Looking at some property on the Middle Fork of the Clearwater. Chatting with the broker today and asked about the fishing. He told me that at the moment fishing was shut down on a few of these rivers due to the tough life the Steelhead and others are having negotiating the Columbia, and populations are in near crisis mode.

This is a beautiful piece of ground that very well could wind up our retirement home. But I gotta be able to fish the river.

What do you guys in the area know about this?

Is there anything to what I was told?

Yes, there is something to what you were told.

The Army Corps of Engineers actively traps and transports juvenile salmonids around the 4 dams on the Lower Snake river and the remaining dams on the Columbia. This transporting starts about 100 miles from where you are considering buying property. They do this to help alleviate some of the survival issues the fish now have in the river. But it's not helping every species. Also, some fish are allowed to travel downriver naturally, assuming there is anything natural about a system that now flows through 8 dams/reservoirs at a much slower rate than in spring flows of the past.

I haven't been up in that area since retiring 3 years ago, so it may just be the fishing is shut down to protect "wild" stocks of steelhead. I put "wild" in quotes because there was (is still?) an active hatchery program there, which fish are supposed to be marked to allow harvest of those, but like everything else in life, nothing is 100%, so some hatchery fish show no signs of having been clipped, make the journey to the ocean and back, and appear to be "wild" fish.

Perhaps if you're interested enough, you might call ID G&F and inquire of the biologists there what the situation is. There are other places to fish nearby, decent deer hunting if the people I knew who lived in the area are to be believed, quail, pheasant and chukar hunting nearby. The Clearwater valley is considered a banana belt by some. Lewsiton/Clarkston just downriver have decent medical facilities and a Costco even! (which isn't packed too badly except on Saturday when the farmers/ranchers come in for supplies! ).

If you see a post by wageslave shoot him a PM as he lives in that area, Lonny also. They may be willing to answer your questions.

Are you looking at Field Grade's place I wonder............that would be "interesting" to say the least. I do miss him around here.

Good luck with it all and PM if you want to know a little more about the fish if the ID biologists can't answer to your satisfaction.

Geno

Steelhead and salmon are having problems, not a small part of which is being eaten by sea lions at the mouth of the Columbia. They blame the dams but a good share of the fish aren't even reaching the dams before they're eaten. You can thank the idiots in congress for that one. It kind of parallels the wild horse situation.
However, the Clearwater has other fish. Check them out.

Yes, as rock chuck says, the Clearwater is a world class smallmouth fishery, Dworshak reservoir too. And Dworshak has kokanee too.

Geno

Columbia basin steelhead and salmon stocks have been returning in dismal numbers the past few years. There are numerous reasons for this...seal/sea lion depredation is more than significant (all the way up to Bonneville Dam), commercial gill netting on the lower Columbia, ocean conditions, and the huge commercial harvest of Columbia basin salmonids of the coast of B.C. and Alaska. The four lower Snake river dams are a HUGE problem as well.
The last couple of years the returns of "wild" steelhead into the Clearwater system have been terrible (IIRC less than 1000 returned in 2019) so the fishing on the Clearwater was greatly restricted or closed. The Middle fork would be in the area that was closed. This was done in an effort to protect those few that did return.
All that being said the numbers of fish returning will likely rebound and season restrictions lessened over the next couple of years---maybe.
It's not the first time runs have crashed and seasons greatly restricted or closed.

The Clearwater country is still a sportsman's paradise. Lots of fishing (multiple species) is still available near the area you're considering and some of the best deer, elk, and turkey hunting to be had is in your backyard.

Oh wow, thanks for the responses guys.

The fella I talked to did say predation was a big problem, and that the slower water made for warmer water, this too was taking it's toll.

The place we're looking at is in the Kooskia area. No idea if it was Field Grade's place. Where was that?

If you got tired of the Clearwater and Dworshak, you could go north to Pend Oreille and catch some walleye.There're sturgeon in the Snake above Lewiston, too, but they're catch and release.

Charlie’s place was down by Lenore.

Salmon/steelhead are in trouble on the whole west coast to some degree or another. Pretty sad

Kooskia is a cool place, love that Clearwater country

I don't know about the Clearwater but we do trips out of Salmon every fall. My wife caught a native big un last fall and the guide was really excited. Only hatchery fish can be kept. Our guide said that numbers were way down, he has been guiding for many years. Idaho would be a good place to live even if you have to travel to fish.


mike r

Muleshoe I wouldn’t have the fishing or the salmon or steelhead fishing be a dealbreaker because there’s some epic fishing within 10 hours of you. I have a guy over here for three days right now steelhead fishing that loves living over there.

The dams take a great deal of heat for declining salmon and steelhead populations. But salmon numbers did not really start crashing until the Marine Mammals Act was passed.

All we really need to help salmon numbers is to let fisherman carry centerfire rifles and reduce the ridiculously high sea lion populations. They are akin to keeping packs of wolves in a beef feedlot.

I used to fish the Clearwater and snake quite a bit for steelhead and the returns are way down the past few years.

Its a shame as I remember in October I could hook a dozen steelhead a day.

Unfortunately, common sense is not all that common.

The realtor was kinda right in that many sections were shut down during the fall due to dismal returns. The steelhead season actually reopened on the lower Clearwater Jan 1. But you are allowed only one hatchery fish per day and none over 28" and no keeping of wild fish. You haven't been allowed to keep wild fish for many years.

On any given year, other rivers in the region might have better returns and a season. But that could mean a couple hour drive one way.

All the ocean-going fish seem to be slowly, but steadily slipping away. I kinda wonder if in another 20 years they will be mostly gone? The people who know what they are doing still manage to catch fish though. A dummy like me doesn't have the skill or the patience to catch them with these low numbers. Keep in mind, that even when returns were much better, 12 hours per fish was considered pretty hot fishing.

The natives are allowed to shoot them in AK, unfortunately the ones I have worked with have overall been horrible marksmen. Even tried helping them but they "knew how to shoot". Figured out one guy was shooting 270 ammo out of his 30-06. I stayed away after that.

Catch rate (hours per fish) is based on man hours of all fishermen devided by the number of fish caught. 10-12 hours per fish can be some damn good fishing.
I've had many 15-30 fish days on the Clearwater, Snake, and Salmon when the catch rate was in the 12 hours per fish range. It's all in knowing the water and how to fish it.
90% of the fish will be caught by 10% of the fishermen...or so they say.

All about the dams and sea lions is indeed true. But another BIG factor is commercial fishing. Allot of fish are caught by many countries in international waters. I have seen steelhead numbers ebb and flow all of my life. Hope they come back again.

Here is a fact to chew on. The biomass of salmon in the north pacific is now at the highest level since 1925. I think the effects of this is a greater impact on salmon stocks in the NW rivers than any other factor.

https://fisheries.org/2018/04/new-r...salmon-abundance-in-north-pacific-ocean/

Bottom line, with commercial hatcheries catering to fresh roe market in pacific rim countries, the pasture ain't big or productive enough for all the fish. Hence we are seeing fewer returning salmon and steelhead and the few fish that return are much smaller than historic fish.

Better that than the other way around.....

Interesting stuff, but........................



we cannot believe a word of it as it is published by the dreaded................................scientists, either from a University or worse perhaps............a Government Agency.


Geno

I tried to point out how dangerous it was and I got hit with "Mind your business whitey"

You mean the government of Alaska pumping a bazillion hatchery pinks into the system effects other salmonids?

Who’da Thunk it?!?!

I was working in Astoria OR. at the mouth of the Columbia River a few years ago. The salmon run was down that spring no fishing for them in the river allowed, but as you crossed Youngs Bridge gill nets were out behind a boat.
I asked and locals knew who was in the boat.

The state owns very few hatcheries actually.....Most of the hatcheries are private non profit, as per the alaskan constitution.

They don't produce a bazillion either.

The entire Columbia system is in the toilet for steelhead and to a lesser degree salmon. If those are not ones sole reason for living, then there are still other resident species and rivers to fish. It's especially sad for Clearwater steelhead as they are the largest of fish south of the Smithers Canadian reaches. They stray up some of our streams and one knows within seconds of hookup that he's into an Idaho fish. Over the last 35+ years I have lived to do 2 to 3 weeks of fall floating/flyfishing for steelhead on the Deschutes (lower down in north central Oregon). For the best of times 28 or 9 fish beached in a week and that many or more lost during the fights. I know that river, and in many runs can warn one that in this or the next cast he will hook up. In 2016/17/18 trips went down to 2 or 3 tugs and 1 or 2 fish landed. Last fall, dam counts were even lower, and sadly I did not even put the boat on the river. Even have a newly built 16 ft Spey rod that's not had the skunk knocked off yet.

I think I might have experienced the best of times. Idaho, and rivers east into Wyoming and Montana can still offer one great trouting experiences. Presently, I'd not do Clearwater property if salmon and steelhead were the central focus. Still a ton of hunting opportunities in the region, so not a bad place to be. Let us pray, however, for a substantial and rapid fish recovery. I'm not getting any younger.

I also, have some distant friends (charter boats) in Sitka, Ak. Historically they've landed day trip limits in 1/2 of the session. Last couple of years, they've been doing a full days work. No one's able to establish the definitive causes.

I'm in no way an expert on this, all I know is that i grew up, and still live in Central Idaho, and that as a kid, Redfish Lake was ...well...Redfish Lake because you could near literally walk across the backs of the Kokanee.

No more.

Hell, some will laugh, but there were several spots on the Salmon back then where we'd go get drunk and shoot salmon with .22s...

I miss those days...

Those B run steelhead were a blast to catch in the Clearwater

All of what you guys say is contributing to the depletion of returns on the west coast. But as a formerly avid offshore salmon fisherman I gotta say, admittedly with no education, something bad is going on in coastal waters. Historically, just off the coast the nutrient rich waters literally teemed with bait..chum..krill whatever. Any given morning, at first light on the sea you would see hundreds of seagulls and fish ducks gorging on the huge bait balls and rafts of krill. The salmon gorging beneath driving the bait near the surface, attracting the predatory birds. That has been in steady decline for 20 years or more. As a result salmon take has declined disastrously with it. Commercial trolling season quotas are filled in a couple days, when it is allowed at all. Charter boats are all but gone. Bottom fishing limits have been reduced to ridiculous levels. Lingcod seems to be the only survivor. Sport fleet is 1/10th of what it was. No bait...no salmon. Something is going on out there...it can't be the Japan and Humboldt current from the Jap Nuke plant meltdown...it was happening long before that. The biologists are fiddling while Rome burns.

It's bigger than just fish when I was a kid and a young man pheasants were everywhere in SW Idaho, We drove about 50 miles though farm country a couple of weeks ago and I finally saw one hen.
I talk to 40 year olds that don't know what a Leopard frog is when they seemed everywhere as a kid on the farm.
Bullfrogs were around by what seemed in the millions and now I don't think I have heard one in a couple of years. People tell me they are around but if so numbers are minuscule to what they were.

True that! We used to shoot pheasants on my wife's Grandpa's place off West Chinden. I've killed a dozen bears up near Bogus, killed 3 mulies over 160 out by Eagle.

Many today that don't remember should look up "Idaho Bunny Bash". My Dad taught us to shoot handgun and offhand rifle on those jacks near Mud Lake. I've lots of brass trophies from IPSC and 3 Gun from that experience. We'd literally kill HUNDREDS over a weekend without making a dent.

Ever heard of the blob? The salmon harvest has been on the increase for years. The commercial trolling season has not been filled in days. Drink the koolaid.

We used to fish the Clearwater near the mouth of Potlatch Creek for steelhead when they were running, and for smallmouth and rainbows when they weren't. The smallmouths were fun but inedible; to me anyway. I worked with a guy in Juliaetta who was the best steelhead fisherman I've known.
Pre-Dworshak, we used to hike in to a stretch of the Little North Fork of the Clearwater and catch juvenile steelhead; along with cutthroats and Dollies. Great times but long gone. It pains me to go back into that country now. On the other hand, deer and elk numbers seem way better, in many areas, than they were fifty years ago. GD

Best weekend fishing trip I ever had was on the Little North Fork of the Clearwater. Wasn't easy to get to, but damn! Now under maybe 60 feet of water behind the Dworshak Dam back up in the canyon where we fished. IIRC, the next upriver access was about 60 miles away.

We were working trail crew USFS in the St Joe, out of Calder Ranger District, and had a 4 day weekend (10 on, 4 off), and took a bus man's holiday.

Remember the Disney film, titled I think, Charlie, the Lonesome Cougar, with the cat on the big log decks? That was filmed at Bole's Cabins IIRC, which is where we started up into the back country. 3 of us in a VW beetle..... A tale in itself. . The film came out a couple years after we were there at Bole's. Or at least that's when I saw it and recognized the location.

At the end of the old logging road we followed, we then hiked down maybe 2K feet elevation down to the river. We were waaay back in.....

Dynamite Cutthroat fishing. The dang little steelhead smolt were a problem, taking our flies ( fished behind bubble bobbers, some times just wet - the fish didn't give a sh*itt) often before the Cuts could get to them. I don't recall any cast that did not catch a fish of some sort.

I hooked one smolt on my bumblebee fly, and had a big Cut make a pass at it on retrieval. So I cast it back out, behind this big boulder, smolt included, and after a good fight, landed a 22 inch Cut - the best of the trip of the three of us.

A couple years later I took a writing class at UAF, and used this trip as my subject, having first read through several articles in F&S, and Outdoor Life for style insight. The full-of-herself TA teaching the class (not the regular professor whom I wanted to take the class from) accused me of plagiarism or having someone else write the piece- I dunno which. I guess I was too good.... Well I dopped that bitch from my class schedule on leaving her office- I could tell we were not gonna get along! She had good tits, tho.

My assignment piece was titled "Green Water Cannibal". 50 years back, and I remember....

The next year I took the same class from a real writer...

You can thank the pivot sprinkler for the pheasant problem. The ditch rows and rocky brush piles in fields are gone so there's no cover. In the winter, all you see is bare ground now. With sprinklers, farmers can farm all the high spots and marginal areas that couldn't be reached by flood irrigation.

After the huge explosion and crash in jack rabbits in the early 70's, they've never come back. At the same time, they were creating the Birds of Prey program. Now the deserts are full of large hawks and I think they're keeping the rabbits in check.

Who is your broker????

There is a broker in Kamiah Idaho that has probably caught more fish and shot more Elk than most here..Ask him...He is the ultimate of Idaho realtors..

My answer,living right in the middle of the Salmon/South Fork of the Clearwater and the Middle fork...No..Just a bad year

Thanks for the responses guys. I didn't mean to impress that no steelhead fishing was going to break a deal, it won't. Looks like beautiful country with much to do there.

I really do appreciate all the insight fellas.

Probably didn't make his shooting any less accurate.....

You didn't mention your realtors company?????

A Kamiah grocer store bought out our local store where my son works and probably over 50% still live in Kamiah/Kooskie/Harpster and along the river with one manager commuting from Orofino daily..They all love to fish and hunt and most have lived here through generations..True locals/not transplants..

Beware of some realtors and there tales for a commission!..

Doesn't help that the predator (skunks, fox, coyotes, hawks, etc) populations is very high and that the F&G quit raising and stocking birds. I can't remember the last time I even saw a pheasant. Sad.

Hank, I don't have a clue what the "blob" might be. My post, did not specify, but it only concerns the area of coastal waters from Cape Mendocino north to Cape Arago. Which includes the Klamath River system, supposedly one of the last wild stocks on the lower 48 coast. I reported my personal observations, recollections of 40 years of sport fishing. I'm not sure exactly what you mean by me consuming kool aid. I'm not reading anything on the subject, just reporting my own observations in a relatively narrow area. Perhaps you can explain why Westport Washington, once hailed as the sportfishing capital of the world, has reduced it's charter fleet by 90%. There may very well be an overpopulation of salmon, somewhere. Wanna buy my boat?

bwahahahahahaha!


You're a hoot mister!


Geno

I used to be a big time pheasant hunter and my best bud had a farm in Parma Idaho. Always enjoyed it..I here now there is not as many but on my trip Tuesday for the wifes docter appt in Lewiston Idaho, we almost got run off the road by pheasants..They were everywhere the way we went..Kinda cool to see them once again in numbers..

Muleshoe: I have fished the Clearwater on several occasions for Steelhead. Its been some time though.
I actually caught and released not one but TWO 20 pound+ Steelhead on one trip - sadly, at that time, the Steelhead had to be released "in the water" which means they could not be brought on board the boat (or ashore!) for official weighing.
BUT... I and my partner "knew" what 20 pounders were and some of those amazing fish we caught there exceeded that rare to attain, mark!
I hope some of those dandy big Steelhead are still with us.
Indeed the onslaught on Salmon and Steelhead by seals and sea lions only gets worse every year!
And for that I hold "liberals" at many levels of government and politics completely to blame!
Good luck if you decide to move to that beautiful area of the world.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

When the Stealhead are up running,there's a ton of Montana fishermen that come over to fish them..My last trip I met a couple who was infatuated with my BFR 45-70 pistol..So I got it up and running and let them pop a couple for there curiosity... I prefer seeing the Montana plates rather than some 1A Idaho plates and I grew up in Boise.

thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week, tip your waitress....

You know how I know it's the government of Alaska, and not some "private" company? Private aquaculture is illegal in Alaska.....

Don't they call that "plausible deniability"?