North Fork Nehalem Mid- February

Fished the NF Nehalem, an Oregon Coastal stream, yesterday with the water low and clear.  There are a lot of fish around and we saw plenty of fish hiding in the deep spots.  A good amount of the fish we saw were darker fish but we did see a fair amount of chrome bright fish still.  With water conditions so low and clear our approach had to be spot on.  We enjoyed a beautiful day with clear skies, sun and some fun steelhead action.  With conditions like this don’t forget to scale down your fly size and use flourocarbon leaders.

An interesting thing happened yesterday as we prepared the raft to launch.  A helicopter on a trailer pulled into the NF Nehelem hatchery.  It then proceeded to fire up and take off from the hatchery.  We later learned that the ODFW was operating an elk population study in the hills nearby.  We guessed that with the dusting of snow on the mountains the elk would be much easier to spot.

Stack mending to a specific slot produced this fish on the edge of fast water.

Good luck on the water.  Come join us some time watertimeoutfitters.com  See our other NF Nehalem trips info Click here for more NF Nehalem info

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