We're more than halfway through February and springtime is nearly "marching" upon us. With a lot of fisheries closed this time of year, February is often a month of anticipation. As the days lengthen and warm, we look forward to chironomid hatches on lakes, perhaps a jaunt over to the Yakima in hopes of hitting the skwala hatch, maybe an afternoon prowling a quiet beach to see if the cutthroat are out yet. There just aren't a lot of red hot fishing opportunities close to home this time of year. So it's a chance to prep gear, tie flies, organize flies, practice your cast, repair leaky waders and get ready for the good days ahead. It's also not a bad time to chase the sun in some southerly locale where you can be perfectly comfortable in shorts and a T-shirt.
I just returned from our yearly hosted trip to Rocky Point Permit Camp on Ambergris Cay in Belize. I'll write another full recount of the trip you can find on our new Trip Reports page on the website shortly, but in the meantime here's the condensed version to give you a sense of how things went. Night one, I fell through an open plank on a dock while a friend was wrangling a good-sized tarpon, nearly broke my leg and subsequently pitched my phone into a muddy lagoon in San Pedro. I searched for it for a good hour with a head lamp, belly down on a borrowed paddle board while everyone else spotlighted the area from the rickety dock and gave me a nervous heads up each time a fresh pair of orange glowing saltwater crocodile eyes appeared along the other side of the lagoon. I never found the phone but I suppose that all things considered, it could have been much worse.
First night fiascos aside, we caught good numbers of bonefish, several of them uncharacteristically big for Belizean waters, a few permit, tarpon, jacks, snook and all the other odds and ends that you never really target or even necessarily want to catch but are still cool in their own way. We got to watch the Super Bowl from the bar over the water at Tranquility Bay and missed a good chunk of the halftime show because we opted to watch large tarpon and permit frolicking under the dock lights (on a much more solidly constructed dock). It was pretty awesome to see the Seahawks win. Belize seemed to be full of traveling Seahawks fans on game day. The week went by all too quickly as they have a way of doing and we're back to thinking about the next time, new flies to create, new places to explore and anticipating another chapter in the ever-evolving adventures that await us.
We had a fantastic turnout at the Lincoln Theatre at the beginning of February for the 20th Anniversary of the Fly Fishing Film Tour. Thanks for all of your support on the North Sound Trout Unlimited raffle and congratulations to the lucky winners. Up next, we have a tying class and all day spey casting class in the works but don't have the dates finalized yet so we'll announce those in the coming weeks. It's also about time to mark your calendars for this year's Speyapalooza on Saturday, May 2nd. We'll have more details forthcoming on that one as well. In the meantime, enjoy the process of preparing for another fishing season. We don't like to think that it necessarily ends, and for a lot of folks it doesn't, but there are a lot of upcoming opportunities to get fired up about further into spring and summer. Here's what is available on tap for the moment.
Rivers
The Skagit closed up at the end of January. There were some steelhead around before the season ended but they remained elusive for the majority of fly anglers. Bull trout numbers seemed pretty solid through January and that hopefully bodes well for fishing the lower forks of the Skagit when they open on March 1st. As always, be sure to check the WDFW emergency rules for updates before venturing out. The river is only scheduled to be open from the Memorial Hwy Bridge in Mount Vernon downstream. If the short Puget Sound season didn't scratch your steelhead itch, there's still some opportunity in nearly every direction but here. Many Olympic Peninsula rivers, at least in the North Coastal region remain open through the end of March this year. The Vedder and Squamish in BC remain options for the traveling angler and there are some late running systems to visit in Southwest Washington to explore as well. Let's keep pressuring the state legislature to fund our Puget Sound fisheries in the hopes of having options closer to home in the future. North Sound TU has a great info page about the role of the Quicksilver Portfolio in providing local steelhead opportunities and how to make your voice heard in support of continuing to fund this fishery.
Lakes
Remember that any lake not specifically listed in the regulations is open to year-round fishing. There are actually quite a few. While February is hardly the best month to pursue stillwater trout, getting out and finding a couple decent fish still beats a day cooped up at home. Lone on Whidbey has been fishing a little better than Pass Lake over the last few weeks. Attractor patterns like Blobs, FABs and Chan's Las Vegas Boobies or bloodworm patterns like Rowley's Holo Worm or red chironomid patterns like the Ice Cream Cone or 3D Glass Chironomid fished near the bottom are your best winter bets. Otherwise small leech patterns like Chan's BMW in black or olive or a white Bunny Leech have been productive too. A number of quality eastside lakes open on March 1st, like Dry Falls, Lenice and Lenore. As the weather warms we'll find ourselves in the heart of lake season before you know it.
Beaches
We're finding a few saltwater bull trout around the Northeast side of Whidbey Island but your better cutthroat fishing in the North Sound is still several months away. Hood Canal and South Sound are your best options for cutthroat and we should be just a few weeks away from seeing the beginning of the chum fry emergence to really heat up the fishing in those areas.