Deschutes River · fly box
A desert canyon river with the biggest salmonfly hatch in the Pacific Northwest.
| Pattern | Imitates | Size | Technique |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pat's Rubber Legs, coffee | Salmonfly nymph | #6-8 | Fish it 60 cm under an indicator close to the bank; the strike zone is the first two metres. |
| Rogue Stone, orange | Salmonfly adult | #6 | Drift it in the foam line against a rock wall; twitch only when it stops. |
| October Caddis, orange | Dicosmoecus adult | #8 | Swing it at dusk on the tail of a riffle; the take comes as the fly straightens. |
| Green Butt Skunk | Steelhead attractor | #4-6 | Classic wet-fly swing on a floating line with a 1.5 m sink tip, step down after each cast. |
| Bead-head Prince Nymph | Green rock worm | #12-14 | Tight-line nymphing through the fast chutes in the canyon. |
The dressing plate
On this river
The stonefly migration
Two weeks before adults appear, the nymphs migrate to the bank to crawl out. That migration, not the adult flight, is the most reliable window: fish a heavy stonefly nymph 60 cm under an indicator, right against the bank, and expect takes in the first metre of drift. When adults start flying, switch to a dry the size of your thumb and cast into the branches hanging over the water.
Swinging for summer steelhead
From late August, fish a floating line with a 1.5-metre sink tip and one wet fly, cast at 45 degrees downstream, and let the current do everything. Step 60 cm downstream after each swing. On a good day you cover 400 metres of water and get three takes; the discipline is in the stepping, not the casting.
Reading a basalt canyon
The Deschutes has almost no gravel bars; its structure is boulders the size of cars and long glassy flats between them. The fish hold in the seam where a boulder's eddy meets the main current, so look for the small slick patch below each rock rather than for the rock itself. If your fly never passes within a metre of that slick, you are fishing empty water.