Late Winter Fly Fishing on California's Upper Sacramento

“No long casts are necessary. Because the water is cold, the trout do not flash cross-stream and strike in wrist-rattling grabs. Instead, the fish sit in pocket water, pointed upstream, waiting for food to come floating by. Cast a short distance upstream and then drift your nymphs right past them, along boulders next to the pockets where trout sit.” Open in winter for the first time in history, the Upper Sacramento River

above Shasta Lake is a great place for “off-season” anglers have to catch trout, as Tom Stienstra notes on SFGate.com

.