount Hood like Pine Hollow and Rock Creek reservoirs start to get stocked fish, and are usually accessible/thawed by then. In April, head back to the Deschutes for the best trout fishing of your life before everyone and their mother shows up for the Salmonfly hatch in May. A few restrictions start to lift in April, on sections of the Deschutes and protected local lakes like Laurance. 99 percent of our local lakes are year-round, so as soon as they're iced off and accessible they fish incredibly. Once May 22 rolls around, the closed streams open back up to trout fishing, too.
May - October, the opportunities are just about limitless. You can fish every single small stream on Mount Hood, they all hold fish and they all hold fish that'll shock you. Same goes for every single coastal stream that touches the ocean, packed with trout. Expect the average size to run 5-8 inches, but every once in a while you'll run into one well over 16. Sea run cutthroat fishing is amazing in the fall, but it's good all summer long. The lakes on Mount Hood will produce 100+ fish days trolling or stripping a wooly bugger. Most all of them are stocked, and they all hold wild fish, too. You can catch nearly every species of trout in the entire state within the boundaries of the Mount Hood National Forest.
But back to winter fishing -- if I could go back in time and give myself advice when I first moved to the area, it would be this: Spend your winter fishing the Lower Deschutes rather than fumbling your way up and down the mediocre year-round fisheries northwestern Oregon has to offer. I can't tell you how many days I wasted in pursuit of six inch trout battling terrible conditions and high water, when I could have been sticking half a dozen trophy rainbows standing in one spot on the Lower Deschutes instead. Even a trophy trout stream can get repetitive, so when the Willamette system is in shape, fish it. When the passes are clear, get out to the Metolius and Crooked. Otherwise, it's a Deschutes game this time of year if you want to fly fish for trout consistently.
