McDonald Creek

McDonald Creek empties into Lake McDonald, the lake where our campground was at. The lower end of it is bigger than you'd expect from something deemed a creek. Lower McDonald Creek is flies or lures only, and is a catch and release area. Easy access, as it's right near the road, and there's several good lookouts to hike around and take pictures.



Some parts more wadeable than others. Parts of the stream cut these mini gorges into the shale, so it's fairly sketchy trying to fish them. The shale is very fine grained, and once it's been polished by water it's extremely treacherous footing. But other sections are more open and flat, with more gravel than rock.




This is one of the stretches I fished. The first shot is taken from the bridge you can see upstream in the second pic. No luck with nymphs, but fishing was good with dry flies. Everything I caught was cutthroat. Very good fights for the size of the fish. Most of my catches were in the 8-10 inch range, and I got a couple around 12 or 13.