Otter’s Eggs on the Clearwater
I had a great note from my friend, Ed Mueller, a.k.a. the Otter. He’s the “Otter” of Otter’s Eggs. Very interesting, indeed:
Gary:
Got back a week ago from the Clearwater. Conditions were tough- very low water, and super clear. Our guide for 2 days told us the clearest he has seen it in 18 years. We fished from a drift boat for 2 days, and then tried wading for another 5 days. My partner, Charles Chandler of Michigan, and I used our center pin reels and long float rods. Our guide had Charles use spawn roe on the first day while I used our Otter Egg patterns. We both were using 10# or 11 # tippets. After about 5 hours of nothing I went down to 6 # tippet and promptly hooked 3 fish and Charles switched to 6# and he hooked 2. Over the 2 days we hooked 8, landing 6, all on 6 # tippet. The best color was Tango/Silver which closely matches King Salmon eggs. The only way we keep these fish on such light tippet was the long float rods we used, which were 13 1/2 feet.
Our best fish was 36″ x 16#, and 34″ x 14 #. Our guide did not believe they would not hit spawn but would take our Otter Eggs!
This river is tough to wade and we only hooked 2 fish over the other 5 days. We just could not get to good holes and water by wading. I am sure you know how tough the rock is along this river and on the river beds. We should have come 6 to 8 weeks earlier when these large “B” run steelhead were chromers just in from the Pacific.
