The Willow Creek Weir has been removed and it looks like the peak of the salmon runs have made it through Willow Creek. The Winter Run Chinook salmon peaked out during Julian Week 40 – 41 at 713 & 217 while the Coho salmon peaked out during Julian Week 40 at 326. The steelhead are…
It has been HOT, this last week with more to come. That is the forecast for the weather. I am not sure if the river is too hot for the salmon to even survive let alone be able to spawn. The water coming out of the Trinity Lake is too hot for the eggs in…
The Chinook salmon quotas for the Upper Klamath and Upper Trinity have been met for adult Chinook salmon on Sunday October 24. As of October 25, 2021 you can only harvest jacks, (salmon under 23 inches, 2 per day, 6 in possession) on he Klamath above Weitchpec and above Cedar Flat Hwy 299 Bridge on…
It is not bad enough to have 100 plus temperatures but now we have the added feature of fire along the Down River section of the Trinity. The good about the fire is that it is of low intensity and burning under story. I think that is about all that is left from the…
Yes it was hot Sunday(102) but it looks like we are in for a cooling down period in the next few weeks. Now if we can just avoid any more fires, we should be in good shape for the next few weeks. I sure hope so because the predictions on the computer for Willow…
Triple digit weather for all of last week was great for rafters and sun bathers but hard on fishing. Last week was a doosee. It was HOT all week and into the nights like Redding and Red Bluff. The good part is that we are in for a cooling down for the next week or…
The prediction of Triple Digit Heat for next week is going to be hard on the fishing and the people. Wednesday July 1st was the opening for Spring Chinook salmon fishing on the Lower Klamath and the Upper Trinity rivers. Saturday July 3rd was “Free Fishing Day”. Friday the Trinity Valley saw 103 degrees…
At the time of this writing it is 101 degrees and at end of the day it was 112 degrees. The water in Hoopa was 77.9 degrees. Salmon can survive in 72 degrees but really will die after 75 degrees. The following is research I have done on the internet: The State Water Resources Control…
C. Shasta hits down migrating juveniles between the Shasta River and the Scott River. 70% of the juvenile salmon trapped in the Upper Klamath showed they were infected with the Ceratonova Shasta virous. 97% of the juveniles trapped between the Shasta River and the Scott River tested positive for C. Shasta. This plus the…
The Trinity River spring water releases have started. Today Sunday May 2, 2021 at 11:00am Lewiston Dam is releasing 1,406cfs into the Trinity River. The sad news is that the Klamath River Basin Harvest proposed total is 1,221 Fall Chinook Salmon. Broken down; Lower Klamath from Weitchpec Bridge to the mouth is 610 salmon; Kamath…
HAPPY EASTER: Bright and sunny for the Easter Bunny! We have been having really good weather for the last couple of weeks with sunshine and no rain. We do need some rain to help bring in the late runners of steelhead. On my trips up and down the Trinity I have not seen any drift…
The Pacific Fisheries Management Council (PFMC) salmon advisory team has come out with some preliminary numbers for Pacific Coast Fall Chinook salmon harvest availability. The cause; there are many causes but everyone wants to point the finger at someone else or some other problem. Science says that the reason there are declining returns of…
The valley received a good rain forth week but a light snow for the snow pack needed for the coming water year. Many of the reservoirs are 505 or below. This is not good for water releases for fish or the farmers. In my travels this last week I saw a light snow covering…
We are still in an “Over Fishing” rating by the Pacific Fisheries Management Council (PFMC). The PFMC will meet in March to come up with the recommended choices for Fall Chinook salmon quotas for the 2021salmon season, then in mid or late April the PFMC will meet and make the “Fall Run Chinook salmon”…
Recent storms have brought us lots of rain but our snow pack is still below average and water content. This is not good news for both water storage and spring water flows. We could be into a designated “Dry Water Year”. I hope not as we could still get more snow from coming storms….
For now the Trinity is in great fishing condition with winter steelhead in the river. The river condition is just right in the upper part of the river with the lower section of the Trinity coming into great fishing condition for winter steelhead fishing. The weather predictions for the coming weekend are possible snow Sunday…
The fires are still providing plenty of smoke along the Klamath-Trinity Rivers. The Red Salmon Complex Fires are slowly coming under control but they are providing most of the smoke on the Trinity River. For the last week I couldn’t see across the river from my house. Today, Sunday I can see the top of…
Smoke in the valley has been pretty heavy for the past couple of days. The salmon are in the Trinity and fishing is fair to good. Orleans area is heavy with smoke from the Happy camp fire and the Red/Salmon Fire complex. This fire is now up to 88,000 acres and is expected to continue…
The Red/Salmon Fire complex fires still continue to grow and now reached almost 24,000 acres. It depends upon the winds and temperatures as to how smoky it gets in the valley. Orleans usually gets the brunt of the smoke but the Trinity side gets a lot of smoke at times. Talking to Patrick and Machel…
The Red/Salmon Fire complex fires continue to grow and are now almost 19,000 acres. A lot of the smoke blows west towards Redding but some it is in the Weaverville area, a lot of the smoke lays along the Upper Klamath in the Seiad Valley, Happy Camp, Orleans section of the Upper to Mid Klamath…
The Salmon-Red Fires in the Trinity Alps plus the fire in Hoopa are still providing smoke in the Trinity Valley, on the other hand we have heat (106-100) on different days which heats up the water most days. On most days the smoke in the valley is not too bad but we still have hot…
The Salmon Red Fires in the Trinity Alps has now started to smoke up the valley. Some days it is just a haze and others days it gets a bit heavier. Here lately it has been a light smoke in the air and not to harmful and clears up sometime in the afternoon. It has…
The “Dog Days of Summer”have arrived! Last week we saw almost the whole week of triple digit weather. This week is almost the same, the only difference is we are only looking at several days of triple digit weather but a lot of high 90s. This is great weather for summer tube floating and swimming…
It looks like the Trinity River Valley is going to be HOT HOT HOT!! According to the weather forecast for the coming week we are going to see temperatures of 100 up to 106. (looks like Lake time) Usually sometime during the month of July it seems like we always get a week or two…
SpringChinook salmon are in the Upper Trinity as well as in the Lower Klamath. Guides have been fishing the Klamath estuary since the first of the month but not a lot of reports. In talking with Allen Borges of Allen Borges Guide service, he was just setting up his fish camp. The report I received…
SpringChinook salmon fishing is going to be tough this year. Wednesday July 1st the In-River spring salmon fishing season will open on the Lower Klamath and the Upper Trinity. The Kamath will be open from the Weitchpec Bridge down to the mouth of the Klamath. Limit; one salmon only, 2 salmon in possession. (this means a…
The new fishing Regulations are out! July 1, Trinity River opens to fishing for Spring Chinook salmon; 1salmon (period) per day 2 in possession above the South Fork of the Trinity to Old Lewiston Bridge. September 1, Trinity opens to fishing for Fall Chinook salmon; 2 salmon per day, 1 adult and 1 jack…
The coronavirus pandemic appears to be slowing down for the U.S. and California. At least there is some consideration of lessoning the “shelter-in-place” restrictions in some areas. Let’s hope that the peak has arrived and we are on the mend. For those who are worried about CDFW Director Charles Bonham’s ability to “Delay” some fishing seasonopenings his…
Over the past 20 to 30 years, I have attended many of the Klamath Fisheries Management Council (KFMC now federally sunset) Pacific Fisheries Management Council (PFMC) National Fisheries Management Service (NFMS) California Department Fish and Game Commissioners meetings plus being on the Trinity Adaptive Management Working Group (TAMWG part of the TRRP) for over 16yrs plus…
As you know, I attended the salmon meeting in Sana Rosa last Thursday February 27th. It was very enlightening and the prognosis was not very good for the Klamath River Basin In-River Sports Fishermen. The beginning estimate for In-River Sports Fishing for the Klamath River Basin was 900 to a 1,000 returning fall salmon to be split…