I just moved to davis from livermore becuase I'm attendind UCD. While I was living in the Bay Area my usual haunt was the lower stan, below goodwin dam, but now that I'm so close to Winters I figured I should turn my attention to Putah Creek. I tried the creek for the first time last thursday. I fished up around the bridge from noon til dark and the only action I got all day was around five o'clock when I lost a nice one (maybe around 16") on a #14 bh hares ear. I plan on fishing the creek again this thursday and had a couple of questions.
1. Where is a good place to start if you are new to the creek?
2. Is there any good dry fly action on the creek (I ask because around 1 o'clock there was a good bwo hatch, but I didn't see a single fish rising)?
3. Can you fish the creek all year or do the flows get too high in the spring and summer?
Although Putah is a different kind of fishery than I'm used to, I've heard many great things about the creek from this board and other sources, so I'm excited to learn the ins and outs of putah creek and hope to fish it often
1. Putah holds fish in all the same types of water as any other creek or river...tail outs ,riffles, deep pools and even slow water..look for rock base and dont bother with the clay or silt bottom areas...Fish are TRYING to spawn so it best to stay away from the redds and any runs behind them..If you can see a fish in the shallow its Spawning and the fish in the run below are trying to as well. Move to a new spot please. 2. Not a whole lot of dry action, but some guys will get a little action here and there. Small bugs and get them on the bottom is the name of the game on putah..#18-22 are most common....Hot flies can be order on this site from Bono the king of putah creek... 3.Flows will go up to 700 and hold .At that point the creek gets a littel harder to fish,but after time you will find plenty of spots. creek opens up at about 300cfs around late aug early sept...fishing gets good then, up and down the whole creek..
that should give your brain a little to think about...I recommend getting out and doing a little more exporing than fishing ..creek is low right now and you can go any where. study the creek. The rocks the ,deep slots, Snags and remember what it looks like.when flows go up it will pay off...Take a look at some post on reeds and spawning and feel free to ask question in regards...Happy spawning fish this year mean a better creek next year..
As for dries, If you commit yourself to it for a day you can get a few sometimes. I've rarely seen all out feeding frenzy with fish rising all over but it does happen from time to time. Listen to Mx he's givin great advice !
Thanks for the tips guys! I'll make sure to keep a look out for spawners so I don't disturb the redds. I'll be on the creek around 11 or noon. I tried up near the damn last thursday so i think I'll try it downstream around access 3 or 4 tomorrow. Hope to see you out there.
Try small dry flies in the riffles around #5. I have had some fun action recently with many small fish in hand. Skating them on the surface sometimes works better than dead drift. One more thing, as far as nymphs go anything small and skinny will work, but as mx19 said you have to get them on the bottom and the drift is really important. After you make your cast try to mend a small loop above your indicator (if you use one). This will keep the flies from swinging; also the water on the bottom of the river moves quite a bit slower than the top. This is what makes a perfect natural drift hard to achieve. Some times all it takes is multipule casts to get just the right drift-then boom! -PF
-- Edited by putahfisher on Friday 4th of March 2011 08:28:03 AM
