Mid Holiday Drift - Fishing reports, music, sports, rambling...

So, here we are in the “mid Holiday drift” between Christmas and new years…one more blow out on New Years before we settle back into the grind of the new year. Christmas with my two boys is always a TON of fun. At 4 and 6 they are in the middle of the childhood frenzy that surrounds Christmas, Santa, and all things that surround the holiday. Things are settling back down though, the legos have been built, the toys have all been assembled, and the total overwhelmingness of mass amounts of new toys has subsided. My wife went on her post Christmas neurotic cleaning binge removing all signs of Christmas from the house and putting things back “in order”…. Living with an interior designer is nice, works for her to as I could care less about most things and she gives me my office to do what ever I want with, granted it is in the back of the house and she keeps the door closed at all times.

I took a few days off but got back on the river yesterday and will be back out again the rest of the week after a day off today. Really the only place in my neck of the woods to fish is the Lower Yuba River and Butte Creek. The Lower Sac is muddy with a little less then a foot of visability as from what I have heard Lake Shasta is blown out….at this point it may be a while for the L. Sac to get back to fishable. No word on the Feather but I imagine it is some what fishable if you want to go to the opener chaos on Jan 1. Here are some reports…

Lower Yuba River – Flows are around 700 with good clarity, there is color to the river but that perfect dark green color that allows fish to see your flies but not get totally freaked out with a low flow and clear water. All my clients fish have come on nymphs or swung flies. Best nymphs have been egg patterns, stonefly nymphs, and any attractor nymph. There has been a sparse baetis and gray drake hatch but I couldn’t get any of the fish to eat smaller mayfly nymphs and medium size mayfly nymphs. I looked in all my normal spots for fish to be sipping the baetis and drakes but never found any, not to say they aren’t there they just weren’t when I looked. Clarity may still be an issue. Also no skwala sightings yet either, in reality I usually don’t see many unitl Jan or feb.

Not bad for an 11year old...

Maxine getting it done on the Lower Yuba

This is a great time of year and the river is in great shape to get out and swing flies on a light switch or spey rod. Most of the fish we have hooked on swung flies have come on olive’ish streamer patterns, something that looks like an Alvin or salmon smolt. I have yet to try swinging stonefly nymphs but I will soon as the skwalas make their migration to the bank over the next month.

Swing'em up

Yuba Trout

Butte Creek – I have not been out sense the last rain but the flows are stable at about 250cfs which is a great flow for wade fishing. Talked to a buddy who floated the creek and he did OK, fish he said are pretty spread out so if you go cover water. I am thinking another good rain is needed to move some fish up from the Sac but who knows. I will be out there in a week or so pretty heavily as Jan is the month I fish it the most.

Sports Report – BOWL SEASON…a true Christmas present. So far so good with the bowl season. Notre Dame Plays today and lets be honest I have no idea what to expect…coach Kelly is starting a new QB and LSU’s Defense is NAILS so might get ugly but hopefully we have healed up on Defense over the break and can hang with a sub par LSU offense.

Also been enjoying watching the Warriors. I am not a huge NBA fan but the Warriors are fun to watch. It is also fun having a team to root for during the time between College football and spring training…NFL is not my thing though I watch it a bit if I am home. Yes I do play fantasy football but really only to talk smack to my buddies as I have finished last place in my league the last two years…might have something to do with the fact I draft based on if the player went to Notre Dame or not, if they played for a hated rival they have no shot. I then set my roster like ounce or twice in September and then don’t pay attention to it at all. I really see it as a gift to my buddies who are, lets be honest, WAY obsessed with the whole fantasy football thing. For me it is a little to close to 16 sided dice and painting figures of wizards while carrying a fat stack of pokemon cards in your back pocket if you know what I mean.

Music – Lots of tunes have been rotating through my ears…Really been getting back into built to spill, dinosaur Jr, and centro matic…Fuzzed out mid tempo guitar rock for guys that grew up in the 90’s. The Centro Matic channel on Pandora is GREAT! I am digging on that right now, the Ryan Adams channel usually gets me going until I am through with my first cup of coffee though. Haven’t really bought and CD’s lately…On that note I hate not having a record/music store in chico, maybe I am just getting old and should completely commit to this whole digital music thing but I am still like having a CD. May need to make a trip to Sac of SF to Amoeba or something and just spend a few dollars.

Get out there people! No one ever said they fished to much