Presidents Message August 2025

July 31, 2025 / davekilhefner / Leave a comment

Hope everyone has been enjoying summer! In spite of the occasionally very hot weather there have been some outstanding fishing opportunities; Willamette bass & carp, trout in the lakes & streams of Mt Hood and of course trout & steelhead on the Deschutes.

August is a “bye” month as many are on vacation or simply can’t make it with all the things on their calendars. Thus, our next meeting will be September 16th.

It’s a good place to point out September, October and November are our most popular and productive Fish A Longs. (click the link for the schedule & make plans to attend!)

While we don’t have an “official” fish a long in August doesn’t mean we don’t have some fishing plans in the works. For a couple months we’ve been talking about meeting in Coeur D Alene in north Idaho during the first half of the month to fish the local rivers there. If you are interested in this let me know.

For several years now we have been posting monthly fishing reports. Looking back on them is a fun way to get ideas for local fly fishing opportunities currently happening or coming up. Type “August” or “September” and you’ll get all the past reports for that month.

If there is anything you want to see on our blog, shoot me an email and let me know.

Good fishing!

Dave Kilhefner

Fish A Long Report July 2025

July 20, 2025July 20, 2025 / davekilhefner / Leave a comment

Our July Fish A Long was a good time and well attended. We had excellent weather, delicious food but only OK fishing. According to the ODFW website the lake was due to be stocked but for unknown reasons that didn’t happen. This became apparent while kicking around the lake as we weren’t seeing the numbers of fish expected. A conversation with camp host Marilynn, who is also a fly fisher, confirmed that the stocking truck just didn’t show up this week. Quite a few other anglers that read the website & made the trip were disappointed to learn this.

Several of us camped out from Thursday evening to Sunday morning. It was nice to escape the summer heat. Morning temps were in the 50’s and rose into the low 80’s in the afternoon. The lake water was gin clear and 60 degrees.

Since we started out assuming we’d be targeting recently stocked trout used to eating pellets it took a while to figure out what the fish wanted. The winning combo was getting your flies down deep in the 7 to 9 foot range with indicator, countdown & slow trolling presentations triggering strikes. Chironomids, callibaetis nymphs & small streamers were the flies of choice. Lastly, the fish were not feeding aggressively and strikes were light with lots of short strikes between hookups. In spite of these challenges, everyone got fish. Most were stocked rainbows but a few brook trout and cutthroats were taken too.

Thanks to everyone for coming to the Fish A Long and making it a great weekend!

June 2025 Fish A Long & Fishing Reports

July 15, 2025 / davekilhefner / Leave a comment

Our much anticipated Central Oregon Fish A Long was a lot of fun in spite of some cold fronts that rolled thru and slowed down the trout bite. Here’s a recap; pics first with the description below.

Thursday we hit Hosmer Lake. I had some bad luck when my electric motor died in the channel halfway between the upper & lower lakes, so I had to use the oars. The extra excercise made the burgers taste that much better at the end of the day!

On Friday we enjoyed a big breakfast with Crepes supplied by Lane. Then we hit Crane Prairie and it got cold fast plus a rainstorm rolled in around noon. That night we had a spaghetti feed. After dinner Chris organized a poker game where the bets were flies. It was a lot of fun!

Saturday morning was cold with more bad weather predicted. We had a big bacon & egg breakfast then finished our fly exchange from last nights poker game. With the bad weather we fished on our own. Rich did OK on the Deschutes between Wickiup & Crane Praire. Then we enjoyed a Pork Loin Dinner supplied by Tim.

On Sunday we made the trip to Diamond Lake. Warmer weather was predicted but unfortunately it was late in coming and the bite didn’t start until around 4pm. That evening we enjoyed Mexican Food in LaPine. The next morning we all drove home. It was another fun Central Oregon Fish A Long. A big thank your to Chris and Stevie for hosting us again this year!

June Fishing Reports:

From Lane Hoffman: Went back east to go striper fishing. Had a really good day, landing around a dozen including one on a surface popper!

From George Krumm: Made a trip to Wasilla, Alaska to fish the roadside accessible lakes. It was another great do-it-yourself trip!

Thanks to everyone that attended the Fish A Long and submitted reports!

Presidents Message July 2025

July 7, 2025 / davekilhefner / Leave a comment

Every year it seems like summer will never get here but once it does it starts flying by! I find myself scrambling to squeeze in all the things I wanted to do once the weather gets nice. This summer I have some good fly fishing plans and hope you do too! These include hitting the Pacific Ocean for Rockfish to chasing trout in Oregon and beyond.

Our July 15^th meeting at High Rocks will feature the always popular Garrett Lesko. His presentation will focus on the Crooked River. It’s one of our most popular fisheries that experienced a die off several years ago due to extremely low water but good fishing has returned and it’s time to get re-aquanted!

The July 19th Fish A Long will be on a Mt Hood Lake, most likely Harriet Lake as it’s due to be stocked the week before the Fish A Long. Several of us will be camping out a day or two before. Contact me if you’d like more info on our camping plans.

We have years of fishing reports logged on our website. Looking back on them is a fun way to get ideas for local fly fishing opportunities currently happening or coming up. Type “July” or “August” and you’ll get all the past reports for that month.

Please remember our local fly shops and sporting goods stores. Hope to see you at a meeting or on the water!