Hat Creek, Pit River

Re-enter The Pit

by Matt

The Pit River has some of the best nymphing fishing in California but it is by far the most physically demanding river I’ve ever fished. You can fish an entire section of water and feel like you’ve waded a mile only to find that you’ve moved a couple yards. Boulder hopping, blind wading, bushwhacking, and endless waves of trout define this river.

Pit 3 Below Lake Britton Dam

Unlike many of the spring-fed rivers and creeks in the surrounding area, the Pit is subjected to warmer water temperatures in the summer which can make fishing for trout too risky for resuscitation. Higher-than-average water temperatures were very prevalent during the four year drought however they haven’t been as much as an issue since the El Nino floods and the decent snowpack we’ve been getting recently. One of the signs along the river I read reported that these fish have adapted to high winter flows and low summer flows therefore biologically these fish are quite hardy and resilient.

Pit 3 is where most of the magic happens on the Pit River. The river
there flows below Lake Britton dam which helps keep the water cool. The river flows through a steep canyon for the first few miles below the dam. There are several turnouts and access points however you’re going to have to hike down to get to them. The canyon starts to flatten out a bit once you make your way down to Rock Creek access. You’ll be spending a lot more time getting around instead of fishing so if you’re looking to get into some quick action definitely hit up Rock Creek access or the river below it.

Took Me Like 15mins To Get To This Spot

My number one advice for anyone who is interested in fishing the Pit is to bring a wading staff. If you don’t bring a wading staff I suggest you bring some extra clothes because you’re going swimming. The Pit is made up of algae covered boulders that are extremely slippery especially the ones that are at an angle or rounded, I don’t recommend putting your foot on those. The river isn’t deep or swift per se it just has a lot of deep holes in it.

Pit River Shasta Bow

Fishing wise this trip was quality over quantity. I hooked more than I landed and didn’t net anything less than 12”. You definitely have to think about how you’re going to land these fish before hooking them because you’re not going to do well trying to fight them in heavy water. These fish appeared to tire fast after a few short bursts and I was able to land most of them by bringing them to the surface while netting them as if I was catching a baseball.

Pit 4 Dam

I did an overnight at Ruling Creek Campground and fished Pit 4 the following morning. I did pretty well while fishing near the campground but noticed that the water was a bit warmer than it was on Pit 3. Not wanting to exhaust any fish to death, I went back to fish Pit 3 for a bit and ended my trip on Hat Creek.

Hat Creek
I continue to keep coming back to Hat Creek despite the hit-and-miss factor if it. Perhaps I truly do enjoy the challenge of this very technical creek. The majority of the day was spent sight-fishing with a hopper dropper. I rose and missed a few fish on the hopper but got several good grabs on the dropper. Later after the sun went down the fish began rising to PMDs then they switched to some sort of emerger or cripple that I couldn’t figure out. The fish on Hat Creek aren’t huge but they are some of the spookiest and smartest trout I’ve ever fished for. Getting a wild Hat Creek trout to eat your fly whether a dry or a nymph is so rewarding.

My First Hat Creek Brown
Baum Lake, Hat Creek

Visiting Fly Fishing Country

by Matt
Baum Lake Run

I wasn’t able to get out very much last month and haven’t had too much time to work on my writing, I blame it all on adulting. Thankfully things have settled down and I can finally get out and fish again.

June in my opinion is by far the best month to go fishing. This is the last month before summer kicks in and the fish and bugs know it. Many of the most famous hatches such as the Hex hatch and damsel migration occur during this month and the top-water bite for bass can be phenomenal.

My wife and I just recently purchased a new SUV more suited for our outdoor adventures and I believed that it was my job to put it to the test. The Cassel/Burney area was my destination and I planned on visiting both Baum Lake and Hat Creek.

Pelicans Stalking Me

This is my second visit to Baum Lake. The fishing was so much fun the last time that I just had to do it again. The lake is accessible and pretty easy to figure out even for a novice angler. You will need to bring some sort of floating device like a float tube or pontoon to effectively fish the lake because it moves like a very slow spring creek. A pair of waders also goes a long way because the lake is spring fed meaning it remains cold all year around.

I caught fish all day on Baum Lake using a variety of methods: dry flies, indicator nymphing, and slow strips got the job done. In the morning around 10am there was a good Trico hatch/spinner fall that had several pods of fish rising to the surface. I didn’t have an exact Trico pattern match so I jumped the gun and threw on the closest thing I had in my fly box, a size 16 mosquito dry. To my surprised the fish were very receptive to my dry fly and I rose several fish for the couple of hours that they were feeding.

Baum Bow
Nice Brownie

After the dry fly bite died down in the afternoon I switched to indicator nymphing and caught many more fish. The quality of fish this trip was consistently good however I didn’t see or catch any monsters like I did during my first visit. Still, the fishing was great and the catching was fun.

Hat Creek

All my visits to Hat Creek have either been a hit or a miss. Sometimes the fishing will be really good and the fish aren’t as picky and then sometimes the fishing will be extremely difficult with fish ignoring every offer you throw at them. The first night around 8pm there was an epic PMD hatch in the lower section where I hooked fish but was only able to land one. It was like heaven being alone in the middle of the creek during last night with what felt like hundreds of fish rising to feed on duns.

The following day I tried a different spot closer to the Powerhouse Riffle hoping that the same PMDs would be hatching. In the late afternoon I found fish along the edges rising for small size 18 yellowish mayflies. I didn’t have any thing that size in my box but tried anyway and failed to interest any fish. In the evening instead of PMDs I got Yellow Sallies both depositing eggs and hatching. I didn’t have any Yellow Sally patterns and struck out my last night.

The new SUV definitely did its job. I was able to get through unmaintained roads that I would have never been able to get through in my Altima. I also slept in the new SUV and found it much more comfortable with plenty of room to spare. Now that I have a better vehicle I want to plan a trip to a place fly anglers consider the Holy Cathedral of rivers, the Lower McCloud.

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Keep Calm and Fly Fish™