FISHING REPORT

Cooler temperatures are setting in and colder mornings are predicted for the next several days, so come prepared!

Trinity River at Lewiston is 304cfs, water temp 48; Limekiln Gulch is 4.6ft at 294cfs; Douglas City is 1.9ft at 335cfs, water temp are 46.6; Helena/North Fork is 8.7ft and 447cfs, water temp 45.9; Cedar Flat is 2.9ft at 584cfs.

Willow Creek is estimated at 844cfs, water temp 55; Hoopa is 13ft at 1,810cfs, water temp 64.4. Mouth of the Trinity at Klamath is 9,070cfs, water 50 degrees.

Klamath River releases at Iron Gate are 1,320cfs. Seiad Valley is 2.9ft at 1,750cfs; Happy Camp is estimated at 2,100cfs. Somes Bar is estimated at 2,650cfs. Orleans is 4.7cft at 3,350cfs.

The good news is that DFG is still counting more salmon redds in the upper river from North Fork to Lewiston — to date 3,059. This tells me that we are getting the escapement needed to sustain the salmon run for the future years.

Trinity River Hatchery is still seeing large numbers of fish. Fishing has been slim and hard up until this week when the rains finally started the fish moving up the river. I have been getting nothing but good reports of steelhead being caught from Lewiston down to Pigeon Point.

Note: DFG has pulled the Willow Creek Weir this week.

Wednesday my fishing buddy from Sacramento, Ed Trujillo, with Mike Meza of Santa Rosa, fished Junction City to Pigeon Point and landed three adult hatchery iron heads pulling plugs. On Thursday they fished the Del Loma run and landed three more adult hatchery steelies. On Friday they were on the river at daylight to fish the Junction City run again and were on the river before most of the guides and drift boaters had launched. Before they even got to the highway at the turn in the river, they had caught and released two adult steelhead. Total fish to the boat was eight adults, the smallest being 8 pounds, the largest 14. Meza caught the big steelie using a Brads' Wiggler Silver Fireback. Let me say they were cold and miserable most of the day, it rained all day Friday, but they still went home happy fishermen.

Down in Willow Creek I saw more fresh fish coming up the river while it was raining. I also spotted several fresh salmon redds in the river where the weir was and watched four salmon spawning.

I didn't get down to Hoopa this week, but the word I got from Johnson was that more fresh fish were heading up to Weitchpec and I guess that as long as they make a right-hand turn at the Trinity, we should have some very good fishing for the Thanksgiving Day holiday.

In the last month, there have been several major changes along the Trinity. John and Elena Letton, the new owners of Indian Creek Lodge, have started to serve a hot breakfast and box lunches for fishermen on the upper river. I might add that they have really cleaned up the lodge and made it comfy for fishermen and guides. Along those same lines, The Dragonfly shop has changed owners. The new owner is Bill Velasquez and he has hired Tim Brady to manage the store. It is called Trinity Outdoors. Both have said that they intend to restock and upgrade the fishing equipment. The Junction City Store has also changed hands and the new owner is Nick Schneider. He plans to stock some fishing gear and he will have fishing licenses and report cards. One of the nice things is Nick has kept on the old employees so you will get the same courteous service that has always been there.