Even with its close proximity to the town of Spokane, the river itself does not get as much love as it should.
One reason behind the Spokane’s relative emptiness is its location – sandwiched in between your popular Yakima River and Northern Idaho, a region full of productive rivers, the Spokane frequently gets overlooked.
The Spokane is, but, certainly one of Washington’s hidden gems. Concealed in plain sight, possibly.
A fishery that is productive rainbow trout, the Spokane River nearby the city is an excellent spot for fly fishermen seeking to escape the crowds.
While it’s not perfect, it is one of the best in Eastern Washington and we’ve included the Spokane River among our picks in Best Fly Fishing Rivers in Washington.
Selective gear rules connect with the river from Nine Mile Dam upstream to the Idaho border, meaning fishermen also can utilize lures with solitary hooks, but no bait. And all hooks on flies and lures should be barbless.
Additionally, the only real fish you can keep upriver from the dam could be a handful of hatchery-marked trout, and without stocking on the state’s schedule (at last check), trout that is most listed here are crazy.
So this is basically a catch and release experience for the part that is upper of Spokane River, where there’s been a concern with toxins. Their state has issued recommendations suggesting no seafood usage for the free-flowing river sections around Spokane.
There are lots of other waters around Spokane where the trout are safe for eating, if catching supper can be your goal. You’ll find resources to greatly help your search linked at the end with this article.
Travel Fishing regarding the Spokane River
Travel fishing on the Spokane River, specially the trout water that is best around Spokane, is classic and conventional regarding techniques and travel patterns. If you’re familiar with fishing streams just like the Deschutes as well as the Yakima, the tactics aren’t much different in the Spokane.
Nymphs fished deep dominate most of the action on the river if you findn’t a hatch going on, and it’s exactly how you’ll oftimes be catching the majority of your seafood.
A strike indicator set deep plus some tungsten beadhead flies are usually all it will take to entice a number of the bigger rainbows within the river, and additionally they can grow big – fish over 20 ins exist.
For the most part, though, you’ll be catching rainbows between 12 and 15 ins, plus they have a lot of fighting nature.
Many traditional nymphing habits work nicely – an especially lethal duo is a rubber legs stonefly nymph (a girdle bug, for example) combined with a beadhead pheasant tail. Prince nymphs and caddis pupa patterns additionally do quite nicely.
Dry flies aren’t the primary show on the Spokane, but you’ll see multiple stonefly habits throughout the summer.
Terrestrial patterns also create well during the days that are warmer the summertime, specially when conditions rise past 90 levels.
Though they’re not seen usually, brown trout are believed to end up being the ultimate goal on the Spokane River.
They truly are for sale in somewhat reduced numbers compared to the rainbows, but the majority of browns within talkwithstranger hookup the river are at minimum 18 ins long and will give you a run for your cash making use of their feisty nature.
If all else fails, don’t hesitate to connect for a streamer. Stripping leech habits or buggers that are wooly the deeper pools and swinging them through the shallower runs can sometimes convince the larger browns to bite.
Conventional Tackle
Spin casters might feel outnumbered days that are here many but mainstream anglers will often check out spinners and spoons to draw strikes from aggressive trout.
Decide to try some different finishes for trout, as sometimes darker or tarnished colors regarding the blades and figures will do the trick.
Rooster Tails and comparable lures also can be very effective for stream trout. Red and brown color habits can mimic forage such as for example insects or crayfish, and red and silver colors may also provoke strikes from trout protecting their territory off their trout.
Make sure to replace any treble hooks with barbless single-point hooks before fishing.
Once more, all trout that is wild be released.
When you should Fish the Spokane River
The Spokane is usually available for fishing from belated might through mid-March, however the summer time is, definitely, probably the most popular season on the river.
Hot summer conditions don’t put a damper on the fishing, but alternatively encourage stoneflies and grasshoppers to emerge and provide opportunities that are feeding the seafood.
When nothing’s happening at first glance, nymphing through the summertime is also a tactic that is extremely effective.
Early summer, from June through mid-July, is normally the absolute most time that is productive of on the river. Fall regarding the Spokane can be good, also as fish enter a feeding frenzy because they prepare for winter.
Once the colder months roll around, the majority of the attention that is minimal Spokane gets through the summer and autumn dies down, and for good reason – the Spokane is not a great river to fish throughout the cold weather.
The harsh winter temperatures of Eastern Washington can seriously influence the fishing, as well as the climate conditions are often miserable.
If you’re wanting to fish the Spokane in the cold weather, though, you may be confident you won’t have much business – a great choice for solitude if that’s what you’re trying to find.
Location and Access
The Spokane River has got the unique feature of being most likely the actual only real great fly fishing river in the Pacific Northwest that operates straight through the biggest market of a town that is large.
This will make access and rooms easy, as the most productive trout stretch is also the absolute most urban – most fly fishermen choose to fish the river into the downtown stretch below Spokane Falls.
