For those of you waiting for spawning season to end at Putah... I went to the Lower Yuba on Sat and caught a few 14 inchers, plus hooked a few other good sized ones. My buddy caught one in the 24 inch range, and hooked another that was probably 18+.
The rain and recent high flows added some tint, which I hear was needed. There wasn't much hatching when we went (maybe some BWOs), and I didn't see as many skwalas under the rocks as expected. Caught all of ours while nymphing upstream from the bridge, using rubber legs and olive Hogan's S&M. The 24incher was caught on an olive BH bird's nest.
I was up there yesterday and the fishing was great in the morning. I had 3 in hand all about 18 inches. I had one on a birds nest, one on a red copper john and one on a San Juan Worm....all droppers under a Rubberlegs.
Didn't see a single skwala in the air or under a rock.
The water is still cloudy which I guess helps...if it was the usual gin clear, the fish would take one look at the hoards of anglers and head straight for the deepest hole they can find and hide!
-- Edited by Bob Loblaw on Tuesday 17th of February 2015 11:25:03 AM
Fished the Lower Yuba this past weekend and had decent luck. Red was the key subsurface and Sunday after losing an entire nymph rig with little time left to fish before having to leave I tied on a Chernobyl Ant for the last hour and hooked 3 fish in that hour! Prior to that nymphing didn't get me any fish in 3 morning hours. These fish came near the bank but from at least 6 feet of water, where not actively feeding on top and where in fast water. They clearly don't see too much life on top and take any opportunity to inspect what floats by. These fish took like cutthroat with the long inspection, slow grab and then back down to be surprised by the hook in the lip... Shameless Plug: Nymphed Sunday with the Red Truck Diesel 11' 5-weight outfit which is a pretty versatile fishing "tool" and then all dry fly and Sunday nymphing on the Leland Sonoma 8' 5-weight outfit. With the Leland line this rod nymph's too well and well dries, the rod was made for that.
Went out today to Sycamore Ranch. Only one dime-bright silver bullet swung up on a brown krystal bugger. A little too windy to ensure good dry fly presentation.... I did try a tandem skwalla and size 18 parachute Adams without any success. I was fun (and annoying) watching some fish fly out of the water on occasion but no response to my offerings.
The Yuba is still an enigma to me - except when the egg bite is on!
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You should try pitching March Brown cripples to the rising fish. On the last Lower Yuba trip with PCT a week ago, every rising fish hit my MB cripple until I snapped it off on a big boy. Went to look for another one, but found that I'd left the 15 or so cripples I'd tied at home. :(
Also hooked several decent (15-17"), less enthusiastic fish on PMD cripples and believe it or not a Light Cahill that I put on so I could actually see the fly in the choppy water.
Got nada on my favorite Skwala dry, but good action nymphing Pat's rubber legs, S&M's and #14 March Brown pheasant tails.
Someone in our group landed 2 20"+ rainbows on a #18 BWO emerger or maybe was it a BWO cripple.
This is usually the besy season on the Yuba, and this year is no exception. I was up a week ago and Skwalas, March Browns and PMD's all got alot of topwater action, however, the nymph fishing was even better. A standard Prince nymph just knocked them dead that day. SOme action on Rubberlegs and Mercer Skwala's, but nothing like the Prince.
Thanks for the tip about the prince. What size were you using?
I throat sampled 2 fish and found among a lot of mayfly nymphs (BWO's, MB's) and tiny midge pupae, a size 8 black stonefly that appeared to be a pteronarcys nymph. I'm very interested in how big a prince they were hitting.
