Root River Report

While most fish are not making it up over the weir dam, numbers are such that even the smaller percentage has yielded good fishable numbers of fish for anglers.  Colonial park has had the least pressure on the river.  As a result fishing has been a bit better and finding a good spot will provide the least amount of stress on the fisherman.  Quarry park and the Horlick dam have both been very popular, with the dam having 40+ anglers every time i checked.  Most of the fish caught above the weir have been chinook, but a few coho, browns and even a few steelhead have been caught as well.  Again, small egg imitation flies have been the best producer.

Lincoln park

Many fish (mostly chinook, but good #'s of coho as well) have moved into the river this past week and with the weir dam preventing the majority of fish from making it upstream, fish have been stacked in Lincoln park.  Anglers have likewise followed.  Counts on the river this weekend were well over 100 with 60-80 anglers in Lincoln park alone!!  With all the pressure and the clearer water the fish have been very spooky and difficult to get to bite anything.  Small egg imitation flies painstakingly and repeatedly drifted past the fish has been about the only way to get consistently bit.  Island park has also seen a boom in fish populations and several anglers had luck drifting the deeper gravel beds in the bends of the river.  Spawn or skein has been a good producer at times (especially early) in this area.  Washington park golf course has the biggest variety of fish with bunches of browns, a few steelhead and good numbers of coho as well as kings.  Most of these fish have either been moving upstream or circling the deeper areas.  Catching them has been difficult.  Fly fishermen are catching a few, but flow is so minimal that a drift is near impossible.  Drifted spawn or even spoons have caught most of the fish here.