Big browns in irrigation ditches of placer county

[Thomas lee]

I have heard there are trophy browns in the irrigation canals of placer county from dutch flat down to Bel Air in Auburn , I would appreciate any tips to address these waters and fish with fly pole. I have never really seen anything like what ive heard hear in nevada county most of are irragation ditches are drained a poisioned you can find small brookies way above nevada city in the main ditches. Thanks again and any tips or help shall not be forgotten.

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

I have heard about the NID (Nevada Irrigation District) ditches for years having trout in them.

I have heard they are not really easy to fish though.

Maybe someone else will post about this.

[Thomas lee]

I think it has alot to do with the fact that NID is strictly profit driven so they like to store water at its most productive point realease it when needed then so on and son, example My grandfather was a blinded veteran and bought 2 square miles in nevada county in 1950 . a main irrigation artery ran through the property called the tarr ditch, and it ran all year back then my grandpa would tell me stories of when he just bought the place and a couple years after he would catch grasshoppers and use them to catch trout out of the ditch right in the middle of are hay field. fast forward about 40 years and the same ditch runs dry in the winter and has a full head of toxic poisions when it is turned on, so a fair amount of bows and brooks live in main ditches that provide alot of water to placer county so brookies and bows up here and big browns down there maybe. I heard from an old boy one time that he was at the ditch on dogbar road before meadow vista and it was being drained for maintence not completely but enough to dipnet 30 browns 18 inches and bigger, I know it sounds horrible to do such a thing but hey when it rains it poors

[Hogan Brown]

Yes it is true about the ditch browns in the NID ditches. When I was growing up and working at Nevada City anglers I use to fish a few ditches that would run or ran by Deer Creek in Nevada City. Biggest brown I caught was about 24". I caught it by hanging a streamer under a enclosed ditch opening. There are also plenty of rainbows in the ditches as well. True though they are tough to fish and you gotta know where the ditches that hold fish are.

[bigtj]

I've run across numerous ditches in the Sierra Nevada over the years with trout in them, but I don't fish them any more because a) ditches can be really dangerous if you fall into them, with the steep, slippery sides that are hard to get out of, especially near intake structures b) they're ditches, after all, and I'd rather fish a river. However for guys with a serious jones to do something different, they can be a lot of fun. If a ditch has an intake near a river with trout in it, and no fish screens, it's gonna have trout in it, for sure.