North Fork Clearwater River, ID
Fourth of July Creek; downstream to Bungalow
Outing Information
- Date
- Start/End Time
- 12:00pm to 6:00pm
- Best Fishing Time
- -
- Rating
- Fair
- Classification
- Public
- Water Temp
- -
- Water Clarity
- Slightly Stained - 3' to 5' visibility
- Water Level
- -
- User
- Jason Hansen
Fish Caught
Cutthroat Trout
| Caught | Avg Size | Pattern | Optional Fields |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 12" | #10 Orange Stimulator | |
| 5 | 12" | #16 Yellow Foamy |
Notable Fish: 14" |
| 15 | 12" |
Weather
| Skies | Morning | Afternoon | Evening |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cloudy | X | X | |
| Precipitation | |||
| None | X | ||
| Rain - Light | X | X | |
| Rain - Heavy | X | ||
| Wind | |||
| None | X | X |
- Air Temp High/Low
- 55.0°F / 40.0°F
- Wind Direction
- -
- Weather Front
- -
- Barometer
- -
- Moon Phase
- 24% Full (Waning crescent)
Other Patterns Tried
No other pattern information for this outing.
Hatches
No hatch information for this outing.
Insect Seining
No seining information for this outing.
Fishing Partners
No fishing partners were saved with this outing.
Waypoints
No waypoints were saved with this outing.
Tides
No tide information was saved with this outing.
Notes
It rained all Thursday night and was raining Friday morning. I got a late start because I was waiting for the rain to subside (it didn't). I headed up 4th of July creek around 1pm and waded/fished probably 1.5 miles up it. The creek is pretty small and there aren't any decent holes like there are on Skull creek. Looking back at the Topo, I should have hiked up Weitas creek instead. I caught a few fish on the Stimulator but nothing of any size. I fished my way back down from 4th of July creek to camp from 3:30pm to dark. There were significantly fewer caddis and mayflies out thanks to the constant rain. I had great success at one hole around 4-5pm where I was getting lots of rises in 1-3' deep riffly water. My large fish from that hole was a 14" cutthroat caught on a #16 humpy or adams as the trailer behind the Stimulator. I made it back to Bungalow about an hour before dark and it stopped raining for that last hour of daylight. I fished Bungalow from the bridge up to just above the rapids. I caught 9 fish and had 24 rises in that time. That same ratio held true during the days, too - I was getting lots of splashes to the Stimulator but not nearly as many hookups. I believe the fish like to rise over the top of the fly and drown it, then perhaps circle back and eat it. I need to work on determining from the rise whether the trout took it in their mouth or just drenched the fly. If they only drenched it, I could wait on the hook set for a couple seconds to let them circle back to take it. Fish totals from Friday were around 15 on the day I think.