May 30th, Fly Fishing Report for the Truckee River and Little Truckee River

The weather is warm and the bugs are popping this week on the Truckee. This is typically some of the best dry fly fishing of the year for our river, with a half dozen or more bugs present at the same time. Hatches of PMD’s, yellow sallies, green sedge caddis, skwalas, March browns, and carpenter ants, have all been explosive lately.
We are right on the cusp of comfortable wet wading with water temps here in town reaching the mid-to-upper 50’s. Wet wading will still be a bit cold in the morning hours, but by mid-day if you’re wearing waders, you’ll be breaking a serious sweat. The Nevada side will be some epic wet wading right now if you’re sick of that pinhole leak in your waders that you just can’t seem to find. After 3 years of average to above average water, this should be an absolutely incredible year!
Guided Spring Fly Fishing
May brings the Truckee River to life with consistent hatches and actively feeding trout! Learn how to fish the runoff with us. As the big bugs of spring continue their prolific emergence, now is the prime time to experience some of the best fly fishing of the year!
Book your guided trip this May and discover the incredible opportunities the Truckee has to offer!
Truckee River Fishing Report & Forecast
The warm days on the Truckee have made flows trend upwards, but not really to the point of it hindering the fishing. In fact, as mentioned above, the weather has made the bugs go nuts, and we are getting more topwater eats this week than we have in the last few months. The most exciting of these newly emerging bugs, in our opinion, is the carpenter ant, for whatever reason the fish absolutely love these things and it can bring some of the biggest ones in the river up to the top.
Another pro tip is fishing a sunken ant this time of year. We’ve got a pretty cool sunken ant pattern from Umpqua that I don’t feel gets enough love. You would fish these just like any other nymph, and can also make a really great dropper underneath a chubby Chernobyl! The fish are almost solely in fast water now, unless they have sunk back into the slow stuff to eat some dries.
Using Euro nymphing tactics will be your best bet to get down and get in front of them fast when they are in the bubbly stuff. With the high water this time of year, the heaviest anchor fly you can find is your best friend. This is the exact situation I tied my Rocksteady stone for, and the sizes 4 and 6 in tan or black have been getting a lot of eats.
On the sections of river with more turbid water, jigged streamers on the tightline set up have been putting some fish in the net. Think sculpin or crawdad patterns, tied heavy with a good profile and a lot of motion; rubber legs, marabou, rabbit or squirrel zonkers, and a whole lot of tungsten and lead! With more of the summer bugs on the menu, we’ve been seeing patterns like peaches and cream, iron sallies, hunchback drake nymphs and fox’s poopah working better and better lately. The fishing remains good all day right now, but mornings will likely get better and better in the coming weeks. Don’t forget that we are open for our summer hours right now, 7am-7pm, every day!
Recommended Flies for the Truckee River
Little Truckee River Fishing Report & Forecast
As of today the flows on the Little Truckee are on the rise, right around 430 CFS as I write this. Due to this and the actively spawning fish, we are recommending to stick with the main
river at this time, which is fishing incredibly well! The fish will likely finish up spawn in another couple of weeks, but we are never sure what the flows are going to do, so stay tuned and we will let you know when the LT gets back into shape.
Recommended Flies for the Little Truckee
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Don't hesitate to reach out and give the shop a call with questions: (530) 563-5119