Originally Posted by
itsbenlong
We just spent 3 days on the Klamath and I promised Andy G. I would post a report. In those 3 days we probably fished 12 hours, if that. BTW I rarely almost never take pics sorry....no proof!
A long story short: Klamath Basin blue-green algae bloom....see ya!
A short story long: We dropped into Seiad Valley around 2pm and skipped a few spots along the way because the river was polluted with algae. It looked like radiator fluid, so we bombed down as far as we thought we could fish before it caught up to us. We got ready fast and booked down to the water, praying it wasn't as green. Luckily it looked like typical fall season before the rains Klamath water. I stuck a half pounder and an adult in the first 5 casts, spent about 1 hour more in the same run and picked up another half pounder and adult. I brought a friend who just picked up fly fishing so I spent the rest of the evening talking about the river and showing him how to cast, swing and more. He didn't get any grabs but we left feeling satisfied that this could be a decent trip regardless of the lack of rain and cool weather. Which I should mention it was getting cooler and shutting down the hatch causing a lack of active fish like the last few weeks. We stayed that night in Happy Camp with the plan that we would hit that same spot first thing in the morning and then work our way up until we hit the Radiator Water.
My friend was slow getting up the next day and we missed the entire morning and didn't get on the water until 11:30am. We walked down to the water and it was pea green soup. I had a bad feeling about it all morning and I knew as soon as I saw it we needed to change gears fast. So, after a few casts since we were already there, I decided to book down river and get past the algae bloom again. The first place we stopped which was a good 10 miles past Happy Camp, I picked up 2 adults and lost another. One was 20" and the other was a beauty at 27" (best fish of the trip). We ate a quick lunch and rolled down to Green Riffle and I picked up a small adult while waiting for my friend to get ready so we could walk up to the top. As soon as we got to the top I stuck a half pounder in that shallow part of the riffle and another adult about 10 yards down from it. I lost about 4 or 5 fish in the run as well. Between that and working with my friend, the day was quickly gone.
We stayed in Happy Camp again, don't know why! I guess because we already paid for the room. We packed everything up the next morning and arrived first light at Green Riffle with a plan to fish down to Weitchpec and then hit the trinity until dark and maybe try up in Lewiston the next morning. Unfortunately I don't know the Klamath that well below Orleans so we spent a lot of time trying to find good water to swing. I picked up another nice adult in Green Riffle and a half pounder in a different run closer to Weitchpec. We were kind of on the fly so we didn't spend a lot of time in each place. We were going to try the riffle below the bridge in Weitchpec but their were so many drunk/high dudes rollin' around the store and both sides of the bridge that we didn't want to leave our truck with all our gear in it for long and decided to burn over to the Trinity and maybe fish around Hoopa or between Willow Creek and Hoopa. Well, Hoopa isn't allowing anyone to stop in the city limits unless you live their and the day was getting shorter by the minute so we just blazed to Willow Creek and then toward Redding. The Trinity is a bust...we didn't fish it but the water is so low that you can walk across to the other side in every run. I'm guessing the water temps aren't even cool enough to fairly fish it, although it was full of folks as usual. It didn't get any better as we continued up it and we just bailed home.
I probably could of just wrote: Klamath - Algae Bloom - Run for your lives - caught some fish but was a lot of work. However, I came home a day early and I am still on vacation until tomorrow morning so I had nothing better to do that bore you with all these details knowing all you wanted to really know is, "how is the fishing, good or bad".
We still had a blast and the Algae Bloom caused me to venture into areas I haven't tried before so all in all a great trip. My friend didn't pick one up, but it was tough out their so next time. It was fun watching his cast get better each day and talking about fly fishing and how to read water and find good runs to swing.
