Upper Sacramento River (above Lake Shasta)

The upper Sacramento River, above Lake Shasta, is a magnificent freestone "walk-in & wade" river that flows south from Lake Siskiyou below the town of Mt. Shasta, CA, down to the Lake.

This river empties both the western slope of Mt. Shasta and the eastern slope of the Trinity Divide drainages. The Sacramento is a little more than an hour's drive east of the ranch via unimproved dirt as well as paved secondary roads.

Despite the rugged and beautiful nature of the canyon, the river has wonderful accessibility along most of its length, thanks to a parallel railroad right-of-way on the western bank of the river, as well as many road access and parking areas and crossings.

This is a wonderful trout fishery, with one of the highest river-mile fish densities (4,000 to 5,000 trout per mile) in the area. The river is noted for dynamite daytime pocket water nymphing and wonderful evening dry fly fishing.

Bob instructs and guides full day walk in trips on this venue. It is one of his favorites, and an excellent place to learn classic Freestone nymphing and dry fly techniques, as well as a fine place to hook very large trout on streamers in the deep pools.

Best times of the year to fish the Upper Sacramento River

Winter
The "Upper Sac" is now open to fishing all year long. While winter fishing may not be nearly as "hot" as the rest of the year, this venue provides for a great day on the water, flows permitting, at a time of year when most other trout streams are closed.

Spring -Summer
The geologic complexity and biodiversity, combined with lots of rain and snow melt, as well as highly oxygenated clean water, combine to produce a large number of insect species, including a large diversity of different mayflies.

From mid-June through mid-July the river fishes extremely well using large stonefly nymphs. Throughout the season there are lots of caddis and mayflies available to provide fast daytime nymphing as well as great evening dry fly fishing. There are mayfly hatches of one sort or another every evening, producing a fair number of 20" trout, as well as lots of smaller fish.

Fall
The river enjoys a prolific green drake (Ephemerella) hatch that makes for wonderful fall fishing.