Wilson report 5/28

I was inspired by Sinkline's recent post, regarding sharing to start posting reports again.

That said, unfortunately there wasn't much to report from the Wilson for the trout opener. Driving down the river looked ok until I got below where the North fork enters the mainstem. I tried a few spots I'm familiar with but they were all muddy and flowing fast.


Driving home I noticed no-one was at the Devil's Fork-South Fork confluence turn out, which is a rarity, so I decided I'd give it a look. Beautiful, but saw nothing swimming around.


Then I crossed the road to check out the holes below where Elk Creek enters the Wilson.


After seeing that the river was nicer up high I traveled back downstream and tried out a few more turn outs.



By the end of the morning I was able to leave feeling the fishing was fantastic, even if the catching wasn't. Maybe I'll try again this evening or tomorrow morning with the hopes that the lower river will be clearer.

Thanks, the clack was up a bit, and colored also today. Guess we just keep waiting, things are bound to turn around.

Thanks for the report. I was out plunking Yergen on Thursday morning. The river looked fine, catching not much so. I was a bit under the weather and called it a day by 0800.

cool to see the pictures!

thanks for the report!

Thanks for the report. I'm think I'm going to head to the Wilson some time next week if the weather isn't terrible.

I've been a bit under the weather, and going out fishing in that condition only drained me further. So I'm a bit late with a follow up on Sunday's trip...

The water was much clearer


And as a result the fishing improved drastically. I caught a couple fairly nice trout, a couple decent, and a few smaller ones. Unfortunately only a few pictures turned out...




I was fishing spinners and spoons and unfortunately I couldn't seem to find out what exactly the fish were keying in on. Most everything would draw the occasional strike, but never a bunch, nor where they particularly aggressive. If nothing else it may just be the water temp and weather.

The upper river was so beautiful that I felt the need to go back just to soak up more of it. There were no fish to be had, but the scenery couldn't be beat.


Now I'm just wishing I had slept in on Saturday to rest up, I would have loved to have made it out on Monday. The river level should have made for a phenomenal day, but just like a fish almost being caught makes it better, not making it out means that in my mind's eye it would have been the best day ever.

Chris, do you remember what the water level was listed as on Saturday? I was up around milepost 21 for an hour or so and it was pretty un-fishable (I'm using a 5 wt fly rod.) I'm watching the water.weather.gov site and seeing it'll come down a bit by first of the week, but maybe still not too fishable yet. Just thought if you knew the level, I could keep that as a reference.

I believe it was at about 4.8ft near Tillamook on Saturday. The site I use is, (TLMO3) WILSON--NEAR TILLAMOOK Station Summary

I agree, it was definitely not easy or pleasant to fish at 4.8ft, but even the small drop to almost 4.6ft helped a lot on Sunday. Heck, looking at that graph right now I'm wondering why I'm at work and not using a vacation day to be on the river .

Great pictures and thanks for sharing! I was thinking about heading down to the Trask hole this weekend.

Thanks, Chris. I'm going to try it again tomorrow (5th)....but will take some spinning gear along w/ the fly rod as insurance. Looking like it'll be around 4.3, which should improve things a lot.

Redhorse71 said:

Thanks, Chris. I'm going to try it again tomorrow (5th)....but will take some spinning gear along w/ the fly rod as insurance. Looking like it'll be around 4.3, which should improve things a lot.

Click to expand...

Make sure you tell us how you did!

Good Monday morning! The river up at MP21 is in MUCH better shape, but still needs to drop to improve the fly fishing. I released two cutts, both about 11", caught with the spinning gear and a red/white Mepps "0". The first one actually regurgitated a 2" sculpin before he went back home.

Took a couple smaller cutts on the 5 wt fly rod by casting upstream, then quick stripping a muddler minnow back down. PERFECT weather, light overcast in the morning, no wind.