Fall River Mills, California: Fly Fishing Season Opener 2018

Season opener 2018

(The 2019 Season is underway starting Saturday April 27. Expect a new post and updated fishing report that weekend)

Here it is again the beginning of another fishing season in Fall River Mills California. And it has been a good one so far. We are coming off some good winter fishing where we had good numbers of huge native fish being taken on our local lakes found in and around the Fall River Valley. After battling snow, rain, and more then our share of wind it will be nice to fish in some warmer weather. The winter of 2018 will go down as a season full of excellent fishing with a lot of bigger than average native fish being brought to hand.
Since opening day in April, the fly fishing has been very good on rivers like the Pit, McCloud, and Hat Creek. Most of my trips so far have been on Fall River. I have several other trips lined up for other waters, but I have not had a chance to fish anywhere else other than Fall River yet, so I will only report on Fall River at this time.
The river itself (Fall River) came through the winter looking good, with excellent weed growth and clarity. There are good numbers of fish from Spring Creek Bridge all the way to Island Rd Bridge. There are numbers of fish from Island Rd to the mouth, but they are spread out not yet podded. We have been getting good numbers of fish from 8 to 15 inches, and numbers of fish from 16 to 20 inches. There is still a bunch of fish up high in the system spawning that are slowly making their way back down into the system.
So far, the bug life has been limited, with a hand full of PMD and midges being the main bug on the water. However, I have pumped a few fish and found a good variety of nymphs, in different sizes from 14 to 20. The fish have been very willing to grab our flies on the swing, with most of the bigger fish being taken under the indicator. Dry fly fishing has been very limited up to this point but that should start to pick up at any time. The mouth of the river is fishing pretty good with fish being active first thing and staying on the bite until late early afternoon.
The fish are not extremely picky yet with a lot of fish being taken on pts, and zug bugs on the swing. Most soft hackles have been working well with olive and the darker colored ones doing the best. As usual leaches in black and gray are pulling fish out of some of the deeper runs. At this point S&M, pt, micro may fly’s, midge larva have been working well with the indicator.
Hopefully this will be enough to get you started. If not feel free to give me a call and I can help you get things sorted out. Good luck and good fishing.