6 days on the Lower Yuba

Lower Yuba in the winter...my favorite place this time of year

I have spent the last 6 days on the Lower Yuba guiding. It has been at times cold, wet, windy, and misserable but the fishing through it all has been great. I had planed on splitting my time between the L. Yuba and L. Sac but with the Shasta blowing out and the Sac pumping mud I moved all my days over to the Lower Yuba. The River dropped to 1300cfs on Weds and by Thurs had about 6"-1' of visibility. Not bad conditions...really the kind where it could be really good or really tough. Fortunately it was really good. Clarity improved through Monday each day then the flows doubled overnight between Monday and tuesday and deer creek blew out. By Tuesday morning flows were around 3000cfs but deer creek was dropping and clarity was about like it was on Thursday, so we went for it. Ended up being one of the best numbers days I have ever had on the L. Yuba. Spent 4 hours in one run hooking fish after fish after fish...pretty silly.

Yuba Fatty

22" of Yuba Love

 Here is what I have found over the last few days on the L. Yuba. Fish are podding up when the flows jump and clarity becomes an issue. As the river cleared through Monday fish began to spread out and we were catching fish in various types of water. Thurs-sat and again on Tuesday fish podded up and were holding in very specific types of water. Most days we  hooked ridiculous numbers of fish but many were in the 12-14" range but there was a few 16-18" fish mixed in and even some big winter steelhead hooked and even fewer landed. Bottom line the river is fishing pretty dam good right now but as always with the Yuba as flows change and clarity changes things can go from great to tough any day. Caught all of our fish nymphing with eggs and big attractor flies but as the water cleared we did get some fish on #14 PT's and mayfly nymphs that were a bit over sized for the naturals that are around.    I would think that swinging flies would also be a great option if you can find a pod of fish as they are pretty damn grabby right now and we hooked fish on when we swung out our nymph rigs at the end of drifts pretty regularly.

24" of Yuba Steel

Close up...Awesome fish

Overall it is a great time to be out on the Lower Yuba and there is plenty of fish around to be caught. here are some dates I have open over the next few weeks if anyone is looking to get out. Book now and get my 2012 rates as I will be raising by rates come Jan 1, 2013

Dec. 31
Jan. 2, 3, 12, 13, 19-21