Columbia River winter steelhead

I've been wondering for awhile what time do winter steelhead start running up the Columbia river? I'm planning on heading to Eagle creek by Bonneville when the creek re-opens to fishing in the first week of December, but not sure how many steelhead will be there? Has the Columbia seen any steelhead, and when is the bulk of the steelhead run near Bonneville dam? Thanks

sapo said:

Wow, thanks! It looks like not many anglers go to Eagle creek on the Columbia river...Only 4 steelhead on that in December on Eagle creek!

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As you can see, the Columbia is primarily a summer steelhead highway.
Some winters go up as far as Hood River or perhaps farther.

From your location I would go to the Sandy, Clackamas or Wilson for winter steelhead.

Yeah, that's what it's looking like...Was hoping to hit Eagle creek though, are there any other small creeks/smaller rivers that aren't very crowded and fish well for winter steelhead in December?

almost every lower Columbia hatchery run is timed to return in December January... exept the Sandy, its timed later. Eagle creek on the Columbia is primarily a resting area for upriver summer steelhead.. Ive hammered it a lot in the past and produced very few fish.

As halibutman noted, its not great. I had a commute passing the creek and fished it a lot over a few years and the fish just aren't there.

halibuthitman said:

Eagle creek on the Columbia is primarily a resting area for upriver summer steelhead.. Ive hammered it a lot in the past and produced very few fish.

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I'm no expert on the area, but my guess is it takes a special combination of conditions too...probably water level and temp. I was once told a magic number for temp is greater than 72 degrees in the Columbia, when the fish seek out cooler tribs entering the Columbia and hover just below them in the presumably cooler water for awhile.

If you look at the catch numbers for August at Eagle Creek, 2009 and 2010, show 233 and 127. But, for 2011 and beyond, it is near nil...only a handful. Perhaps EC was running too warm and/or too low flow to make the difference the fish are looking for as respite, or the Columbia had cool enough water there was incentive.

I will say this, Herman creek is a much better location for resting summers, but if the daily air temp has been over 80degrees for more than a week, that's when you want to go fish the first mile or so of these streams. Its a much better plan to actually fish the Columbia at the down river side of these tribs, you can hardware fish, boober fish and plunk with a great deal of success, but yeah.. a lot of things have to line up for these creeks to fish hot.. and there are simply better places to put in your time... in my opinion-

This is a really late response..But I went to Eagle Creek about a month ago to see if there were any steelies there on the way back from the Owyhee. We saw maybe 30 steelhead, and though we didn't have decent gear to catch them, a guy upstream limited in 10 minutes. Not a bad creek at all