Anybody Been to the Lower Illinois Recently (Summer 2016)

[mattmar10]

Considering making a trip to the Lower Illinois in a couple of weeks so I was wondering if anyone had been there recently. I know a lot has changed since the flooding. Is the water still murky and dirty? Since the flood, is Watts a good place to try (I don't mind walking either way for a while to get to a decent spot) or is it better up by the dam? 

[dainw]

I've been a few times this summer, most recent trip was the end of july. Water is still murky at least as of last month, but slowly clearing. My honest opinion is that if you're going for trout this time of the year, best to stick closer to the dam. I don't think Watts gets stocked as often and holdover fish are going to be moving up river in search of cooler water. Not that there won't be fish at watts, it's just that closer to the dam has been more consistent this summer, for me anyway.

I would recommend if you go, waiting until probably late fall or early winter. November-March has always been better for me at the LIR anyway, just because fish tend to spread out up and down river with cooler water temps and usually seem more willing to chase bigger flies. Last time I was down, we were fighting swimmers/tubers as well, and there won't be any of that to deal with in the winter. If you do go though, black and brown woolly buggers size 8-10.

[mattmar10]

Thanks for that update, dainw! You're probably right about the cooler water. If I make the trip, I guess I'll try both places; starting up by the dam. When you went, did you catch many fish? Totally agree with you about the winter... but I'm getting the itch to go with the temperatures cooling somewhat and the Lower Illinois is the only reasonable day trip option from OKC. I did read a fishing report that came out today that said trout were good on nymphs along the tailwater and Watts. Not sure what tailwater means exactly. You ever try throwing nymphs?

[dainw]

Yeah we did pretty good both times. As far as the fishing report, that sounds like something out of the daily Oklahoman, and who knows what they mean by that. I've had some success on larger black stonefly nymphs down there this summer, but trust me man, your best bet is gonna be a dark colored bead head woolly bugger stripped back slooooowwww on the bottom. Unless the water clarity has really improved in the last month, which I doubt. You might check out the TU chapter 420 Facebook page for recent reports. Those guys seem to have it dialed in.

[jcw355]

A friend of mine was there this past weekend and he said it is clearing up. They were striper fishing.

[mattmar10]

Aug 24, 2016 18:50:44 GMT -6 dainw said:

Yeah we did pretty good both times. As far as the fishing report, that sounds like something out of the daily Oklahoman, and who knows what they mean by that. I've had some success on larger black stonefly nymphs down there this summer, but trust me man, your best bet is gonna be a dark colored bead head woolly bugger stripped back slooooowwww on the bottom. Unless the water clarity has really improved in the last month, which I doubt. You might check out the TU chapter 420 Facebook page for recent reports. Those guys seem to have it dialed in.

Thats great advice. I will definitely give the buggers a try! 

[dainw]

Good luck. Let us know how you do.

JCW glad to hear it's clearing up. Hopefully it'll be back to normal time for winter fishing.

[mattmar10]

Just wanted to give a quick report on the water conditions and fishing on Sunday, 9/4/2016. 

The water conditions were much better than I anticipated after reading about the "chocolate milk" in some of the more recent forum posts. It seems that the water is clearing up quite a bit, though it does still have a little bit of stain/discoloration. While we were there they did not generate, but the flow seemed higher than what low flow normally is. I talked to a couple guys that fish there a lot and they mentioned the flow was a little bit higher than low flow normally had been. 

As for the fishing, it was decent, but not great. Having said that, I went to the river to try out some European nymphing techniques that I have never done before. To help teach me, I went with a local guide Donavan Clary. We started the morning around 7am at the 2nd parking lot below the dam. Early in the morning, we could see a few fish rising, but not a ton of activity. While I threw the euro rig setup with midges, Donavan alternated between midges and a wooly bugger. We caught maybe 3-4 fish between the two of us before 11... so not a great start. One fish was caught on the wooly bugger, the other on dark (brown or black) zebra midges. Maybe what was more interesting, was that Donavan pumped a couple of these fish to see what the were eating, and they had only 1 little midge a piece in their stomachs. Donavan fishes the river a lot, and he said that was really strange - to not find food in their stomachs. Maybe that could explain some of the slow fishing. He said a couple of times that we should be getting more takes than we were. It wasn't just us, there were quite a few fly fisherman on the water that morning, and I didn't see any of them bring up a fish. The bait guys had a little better luck and would reel one in every now and again using powerbait. 

After lunch, we fished below Watts and had a little bit better luck. We had to dodge the swimmers but managed to catch 10-12 in the afternoon below watts... all on zebra midges. A couple other guys down there were throwing wooly buggers in the deeper/slower water, but they weren't having much luck. 

Overall, I guess it was a good day. The water conditions seem to be improving, and I did catch a few fish. Maybe by winter, things will be mostly back to normal. I'm sure I would have done a little better had I not been out learning a new technique for the first time. I think maybe the water temp was a little up for them, and I think the stripers may have them up in shallower water. Most of the fish we caught were in 1-2ft of water. 

FWIW, there was one guy there that did say he caught 20ish fish up by the dam that morning... using an olive wooly bugger with a gray hackle. 

[jcw355]

Have cracklebacks/ wooly worms in your fly box as well. My best one for LIR has an olive flash body with furnace brown hackle. Ive never tried them in off color water but when it's clear it works.

[dainw]

Thanks for the report man. Honestly, for late summer, that's a pretty good at LIR. Glad you had a good time.

[mattmar10]

Sept 5, 2016 12:41:19 GMT -6 dainw said:

Thanks for the report man. Honestly, for late summer, that's a pretty good at LIR. Glad you had a good time.

You bet. I know things might be different since the flood, but normally, what time of year does the fishing really start to heat up?

[dainw]

Best time for me has always been about the end of November through March. Seems like there are always a lot of fish in the system and they are usually willing to chase an olive woolly, even in super clear water, so there's not a lot of guess work. Once you get into April and May fishing can still be good, but you have to start throwing smaller stuff and lighter tippet. Not sure why, could be a water temp thing. In the summer stripers move up into the system and there just aren't as many trout around.

[flyfishermann1955]

Lower Illinois River Update (20 Oct)

The weekly ODWC fishing report showed the water as 60 degrees and clear, so we went down to catch some trout. Arrived below the dam at 0730 to find the water off color (greenish-brown) with visibility 8 inches at best. I took the temperature at noon in still water, 2 inches below the surface and it was 64 degrees. If I knew the water was like this, I would have stayed home since it's a 2 hour and 15 minute drive (138 miles).

Actually caught a catfish--yes, on a fly (olive micro jig). No success on trout in the still (lake-like) water, but I did catch a few in the moving water. 1 on an orange San Juan worm and 1 on an egg. Hooked and lost 2 other fish and turned 1 more. Overall, very slow and disappointing. Much the same result for the 2 other guys with me.

Thanks- Ken

[jcw355]

The water had cleared and the lake turned over and made it dirty again is what some of the TU guys were saying. Some small browns were stocked, people were catching some in the Watts area.

[flyfishermann1955]

I noticed in this week's ODWC fishing report, it's listed as "murky" again. I wonder how long it will take until it's really clear again?

Thanks- Ken

[dainw]

Man I don't know if it's ever going to clear up again Ken. Seems like it's been what 7 or 8 months since we've had fishable flows on the LIR. I was really holding out hope that clarity would be back to normal in time for winter time fishing but it's not looking good.

[captwoody]

I was there 23-28 and water was very clear, much better than in the summer.

[troutbum54]

I was there on October 29 and it was pretty dang murky with about 5 inches of visibility, but the fish were still biting!

[golferjeff]

Who is running the spigots at LIR? Clear for 6 days and murky on the next?

[troutbum54]

I believe the lake flipped which pushed a big pocket of muddy water that was suspended in the lake from the floods down causing it too darken

[jcw355]

I fished yesterday, water looks like coffee with a lot of cream in it. Not many people there for a weekday. After they left I was able to move around more. I picked up fish in several spots but never found any big concentration of fish. Black and fluorescent pink/ cerise colors worked plus fish seemed to be hugging the bottom. Water color reminds me of back in 2011 when we had big rains.

[jcw355]

Fished yesterday, water is clearing up and looks much better. Only got to fish a couple areas but caught fish. TU facebook page members say they are catching fish. Me and a friend caught quite a few.

[dainw]

Dec 7, 2016 7:26:03 GMT -6 jcw355 said:

Fished yesterday, water is clearing up and looks much better. Only got to fish a couple areas but caught fish. TU facebook page members say they are catching fish. Me and a friend caught quite a few.

Great news! What were they bitin on?

[jcw355]

I was using black and olive micro jigs I tie.

[dainw]

Fished today from 9-5. Almost had the river to ourselves, it was strange. Only saw a couple other fishermen all day in the watts area. Probably caught close to thirty. Best success was on eggs, both chartreuse and pink were working. Also caught a few on a SJW and rainbow warrior. Nothing big, but had a good time.