9-28-25 Big River Low Water
The lack of rain has made fishing smaller streams out of the question, so today we went and waded into an area that’s usually only accessible by boat. With the low water, we weren’t sure what to expect but fortunately the river was easily wadable and the water temperature was 58.
We targeted an area that has a lot of pocket water and usually holds a decent amount of fish. This is one of those spots where we always anchor the boat and spend some time picking it apart. In normal flows on this river, I wouldn’t even consider trying to wade into this section. Fortunately, I was able to get into a great position to fish it. I started out with a nymphing setup, used a 3.0mm tasmanian devil on point and a 1.8mm bwo emerger pattern on a dropper tag. I felt like I covered that water really well, I did not move, scare, or see a trout in the entire section. I switched over to a jig streamer to see if that could entice a trout, but only fooled a fall fish with it.
I continued to search and found a really deep section that was about 50 feet long, I figured if trout weren’t around, I might be able to pull out a few smallmouth or fall fish. I left the jig streamer and worked my way up through the run. Both smallmouth and fall fish decided to eat the streamer and provide some action.
The stretch looked too good for there not to be a trout, or at least for me to believe there weren’t any trout. I walked back down to the tail out and switched back to the Tasmanian devil and blue wing olive emerger rig. The change up worked and I finally found a trout, it was a rainbow. I continued my way up the run and was able to land 2 more, both rainbow trout. I searched and found more water but was not able to entice another fish. That’s when Jim called me and said he found a lot of fish upstream.
I lit a cigar and walked my way up to him. I was surprised to find him in an area that looked like a long shallow riffle. Especially since the only place I found fish was in deep holding water. He was spot on though, those fish were in that shallow fast water actively taking dries and emergers. They were scattered all throughout the stretch, from the really shallow tail out to the deeper outer seems. We started fishing dry droppers and were able to get into some decent rainbows and browns.
We typically fish this water out of a boat with streamers, but this low water really helped us learn the water. Next time we float it, we will know where a lot of the buckets are located that we can hit with greater precision in the future. We both had commitments to get to later in the day so we decided to hike out and call it a day. The brush getting in and out of the river made me feel like I was grouse hunting. I broke my rod down and kept my net in my hand, this made it way easier to follow the deer trail out. We will see if my waders held up on the next outing!