Marty's Drift August 2006

Crabbing and Williamson Trout

At the end of July Joyce and I took a week of vacation time. Our vacations are normally pretty simple events. We have an old house at the Oregon coast and we like the seclusion and quiet that we have there. Rabbits, hummingbirds, deer and elk move through our property and feed on and from our flowers. I especially like to watch the hummingbirds at the fuchsias.

We also have availability to some good forest hikes. We can leave our house and hike three miles to the Salmon River drainage on U.S. Forest Service land through some great Sitka spruce forest.

Fishing in most coastal streams during mid-summer is usually not that great. The fall run cutthroat and salmon are still several weeks from arriving. However, many of the estuaries have crabs available. I have never been too excited about crabbing. I have never known anything about how one catches crabs and therefore I’ve been reluctant to try.

Joyce, on the other hand, has gone with friends a couple times, and she convinced me we should give crabbing a try. Finally I gave in and agreed to go. We had crab pots and buoys stored at the house because Joyce’s son, Jeff, had done some crabbing before he moved to New York. For bait we used whiting fillets on our first trip. On our following trips we used chicken and learned that it works great for crabs and doesn’t attract seals to your traps as fish bait will do. Crab pots take up a lot of space and we really appreciated the interior room that we have in our 18’ ClackaMax.

The wind was howling when I unloaded the boat in the Salmon River estuary and rowing was tough. I was attempting to row out closer to the mouth of the river and the ocean, but I only made a half mile beyond the boat launch.

We baited our traps, pitched them overboard and waited 30 minutes. When we pulled them, I was stunned! We had legal crabs in the trap.

Our first crab trip yielded four Dungeness crabs. That provided enough crab meat for two dinners and two lunches. Our next two crab outings resulted in six crabs each time. We feel that six crabs are plenty to take at one time. If we caught more we would have to freeze them and they just don’t taste as good once they have been frozen.

In Oregon you need a shellfish license to harvest crabs. You are only allowed to keep male crabs that are 5¾” across the shell or larger, and the limit is 12. Oregon has many estuaries where crabs are present. Tillamook Bay is fairly famous for crabbing as well as Nehalem Bay. At Siletz Bay people catch crabs from the shore. I don’t have a motor for my boat, but some of the estuaries are big enough with strong tides that an outboard would be required. Crabbing is another way you can use your drift boat. Until the salmon and cutthroat start to run, I’ll be crabbing.

Williamson River Trout

In mid-August we completed a new 16’ Low Profile boat for Marlon Rampy, head guide at Lonesome Duck Lodge, www.lonesomeduck.com (1-800-367-2540). I agreed to deliver the boat, and Marlon invited me to fish with him for a day. I’ll never turn down an invitation to fish the Williamson River.

I’m no fan of hot weather and southern Oregon can get hot, so I was pleased to find the conditions very pleasant at Chiloquin, Oregon. The daytime highs were around 80 degrees and the temperature began to drop with the setting of the sun and went down to the upper 30s overnight.

Marlon and I met for breakfast at 7:00 a.m. After eating, we took the new boat to Lonesome Duck Lodge to make the boat transfer, pick up lodge owner, Steve Hilbert, and start our float.

Lonesome Duck Lodge consists of two 1500 sq. ft. beautiful log homes and a smaller, but equally beautiful cottage. All three facilities are located on the banks of the Williamson River. At the lodge you will find hammocks, barbeques, big porches and boats and canoes to use. The homes and cottage all have comfortable bedrooms, living rooms and complete kitchens.

Once we had transferred Marlon’s gear to his new boat, we were off to do some fishing. We drove upriver to a Klamath County park and boat ramp four or five miles above the lodge.

Without a boat, access on the Williamson River is fairly limited. This small county park is one of the few places that bank anglers find a place to fish. The courteous guides, Marlon being one of them, leave this water to the bank anglers. After all, the rest of the river is wide open for boaters.

I would have terrible luck if I tried to fish the Williamson without a guide. The best fish holding water is in places I would float right past. Marlon anchored the boat at a large quiet pool below the put-in. On the Williamson anchoring is crucial. There are generally winds either gusting and swirling or blowing straight up river. A boat with a single stern anchor will spin around, putting the anglers into bad casting positions. We built Marlon’s boats with both stern and bow foot release anchor systems. This way Marlon can set the anchors and get the boat in perfect position for the anglers.

The correct tackle is also important for success on the Williamson. Marlon advised me to use my 10’ 6-weight rod, but instead of a floating line he gave me a reel loaded with a Rio clear intermediate sinking line. Leaders were 12’ with a 5x tippet. Even with 5x tippet I learned that you need to set the hook gently with Williamson trout, since I broke off two during the day.

There are bug hatches on the Williamson River; BWOs, caddis and especially the big Hex hatch in late June, but the day to day, go-to flies are small, sparse marabou leeches. We used size 10 and 12 flies in several color combinations; light and dark olive, brown and black. Several patterns had a peacock body with either a brown or olive palmer hackle.

Several places required long casts. Many of the pools are deep and the line must be given time to sink and then retrieved with a variety of strips at different speeds. Several of the strikes I got happened as I was slowly stripping the fly just a quarter- to half-inch at a time. Marlon hooked fish with both a slow strip and a slightly faster one.

As we neared the lodge take-out, Marlon had his eye on a particular bend in the river. For the past three days the wind had been blowing grasshoppers into the water, and his clients had caught some sizeable fish on dry flies. He handed me a dry fly rod as he positioned the boat. The cast was pretty long and once it was made it was possible to shake out line for a drag free float until I reached the backing. On several casts I had little fish boil at the fly, but nothing took it down.

I handed the rod to Marlon for him to try, and he was able to bring up a bigger fish. With that, we called it a day.

Rainbow trout continue to migrate out of Klamath Lake and up the Williamson River throughout the summer and fall. During September and October a larger class of fish appears. Generally they are pursued with streamer fishing techniques. The Oregon state record for rainbow trout is over 20 pounds. It was caught in the Sprague River, a Williamson tributary. Marlon says that every fall his clients land some 12- and 15-pound trout. If you would like to try for some large fall rainbow, contact Marlon: www.flyfishoregon.com, 1-541-660-3780, or P.O. Box 4222, Medford, OR 97501. I suspect you will have some great fishing.