Good morning from Buenos Aires, today we leave to Patagonia and the wonderful mountain town of San Martin de Los Andes, one of my favorite places that isn’t Sisters or Camp Sherman or Neskowin, Oregon. It is really special and I am so excited to share this trip with the 7 great people who are here with me.
Like our own conditions, they are not immune to weather conditions changing plans for the fishing. This past winter the Andes in this region received below average snow pack and the special 3 day float on the Rio Calefu that we were all so excited about has to be changed to a bigger river called the Rio Collon Cura (pronounced Co-jon Cur-ra) where our guides have been seeing good March Brown hatches and should offer great streamer fishing down the banks.
Closer to our Central Oregon home waters I had good reports this week from Phil at the shop who fished the Metolius River with good success with a Bird of Prey Pupa. Not a surprise with how many October Caddis are hatching. We have several good October Caddis Pupa from the Bird of Prey to my improved Fat Caddis in the large orange version that compliments the original Tan and Olive versions we introduced through Dreamcast Flies last season.
Besides Caddis Pupa mayflies are of daily importance with a pretty decent chance of seeing a fishable afternoon hatch of mostly Blue Wing Olive’s #18. I would make darn sure to tuck a few #16 yellow comparaduns and sparkle duns in the box and a yellow softmerger that you can grease up with Aquel and fish dry, or swing as a soft hackle or fish dead drifted as a dropper tag fly with a heavy bead nymph on the point. Mayfly nymphs are very important and a 2 Bit Hooker, Micro May and small Olive or Purple Perdigon are tops in my book. Go #16 to 20 on these and fish them on a light tippet for best success.
Over the winter Midges in the larval stage are in the drift often and because of the sheer numbers of them and the constant presence they don’t really have a “slow time” where a lot of the mayflies are in tiny or small early in-star as nymphs and not as available in the frequent biological drift that will ramp up later in the winter when the mayflies mature and we get closer to next spring. While winter seems long, things happen quick when the days start getting longer later this month and especially noticeable by February with more mature nymphs in the drift.
Stonefly Nymphs are a top producer on the Met, especially Golden Stones. Also carry some Peacock ones like the fly called a 20 Incher which during Green Drake time we recommend as a Drake nymphs too!
2 other winter nymphs to never be without on the river in December (and January and February) include a Blue Psycho Prince and an Orange Egg.
And you bet the Bull Trout action is good now. It is still more of a streamer show than a nymph game, but as we go into January add some Red Ice Cream Cones and Red Lightning Bugs to the nymph selection, especially if you hope to catch Bulls.

Mattias and Gavin from the shop did some days on the Lower Deschutes from Warm Springs to Trout Creek this week and really crushed it. Many steelhead and trout were landed between these two very talented young anglers.
Eggs, Perdigons, Slum Lords, Soccer Mom, Walts Worms for nymphing, and leeches and intruders on a sink tip for swinging steelhead.
Good access from Mecca on foot or Mtn Bike. Or float but remember the Warm Springs Reservation side is closed now until 4/22/26 and that includes any waters west of the main channel including islands that fall in that side of the river.
Definitely seeing the best catches on a Euro/Tight Line rig with nymphs and small streamers. This area stays open until 12/31 and closes on all water adjacent to the reservation on 1/1/26 until 4/22/26. Get it while you can. Waters not adjacent to the Reservation are open all year but can be a little up and down, or downright slow until warmer spring weather comes in Mid-March. We will watch it and report on it if it’s good to go!

The Fall River remains a consistent and great choice for anglers now especially since it is the most consistent afternoon hatch of all the rivers in the area for the moment. Those hatches include BWO’s #18 and #20, and Amber Caddis #14-16 and small Midges #22-24 in black or red. Personally I haven’t seen red midges hatching, but for some reason a red emerger is a winner on these fish. Try tying some 22 Red Palomino Midges. They are so easy you won’t even struggle on that small hook! I tie mine with a hares ear dubbed thorax BTW.
The KD Dun for a BWO cripple will thrill the fish probably better than any other, and have some other emergers like a Film Critic and Stalcups Winger, plus Sparkle Duns and tiny parachutes when the fish are keyed on the duns.
Slum Lord, Soccer Moms and Mini Gulp are awesome lil’ streamers and fish extremely well on the Fall almost any day you go. Eggs and Tungsten Micro Mays and small Perdigons are the other 4 to focus on for sure, and a Zebra Midge, Mop Fly and Olive Scud play important roles in a fly cycling every angler needs to do on the days we can’t quite figure it out.

The Crooked River is holding up great without any really cold days and nights to contend with so far.
It is mostly nymph fishing in the day with some midge hatches late afternoon that can offer some dry fly opportunity the last hour before dark, maybe a little longer if the cards are in your favor.
Zebra Midges, tiny Perdigons, Walts, Scuds, Winkers, Rainbow Warrior.
This time of year a good approach is take your 10′ 2 or 3 weight and think about setting it up as an indicator rod with a NZ Wool Indy, or the tiny Oros and make a 3 foot butt section of 12# Seaguar fluoro to a tippet ring, then add 6x fluorocarbon tippet off the 2 mm ring to a single fly in most places, or add a dropper tag for some of the deeper pools. You can drop shot this leader, or just fish weighed flies. Drop Shotting is adding a split shot on the tag position of the tippet and adding a tag off the tippet so the shot is on the bottom but the nymphs is above the bottom and not getting hung up as easily. It slows the drift of the fly and puts the fly in the zone to find where a lot of fish hang, snuggled to the bottom in cold water.
If a hatch occurs you can change out the leader (loop to loop so get a FFP or Loon Foam Roller to store the other leader) and add a 9 to 12′ 6x leader for a Griffiths Gnat. This leader is also good for general indicator use. And finally take any of those off, and add a traditional Mono-Rig with 25 feet of UFM or Cortland Butt material, and a sighter, 2 mm tippet ring or micro loop and 4 feet of 6x or 7x fluoro tippet to a single fly in my opinion. Carrying one rod is so liberating and this 10′ rod is a jack of all trades now.
If you want to know what I use, I like my Sage ESN HD 10′ 2 wt with a WF2 fly line for dries, and then I add a mono rig for euro nymphing and a chassis leader of dry fly leader for the other methods. this is the ultimate Crooked River rod, as is my 10′ 3 wt Echo Shadow X.

I am going to leave this with a plea for some support of the organization I think has the most power to fight some bad shit that going to happen to waters across the USA and here in Oregon. The Clean Water Act is under assault by interests that do not align with our love of wild trout waters and the places we cherish as sportsmen and women in our country.
I can’t stress enough how perilously close we are to a major and bad shift to the environment and now is the time to act. Write your congressional rep’s for sure, but as importantly follow Trout Unlimited now. http://www.tu.org will get you there. Join them with a membership if you feel it is right.
I’ve been thinking about how to address this issue with the people who follow this report and who I know care about trout and the places when’re they live as much as anyone! I appreciate you so much for your commitment to the fish and the places they live.
Here is a little excerpt from an industry newsletter I get each week:

This issue, however, is a no brainer. Anyone who derives a living off of fishing… anyone who deeply appreciates fishing as a form of recreation… anyone who feels tied to fishing in any way should be deeply, deeply concerned about the proposed rollback of protections under the Clean Water Act. Time to speak up… 

“Clean water is the lifeblood of healthy fisheries, wildlife habitat, and strong communities. But right now, Congress is considering H.R. 3898, the ‘Promoting Efficient Review for Modern Infrastructure Today Act’ (PERMIT Act)–a bill that would severely weaken core protections under the Clean Water Act.” More from TU: “The announcement will trigger a 45-day comment period, which is now open through January. Tell your members of Congress to safeguard clean water.” Make your voice heard.

I am going to go to bed now, and get some sleep before I fly to Patagonia in about 11 hours.
Thanks for reading this, thanks for supporting FFP, me as your friend, and our cold water fisheries! We are a force together and none of us can do it without being part of the same team.

Jeff