The Lower Deschutes has been a lot of fun for our guides and friends this last week on the Warm Springs to Trout Creek drift. There is no doubt about the steelhead being up there.
The water levels bumped quite a bit from the low 3000 (cfs) to the mid 4000 (cfs) and looks to be at 4400 cfs today and I am going to guess will stabilize there for our average winter flow. That is usually around the flow from the end of irrigation season until we get a flow increase due to rain or snow melt.
With that, I do think we are quickly moving away from floating line steelhead to sink tip steelhead, and nymphing steelhead. By all means, a floating line and a favorite swinging fly like a Muddler, Euphoria or Green Butt Skunk will still be good. I can remember a story from Brian O’Keefe years ago in late fall and he was swinging an Orange Polar Shrimp on a 24′ Sink Tip and had an epic catch day on the D with that. I would have never tied a Polar Shrimp on for a Deschutes day in the 1st place, but it is hard to argue with an O’Keefe experience. I’d be confident in leeches and intruders in the similar set up.
There seems to be very little in the way of Dry Fly action on the Deschutes now, so it is a nymphing game with eggs, stonefly nymphs, caddis pupa (green #16, tan #14-16, grey #18, orange #8-10), and of course a good selection of Perdigons with bead sizes and colors to fish best in higher flows and changing light conditions. Micro Streamers like Mini Gulps, Soccer Moms and Sir Sticks a Lot are doing well and is another option to find fish. A brown mini gulp sure looks like a small crawdad or a sculpin!