Fly Fishing the Feather River. Michael M. Noble

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      Feather River (Northern California)

       Location: Northern California, about 3½ hours from San Jose, 3 hours from San Francisco, and 1½ hours from Sacramento.

      California’s Feather River—a tailwater fishery smack-dab in the heart of 1849 Gold Rush Country—is probably the most unusual in the world by virtue of its assortment of gamefish. Recognized for its prolific run of steelhead, it is also fished for Chinook salmon, shad, striped bass, large-mouth and smallmouth bass, and carp.

      From its source in the Sierra Nevada, the Feather River flows from three separate forks into Lake Oroville. Completed in 1968, Oroville Dam is the largest earthen

      dam in the U.S., at 6,920 feet across and 770 feet high. Over 80 million yards of old mine tailings were used to build it. The Feather River flows from Oroville to the confluence in Verona, where it enters the Sacramento River. Fish entering the system from the Pacific Ocean pass under the Golden Gate Bridge and through San Francisco Bay.

      The Feather River hatchery, completed in 1967, was designed to produce salmon and steelhead due to the huge habitat losses above Oroville Dam. It can accommodate 9,000 adult salmon and 3,000 steelhead. Its incubators can hold 20 million eggs, and its 8 concrete raceways can hold 9.6 million fingerlings.

      The Feather is known for its fall run of Chinook salmon, and fall- and spring-run steelhead. Fall steelhead follow Chinook salmon in late September. Until temperatures decrease and salmon start to dig redds, steelhead hold in pools where water temperatures remain cool in the hot summer months. Steelhead move onto salmon redds in early October looking for eggs. The first

      rain is always a good indicator of the fall season starting. Find spawning salmon, and steelhead will be close behind. High-stick nymphing or indicator nymphing with an egg and a green caddis pupa dropper is the proven technique. Get the flies over the salmon to the waiting steelhead below the redds. Sight fishing while walking the river is possible. Look for agitated salmon. The buck salmon will chase the steelhead out of the redd, and then go back to pair up with the hen. Look for buck salmon making a sweeping circle chasing steelhead. The chase is a great indication of steelhead in the area. Sneak up on the salmon and high-stick the egg over the salmon to the waiting steelhead. Stealth and a