Northwest Fishing Reports

I was going to head to the Wallace tomorrow and fly fish the section open for trout. Where does one park for this section? The regs say from the mouth to 363rd (where the mini-mart is) is open for trout. I don't want to park and cross the train tracks where I used to for salmon/steelhead and don't want to wade down from the hatchery either. I scouted it out Monday and saw big schools of chinook (and a jumping steelhead in the mix) up by the hatchery and want to leave them be.

At the hatchery I also got the chance to talk with some of the WDFW hatchery folks and they said that they just purchased a property down by the mouth and plan on opening it for access in the Fall at the earliest. Means we shouldn't have to worry about getting tickets or towed crossing the tracks anymore.

Wow! Thats awesome news. If you turn on Reece rd there is a bridge over the wallace and enough room to park. Farther down reece there are a few spots on the right where ive seen people park.

Wdfw just released river closures, the wallace river will be closed tomorrow :/ maybe the sultan instead?

I fished it Wednesday, parking at the mini-mart after they gave me permission and hiking downstream from the bridge. I got some hits on dry flys floated by the bank in shady spots with slightly deeper channels. I got maybe a half mile down the river and was spooked by some serious junkyard dogs hollering at me from the trailers that line the south side of the river. Made it past the dogs and to a spot where I was going to continue with the drys but saw lots of bear tracks and fur around some game trails that led into the woods. I left. With the dogs and evidence of bears and me not packing I decided to cut the trip a little short

TyeeMatt wrote:I fished it Wednesday, parking at the mini-mart after they gave me permission and hiking downstream from the bridge. I got some hits on dry flys floated by the bank in shady spots with slightly deeper channels. I got maybe a half mile down the river and was spooked by some serious junkyard dogs hollering at me from the trailers that line the south side of the river. Made it past the dogs and to a spot where I was going to continue with the drys but saw lots of bear tracks and fur around some game trails that led into the woods. I left. With the dogs and evidence of bears and me not packing I decided to cut the trip a little short

theres only going to be little black bears in that area, they will run from you.

i agree with strider, i feel safer in a forest laden with black bear cougar or other predators than in my neighborhood in everett, litterally. ive had several run ins with wild life in the past. ive seen, black bear, deer, mountain goat, turkey, and lots of coyotes so far, upclose and personal. The one that scared me most was the mountain goat. Just stand your ground and know you are the alpha mammal in the area and act like it, all wildlife will flee.. except goats which are very terretorial and can be aggressive. As always try to avoid them, intentional loud noise making will scare anything within earshot before you ever see them. if you see scat/tracks just make loud noises as you go and youll be fine. the key is to not sneak up on them.

I have seen more bears than normal this year, but all I really see is them running away into the thicket. You certainly don't want to startle them. I almost always carry so I have a good noise maker if needed to scare them away which makes me feel more secure even though its a smaller caliber that I wouldn't want to necessarily shoot a bear with.
Ive stomped around this area for nearly 40 years and have never had a bad animal encounter. Once I was scared of bears at night that were coming for our dirty bbq. We finally scared them away.