Going With the Flow

As the snow begins to melt and the spring fishing season creeps closer, more and more anglers are scouting out their favorite rivers and trying to figure out when the flows will die down and allow for some good fly fishing this year.

If you can’t make it out to your favorite fishery to scout it out this winter, anglers can always access stream flow data via the United States Geological Survey. The USGS National Water Information System is readily available and free to the public on the USGS site. Just click on the state you’re looking for and a map pops up with flow data on the major streams and rivers that have onsite USGS stations present.

I’ve got the USGS bookmarked myself, counting down the days to my favorite trout run is fishable again and no longer looks like a stream full of chocolate milk thanks to all of the runoff and flooding the winter storms brought.

While conditions are different from water to water, I usually hold off until the local rivers are much clearer and flows are under 1,000 cfs (Cubic Feet per Second).

When the flows are above 1,000 cfs, our local waters are difficult to wade and the pockets can become dangerous, meaning anglers should stick to fishing from the bank in these conditions.

Photo by Brian Milne.