March 8, 2016 – Nothing but Scuds and Midges on the West Valley DHALO

Day of the zebra midge

I headed to another Delayed Harvest Artificial Lures Only creek today for some stocked rainbows and browns.  I have never fished this Valley Creek, known on the maps as West Valley, and despite seeing DHALO signs below a long, curving, dark tunnel, I saw no signs of fish in the first stretch I explored.  I did see some nice stream improvements, so the local Trout Unlimited is doing good work. After catching a half a dozen chubs in some nice holes, I walked back to the Subaru and drove back through the creepy tunnel and upstream to find another spot.

Nothing below here this morning despite the DHALO postings.

I saw another pull-off about a half-mile from my original parking spot, and was encouraged to see another car there.  I only caught a glimpse of a guy throwing a plug above me, and one fly guy heading away from me.   That was it all day.  After more walking, from high on a bank I finally saw fish, including a huge rainbow surrounded by smaller trout, suckers, and chubs.  With high sun, they saw me, but at least I knew that there were fish around. 

A few, including this brown, took a scud.

I camped out in a deep hole with a scud and zebra midge as the dropper, and I finally had some fish.  Man, they were barely taking the midge.  Hits were very subtle, perhaps due to high sun and high pressure.  I caught 90% of the 18 or so trout I brought to hand in this 100 yard stretch on the size 20 zebra midge.  I also caught a sucker, a few rock bass, and my first smallmouth of the year, all on the midge.  The other 10% took the scud like the brown above.

First smallmouth of the year - caught chubs, suckers, and rock bass too...

I probably hooked half a dozen more that came off.  That will happen with a hook so small on a day when the fish were barely taking the fly.  My only regret is not landing for a photo op a pig of a rainbow that took the midge.  I carried my net on the first drop, but I left it in the 'Ru at the second parking spot because I didn’t think I’d catch fish, let along need to net an 18 inch rainbow.  I had a mix of bows and browns, my first stocked browns of the year.  Not a bad 3 hours on a new creek.