Coeur d'Alene Fishing Report 06.21.18
Coeur d'Alene River
Flow 1,090 cfs at Cataldo and dropping. Fishing is fantastic. The river is in awesome shape and with the rain and overcast this last weekend the fishing was killer. This week’s forecast is great. With warmer and clearer weather to come, it should be great. Mayfly and Caddis hatches are forming up well. Lots of Pale Morning Duns out now along with Pink Alberts and Rusty Spinners. Still a few Golden stones and Green Drakes around too. If we get some more overcast weather, the Blue Wing Olives will be out in force like over this last weekend. Nymphing is still good but with the abundance of May flies you will need to start thinking about some smaller offerings. Mid-size bead head nymphs like Hare's ears and Pheasant tails in #14-20's are going to get attention. Try doubling up with a smaller bead head and a soft hackle as a dropper and see what happens. If you get on pods of risers, run the appropriate dry fly to match the hatch but run an emerger as a dropper like a cripple or soft hackle. Streamer fishing is still good too. Black and olive Sculpzilas and Near nuff Sculpins are doing the trick now. Don't need to be overly big with the streamers either.
St. Joe River
Flow 2,790 cfs and dropping. I fished the Joe on Monday and it was awesome. It was overcast and rainy all day, and the fish were excited. Like the Coeur d'Alene River, the Mayfly game is now in full force. The river should fish very well this week. A bit on the warmer side and this will keep the stoneflies going along with the May flies too. Nymphing is still good but fish are getting a little more particular on what you throw. Streamer fishing was good and should continue to be. The water levels seem to be a couple of weeks behind the Coeur d'Alene, so there is still plenty of water now and the upper river should be more wadeable in a week or two. The flows are still great for drift boating too. This is going to be such an awesome summer on the Joe. We will have ideal conditions through the warmer months, and hopefully, we will keep getting a spell or two of rain from now till then.
Clark Fork River (MT)
Flow 24,900 cfs and climbing. Man, there is still a bunch of snow still left up there. With the rain over the weekend, it is on the climb again. Looks like it will top out at around 30,000 cfs in a few days and then drop hard. I have seriously lost my patience with this river, I suppose when it hits 15,000-16,000 I'll have to go.
Read past reports from the CDA region here, or click here to view all northwest regional reports.