Upper Sacramento River

Finally hooked into some of the larger fish on the Upper Sac. In the past my largest fish was about 12-13". Also, the average size of fish was bigger than in the past. The Upper Sacramento is considered the stretch between Lake Siskiyou near Dunsmuir, CA and Lake Shasta. The river is a fraction of the size of the Lower Sac below Redding & Lake Shasta and is a trout fishery. The lower has salmon, steelhead and trout along with shad and striped bass.

Love being able to use the train tracks along the river to hike around.

Weather was cold and windy but luckily the fishing was great that day. Was worried the cold spell would turn off the fishing but I lucked out. 

The rainbows of the Sacramento and McCloud rivers are the prototype for what a wild rainbow should look like. Incredibly beautiful fish--I think the best looking of trout. This is their native range and the strain that came from the McCloud/Sacramento rivers is what was originally used to stock the rest of the world with rainbow trout ~100 years ago.

The #8 Rubber Legs and #16 black Frenchie caught all the fish. There were a few Baetis around as well as the occasional Oct Caddis laying eggs. The Oct Caddis will emerge at dusk/at dark and will mainly lay eggs at that time as well. Upstream of Dunsmuir is where there are a ton of Oct Caddis. Below Dunsmuir, not so much.