finially someone asks for something i know something about.
I grew up on the Washougal and fished it for 20 years or so. The washougal has suffered some of the most serious decline of any steelhead river. In the early - mid 90s they started lowering the plants in the river for the sake of wild fish. That combined with the poor ocean conditions caused several years where there was no fishable numbers. The last few years however WDFW was started planting more fish and they are surviving better so it can provide some good fishing. The fish are not like they used to be. They are almost all little 6-7 lb fish. They look like they came out of a factory ohh umm maybe they did. They go very dormant in cold water and are not aggressive at all. Bait is by far the best bet I cant emphasize enough these fish are not aggressive!!!
In my opinion they are very poor steelhead.. If you come here please keep every fin clipped steelhead you catch. They are causing problems for our wild fish we have to keep them off the spawning beds!!!!!