Newsman's sport fishing column and report

Weekly Fraser Valley Sport Fishing Column for Jan 4 to 11, 2016

Last January we started looking at a history of sport fishing in North America, from 1630 to 1910 we have crossed the continent, and covered nearly three hundred years of our free hold right and heritage as North American anglers. We resume our look into our history at the dawn of the glory days of North American sport fishing. The push was always west; west across the Atlantic, west across escarpment, across the plains, then across the Rockies, and onto the pacific. When the adventures reached the pacific, they soon turned north, ever north, in the quest to find that untouched glory hole, somewhere off in the distance, beyond the end of the map.

Tommy Brayshaw found his way from Briton to Vancouver in 1910, and began designing his famous flies, while fishing rivers such as: the Capilano, Seymour, and Coquihalla. Tommy’s early years in British Columbia were short lived however, since Queen and Country called him home at the out brake of the WWI. Brayshaw would return and grow into the BC legend he is some five years later. In that same year of 1910 after leaving Ann Arbor Michigan two years earlier, the future steelhead legend and fly designer, C James Pray found himself in Northern California. In his quest for adventure Pray spent some time in Denver, then Ogden. When he came to California, he first set up shop in Scotia on the Eel River. Later he would settle in Eureka, again on the Eel; the “River of the Giants.”

General Nole Money, Zane Gray, Jack London, Jim Pray, Tommy Brayshaw, and many other un-named legends blazed the trails, that the like of A Bryan Williams, Haig-Brown, Bill Nation, Bill Schaadt, Dan Bailey, Norman Means, Enos Bradner and many others would follow. The fish were big and the legends were bigger. The North West was the place to be and the railroads cashed in big. More on this next week.


The Report

Fishing on our lower elevation lakes that are ice free is slow. For better success try ice fishing on our higher elevation lakes. For open water try: Chironomid, Bloodworm, Wooly Bugger, Doc Spratley, Halfback, Micro Leach, Pumpkinhead, or Baggy Shrimp. For ice fishing try: Shrimp, Baggy Shrimp, Ice Flies, and Crappie Jigs.


The Fraser River along with its backwaters and soughs are fishing slow to fair for whitefish, cutthroat, rainbow, dolly Varden, and early steelhead. For cutthroat try: Rolled Muddler, Flesh Fly, Eggo, Professor, Silver Doctor, Borden Special, Zulu, or small black Stone Nymph. For dolly varden try: large Clouser’s Deep Minnow. Zonker, Eggo, Flesh Fly, Dolly Whacker, or Kauffman Stone. For rainbow try: Czech nymph, Cased Caddis, Coachman, Rolled Muddler, Mico Leach, or Zulu. For whitefish try: Czech Nymph, Cased Caddis, Eggo, Hairs Ear nymph, or Mico Leach. For steelhead try: Big Black, Flat Black, Squamish Poacher, Polar Shrimp, Popsicle, GP, Steelhead Nightmare, or Kauffman Stone.

The Harrison River is slow to fair for cutthroat and rainbow.

The Vedder River is slow to fair for rainbow and the odd steelhead.

The Squamish River is fair for dolly Varden and cutthroat.