I had a few hours Sunday morning so I decided to scout the Nooksack. I hiked into various places on the South Fork and the river is loaded with coho, the opener should be a good one. I also checked out a number of locations on the mainstream and as long as I was out on the river decided to fish a bit. I started with my fly rod, a 7 weight with an intermediate sink tip and a 9’, 10 pound tapered fluorocarbon leader. At the business end I had tied on a black and chartreuse egg sucking leach pattern fly. After frequent casting misfires due to the wind and heavy tree and brush cover directly behind me I finally got a handful of solid casts where I wanted them. Handful or otherwise they were on target and my fly stopped mid-drift. Shortly thereafter I was into the backing with a nice coho heading upstream at 100 mph clearing the water every 20 feet or so. 15 minutes or so later I was releasing a nice 7 or 8 pound coho. From there I fished a number of other holes with my drift rod. I fished a variety of yarn and corky combinations, spinners and spoons. I connected with and landed two more fish a twin coho on a rainbow spinner and a 12-14 pound chinook on a River-Fisher spoon, both released to continue their journey upstream.

On the way home I also fished Whatcom creek for an hour or so. Occasionally a chinook or two would swim the circuit and tease the few anglers. I did not have any success but there were 2 or 3 spots on the concrete or grass where a fish had recently bled (well I hope they were fish anyway). I did have chinook follow either a small metallic/chrome/green or a small chartreuse/ orange spin-n-glow a number of times. They would turn and disappear as soon as they saw me (hmmm…). I only had a few hours to explore but I would say that overall it was productive and the time on the water was sorely needed.

strider43

9/11/2012 7:22:00 AM

Where on the Nooksack did you explore? where do you access the Noocksack?

rseas

9/11/2012 5:47:00 PM

Hey strider, I hiked into numerous locations on the both the mainstream and South Fork. If the various drifts/holes have names I don't know what they are. While exploring both the mainstream and South Fork I would find a wide spot or pull-out along the road and bushwhack my way down to the river. What I do know is that there are miles of fishable river bank and gravel bars on the upper mainstream and South Fork of the Nooksack and when October first rolls around we should have an incredible fishery.

strider43

9/12/2012 9:45:00 AM

Thanks RSEAS, do you acces the river from hiway 9 and or the mt Baker hiway 542?
Thanks for your tips on fishing Baker lake I did manage to land a Salmon in early August!

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