I’m in Basalt CO for the last 2 weeks of July and the first 2 weeks of August visiting my son. He wants to get away from from the Frying Pan and Roar Fork to fish the Green River in Utah. Does anyone have any information on it. One is it a strikely float river or are there areas for wading? Also any good camp sites?
The San Juan is the same amount of time away…Better fish, More of em.
Easy to wade. There’s a trail on the north side of the river from the dam all the way to Little Hole–7 miles. I like to hike up from Little Hole. Can get current info at http://www.fishgreenriver.com/.
As Trigg said, trail on the north side through the A section. Definitely wadeable, may be some parts you can’t get to (never fished it at that time of year) but there are plenty of really nice fish in the river.
Wading will be limited to the little eddys along the shoreline because the water gets deep fast. There’s some steep places off the trail which lead down to deep water that don’t look that deep; 20’ + because the water is clear. Float tubes are good if you have any experience in them, but a drft boat is the way to go so you don’t end up wet. About 2 miles up the trail from the lower take out there’s a good eddy that BWO’s fooled many a nice trout & around the lower take out ramp fished the cranefly hatch with good results over a Memorial Day weekend years ago. Doubt the mid-summer weather will be anything like the rain, hail, sleet, sunshine , snow & lightning storms we encountered. Fly fishing at the bottom of a canyon, but there’s almost nowhere to get out of lightning storms dancing on the canyon rim & farther down the rock cliffs.
Check out the flows - I read somewhere that it is running 8600 cfs, and it seems that that would wipe out some of the streamside path. When we fished it they were running it at around 800-1200 and we got around just about everywhere, but I can’t imagine 10 times that.
I want to thank everyone for there input. Looks like we’ll be going to Durango. Anything on that location?
The Animas river goes right though town. The San Jaun is a hour south, and the Rio Grand is a hour and a half to the east. Also has a bunch of great small stream fishing in the Weeminuche wilderness. All in all a good place to fish.
I’ve often thought it would be fun to ride the Narrow Gauge up the river a ways, then they will let you off to fish and pick you up on the way back.
I live 30 minutes from the Green. It will fish just fine for wade fishing at that time of year. The current “flood” will not hurt the fishing then. If anything, it will clean the river of silt and debris, and make things better. Plenty of wade fishing BELOW Little Hole, and further down into Browns Park. Floating is best, of course, but theres miles of good water and the trail below Little Hole is pretty easy. There are campsites on the road to the river, around Flaming Gorge Reservoir, and along the river itself within a couple of miles of the Little Hole parking lot.
You can fish hoppers/crickets/beetles/ants on top. Nymphing ALWAYS catches lots of fish. Hatches are sparse at that time.
Been over 10 years since fishing this Blue Ribbon river with lots of BIG trout per square mile, but recall the crowds on most of the western streams. Probably still need prior reservations to drift boat the river or others as it seemed they only let so many have access; local lodgeing a few miles away plus a nice campground for tents & maybe some RV’s in the park . Recall being told by park rangers how during the week there’s not as much flyfishing pressure, but Thursdays have about 500 people, Fridays about 700 with Saturdays & Sundays around 1000; but that was over a long Memorial Day weekend .
You should have searched first. There is a thread from not to long ago [b]HERE[/b] with TONS of good info!!! (watch the videos I linked)
The river has recently been at ~9,000cfs (they’re trying to lower the reservoir level to allow for the ~170% of normal snowpack which has not yet started melting), and is now at powerplant capacity of ~4,600cfs. They anticipate to LOWER the flows to around 2,000cfs when the Yampa River peaks to prevent flooding downstream, however, once the Yampa subsides they may increase flows back to 9,000 for awhile. These kinds of flows have not happened in 10 years or more!!! (The river will do well with the long needed 9,000cfs flush)
If you’ve never been to the river, it is a must-see / must-fish! The canyon is beautiful! Wade fishing at the end of July shouldn’t be a problem, however, read my post in the other thread. That’s the time of the mid-summer lull in fishing there, and things aren’t as good as other times (not that you can’t catch fish, it just typically seems to be slower). That being said, this is all relative, and an average day on the Green (especially if you float the canyon) still beats a great day many other places. There are plenty of fishing opportunities within a couple of hours of Basalt if you choose to go somewhere else.
Saltydancindave, I cannot recall the last time they were limiting floaters down the river. The canyon is a nat’l rec area, so there is a small fee, but they’ll gladly take your money and let you float if you so choose.
(and is only fun if you enjoy fishing shoulder-to-shoulder, and fighting for a spot to fish)
I missed this post when I read this previously.
Saltydancindave, I cannot recall the last time they were limiting floaters down the river. The canyon is a nat’l rec area, so there is a small fee, but they’ll gladly take your money and let you float if you so choose.[/QUOTE] Might have been other western rivers, or they just didn’t want too many floating down that weekend because after we got dropped off from the drift boat at an eddy; the drift boat that was supposed to come back to get us never did because a float tube fisher turned upside down, drowned & had to take the body down to the lower take out ramp to the ambulance.
For shear beauty and the number of fish per mile, the Green River below Flaming Gorge is hard to beat. The last electroshock they did showed something in the neighborhood of 14,000 fish per mile. Near the dam you’ll find Rainbows, Cutthroat and Cutbows. As you drop down stream the Browns become more prevalent. The area around Little Hole and down stream is great Wet Fly/Soft Hackle water and you can catch fish all day long without moving more than a couple of hundred yards.