Throughout everything we seem to throw at the Crooked, she’s still kicking out there in her gorgeous little canyon. The flows just a week ago were pushing 2000cfs, up from the lovely 82 she’d been at for months. This is all due to an antiquated formula used my the Bureau of Reclamation that factors in date, inflow, lake level and snowpack. While we did have a ton of water pouring into the reservoir, nobody in their right mind would see the sense in dumping that much water into an already fragile and recovering riparian habitat. Another dam story if there ever was one.
So…the good news is that flows were ramped up and stepped down in such a way as to allow the Redbands time to adjust. We’ve been holding steady at around 390cfs for five days. And the fish are eating. So don’t be afraid of these higher than normal flows. Get out there and fish. We’ve been using lots of eye-catching nymphs like the Trina’s Angelcase, Anato-mays, Flashback Pheasant Tails and Psycho Prince in #16 and #18. The Ruby Leech and Zonker Leech in black have caught fish both under bobbers and swung. If the hatch comes off and the fish feel like going up through all that water, try Parachute Adams, Purple Haze, Hackle Stacker in #18