Deschutes Mid may

[Chrom3]

Going trout fishing in mid may on the deschutes below Maupin, anyone have any tips for me? What kind of lures I should be using? Anything specific I should look for? I am also bringing my Fly Rod, I will be using my Baitcaster secondary.



Thanks,
Mitch

[codeman]

i fished one day a couple of years ago at trout creek. it was around the first week of june. I used 1/16 and 1/8 oz panther martin spinners and the same size kastmasters. The water was pretty swift and kinda tough to fish. Wasnt super impressed with the river. managed 32 fish in about 5 hours, but i really had to work for them. The most important thing I believe though is using 4 pound line. this allows your smaller lures to go deeper and really hides the line and knots from those trout that get hammered. bring your fly rod if you like, but i must have talked to 20 or more fly fisherman that morning, and no one i talked to hooked more than 3 fish fly fishing all day. set your drag right and you can land big fish on ultralight gear. i used my 5 ft rod. i caught one nice bull trout at 27 inches, a few rainbows in the 18-24 inch range and most of the rest were in the 12-18 inch range. the water was so swift with so few pockets i basically had to let the lures just tumble through the current and try to keep the slack out. hope this helps.

[Chrom3]

Awesome thank you.

[OregonSteel]

dont be afraid to try larger spinners too. rooster tails, blue fox, r&b. ive had 12 inch redsides absolutely nail #4 and #5 spinner while steelhead fishing. black and green would be the go to colors on the deschutes.

[codeman]

ya if i ever went back, id make sure i had some larger 1/4 and even 3/8 oz panther martins. Im sure blue fox work too, ive just had way more luck with the in line style spinner like the panther martins. It seems like you can fish them much slower because it takes ALOT less pressure to move the spinner blade. I was wishing I had some the last time i was there. Most of the rivers I trout fish tend to have alot more pools. I was surprised by how swift the water was and how few larger pools i could find. Most of it was small little pockets. Very Challenging. Im more used to throwing lures to fish that have never seen one before, in the wilderness of idaho. I like stupid fish. its alot funner to catch a fish on every cast. Those fish in the deshutes were sure strong though.