Yakima River Enforcement

I floated the Yakima river yesterday and for the first time in the many years I have been fishing down in the lower canyon I saw a Sheriff's Jet boat with a WDFW Enforcement Officer aboard. Unlucky me I forgot to throw the PFDs into the drift boat. However, lucky me because all I got was a warning.

Personally, I am glad to see them out there. The WDFW Officer told me that yesterday was education and not enforcement, but they were going to be out there on a regular basis doing enforcement throughout the season.

I hope they can cut down on the poaching that goes on out there.

On another note I am glad to see most of the areas on the river are now pay per day to use. There are honey buckets, dumpsters, parking improvements, and these places get patrolled regularly. Looks to me like it has cut down on some of the riff raff.

Fishing was mighty slow yesterday and the water was on the rise.

Mike,
Thanks for the heads-up on the PFD's. They're in my DB but I can't seem to put one on when its 85+ in the canyon....

I took my 79 yo father-in-law on his first float down the Yak for the "day after Mother's Day" caddis hatch. I hooked 'em and he landed 'em. We managed to get quite a few to hand, targeting rising fish throughout the afternoon. It was challenging to get a good drag free drift on a bug while anchored-up at these elevated flow rates and casting to a riser under low branches. Let me know if you head back over there again this summer and we can do a shuttle.
Michael

Michael, sounds good on the shuttle. Don't know when I will be going back. June has me gone most weekends. Will probably find some time before the July 16 opener for Hatchery Kings in Puget Sound.

I wish I could have been there a few days before. I heard it was on fire. Water levels were on the rise yesterday and that cooled the hatches off and put a lot of the fish off the bite.

Thats a nice fish your father-in-law got. You don't have to wear the PFDs, but you need them in the boat. It will be interesting to see how many party rafters get cited this summer.

Mike

We saw them on Saturday as well. Glad to see them out there. It took a minute but we were able to pull a couple of life jackets out from under the seats.

good...check that...great to see somebody out there. 11/2/2005 myself and 2 buddies were floating the canyon in my d-boat. my truck and trailer was left at the slab, which was our take out. we got there...no truck/trailer. gone. some jacka ss stole it while we were floating. now it's 5:00 at night, cold and dark and we are like 7 miles from no where with no cell reception. thank god somebody installed those emergency phones. we called the sheriff, like about an hour and a half later they showed up. in the meantime we walked up the hill on the other side of the road and managed to get a cell signal, managed to get a hold of steve from red's flyshop. he was the MAN!!!! he dumped one of his boats off a trailer, probably left dinner with his family and saved our backsides that night. my buddie's truck was left at red's. i got home around midnight that night. about 5:00am the next morning kittitas county sheriffs dept called to tell me they turned my trailer up down the road in a ditch. thats where it would be so i could find it. ooohh boy did i haul -ss to get there before it went missing again. my truck was found 2 weeks later at some yakima crackhouse motel parking lot stripped and totalled. never saw the truck again. that was a wednesday...probably the only time i've ever fished the yak and never saw another fisherman.
BTW does anyone know if powerboats are legal above roza dam?? i didn't think so, but memorial day, took the long way home up canyon road and saw ski-boat style boats running the river down there above the dam. just curious.