We've been hearing lots of rumors apparently coming from some of the fly shops in the Eastern Sierra that the water temperatures on the East Walker River are too high to fish. This is entirely not true. Upon hearing some if this information from walk-in customers as well as folks calling on the phone to verify what they've heard from other shops I figured I'd better get down to the river and get some exact temperature readings. As of this morning (Sept. 7, 2006) at about 11:15 am the water coming out of the dam was 63 degrees, then a mile down stream near the bridge it had gained 1 degree and was at 64 degrees.

 

In years past the Fall has produced some very high temps on the East Walker, this typically occurs in drought years when Bridgeport Reservoir is very low and the summertime temperatures are very high. The dam on Bridgeport Reservoir is a bottom feed dam so all the water that makes up the trophy stretch of the East Walker comes from the bottom of the deepest part of Bridgeport Reservoir. Of course the bottom of the Reservoir is where the water is the coolest.

 

Bridgeport Reservoir has grown a considerable amount of algae, as it always does in the summer. Bridgeport is a relatively shallow lake to begin with and when the water temperatures get in to the 60's and 70's the algae starts to grow. The interesting thing this year though is that the algae hasn't grown near as much as it usually does by this time of the year. There's still anglers trolling on the Reservoir, and usually the trolling is finished by the end of July, this is mainly due to the fact that when the algae is too thick it's very difficult to keep your gear clean while trolling.

 

Bridgeport has already experienced at least 5 or 6 night-time air temperatures below freezing this season, day-time temperatures have been from the high 60's to the mid 70's, this means that the heat of the summer is already past. After the heat of the summer passes, the water temperatures always follow. This means in theory that the water temperatures will gradually decrease from here on out.

 

This morning after hearing the first report of the temperatures being too high on the river Andrew Sears, who guides through Ken's on the East Walker, reported that in a 4 hour session yesterday morning he had over 25 hook-ups on the river. Within moments after Andrew left with clients a walk-in customer came in for some new backing on one of his reels because he was spooled by a fish on the river yesterday and decided that 10 yards of backing just wasn't enough. After further conversation I found out that he and his fishing partner landed over 30 fish between them yesterday. As of late we've been getting more good fishing reports from the river than bad, and these reports are coming from anglers that are actually fishing the river.

 

In short, the water conditions couldn't be better for this time of year on the East Walker River, there's absolutely no threat to the fish because of water temperatures or conditions on the East Walker River, the fish on the East Walker River are happy and healthy...except for maybe being stuck in the lip once in a while.