Was getting the steelhead itch so I decided to check out Reiter for the first winter steelhead outing. I was shocked to see that only one other car was parked in the lot when I pulled in around 6:45am. Got a little excited because with the recent high water and lack of people I was thinkin it may be a steelhead bonanza, sadly it was not. First thing I noticed was that somebody had driven past the gate and parked down by the outlet creek. I wanted to say something but maybe he had permission or he was just trying to get away with something, who knows.

Walking in I only saw 4 guys all fishing right at the head of the outlet creek and just 2 guys across the way on the other side so I had the rest of the river all to myself, drool. It was cold and very windy which is probably the worst thing for float fishing. Water was high about 9 feet, running 11,000 cfs, and was very silty white with limited visibility. A lot of sand/sediment was piled up on the banks from the high water event. Started off floating jigs w/shrimp and ran the entire length of the bank to the fast water, nothing. Ran back up and switched jig colors and ran down again, again no luck. Switched to a bobber-dog rig and fished a yarnie with shrimp the entire length again and no luck. Switched to a drift rig with a yarnie for the faster water and fished the whole fast water section with no luck. I also fished that little slow water section just below the fast water and above the cable hole were the little tiny creek runs first with a jig and then with eggs, nothing. Walked back up to about the middle and bobber-dogged a yarnie again and fished my way out, nothing. In total I fished the entire length of Reiter 4 times in about 4 hours and not a thing and saw no fish landed. On my way out I hit Proctor creek and floated some eggs for about 30 minutes with no luck and called it a day my dream of the steelhead bonanza crushed.

Bank drifter

12/2/2014 8:15:00 PM

Try later in the day, even the fish need to wake up when it s that cold, works for me. Great plan and coverage though.

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