Tim's Fly Fishing Page
I grew up fishing and began fly fishing at about the age of 12. I remember reading about fly fishing and wanting to try it so my Dad took me out with a friend to a trout pond to try out fly fishing. I don't even think I learned to cast on that outing but I was hooked. I bought a cheap fiberglass rod, began tying some simple wet-flies and caught bluegill and crappie at the lake we camped at all summer. Within a few years I was ready for trout and spent my high school days roaming the northeast corner of Iowa in search of browns, brookies, and rainbows. In college and shortly afterwards I spent time trout fishing when I had the chance but most of my fly fishing was for largemouth bass and crappie in local lakes and ponds and for smallmouth bass in the Middle Racoon River outside of Des Moines.
In 1990 I made the move out west where I knew there were mountains, oceans, and big rivers. I have explored most of the fly fishing options in the Northwest - fishing Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana waters. I spend at least a day a week out close to home fishing the Yakima, swinging flies on the Snoqualmie for steelhead, or wading off a beach in Puget Sound in search of salmon or cutthroat.
In 2002 I began to get interested in saltwater fly fishing and soon became an addict. It started with a trip to SoCal where I hooked up a corbina on about the third cast and I was hooked myself. I began exploring Puget Sound beaches then expanded my horizons to the Caribbean, Baja, Florida and the Bahamas. Now I spend at least half my 100 days fly fishing each year in the salt.
Northwest Fly Fishing
- Yakima River - Washington's blue-ribbon trout river and my "home" river
- Puget Sound - Year-round fishery for sea-run cutthroat and Pacific Salmon
- Steelheading - Locally in the Snoqualmie but I also the desert rivers - the Deschutes, the Methow, and the Wentachee
- Rocky Ford Spring Creek - Home of big Kamloops rainbows in the Washington desert
- Desert Lakes - Lenice and Dry Falls are my favorites though I've been known to show up at a few others.
- Methow Valley - I love fishing the Methow, Chewuch, and small streams and lakes in the area.
- Alpine streams - The Cascades abound with small streams and lakes at altitude which I fish while backpacking and hiking.
- Central Oregon - the Fall River, the Metolius, the Deschutes, and the Crooked - trout fishing paradise in the high desert
Other Places I fish regularly
- Florida - I've managed to somehow fish almost everywhere from the Mosquito Lagoon, to Key West and up to Crystal Springs.
- SoCal - surf perch, corbina, surfers, sharks and bikinis - what a combination
- Montana/Idaho - the trip to the Lochsa and Bitterroot just got me going in this area
- East Tennessee - home of the Hiawasee, the Clinch, the Little River, and the Tellico river system.