Pit River, California

Pit 1 below Fall River Mills

The fishable Pit begins below the Pit 1 powerhouse near Fall River Mills, where the Fall River and then Hat Creek pour spring water into it before it slows into Lake Britton. This is the reach the USGS gauge on this page measures. It is bigger, slower water than the canyon below, best in spring and fall, and pontoon boats and inflatables reach miles of it that wading anglers never touch.

Pit 3 below Lake Britton

Below Lake Britton Dam the river drops into the canyon that made its reputation. The road stays high above the river for the first three miles, then descends at Rock Creek, and from there to the Pit 3 powerhouse the river is reachable: relentless pocket water over greased basalt boulders, cleated boots and a wading staff mandatory. Flows here are set by PG&E's license, not by the gauge on this page.

Pit 4 and Pit 5 to Big Bend

Pit 4 starts below the Pit 3 powerhouse in a wider canyon, with Tunnel Campground and the hike in from Deep Creek Campground the main access, and Pit 5 below its dam has the deepest pools and the largest fish before the canyon opens toward Big Bend. Guides meet at the Big Bend store or in Burney, and private land limits where you can get in below Pit 5.

Rainbow trout

Every reach holds wild, heavy-bodied rainbows that grow on the combined insect output of the Fall River, Hat Creek and the reservoirs. Salmonflies hatch sporadically through May, golden and little yellow stones follow into July, caddis fish every summer evening, and Isonychia and October caddis drive the fall nymphing. High-stick nymphing with stonefly and caddis larva patterns is the everyday method.

Season and regulations

The Pit is open all year, and because its flows come from dams and powerhouses it stays fishable through most winters and springs. At the Pit 1 gauge the river runs about 1,150 to 1,300 cfs through summer and fall and 1,600 to 2,500 cfs in winter and spring, so the 800 to 1,400 cfs band here marks the settled fishing-season flow on that reach rather than a shop-published range; the canyon reaches run far lower and PG&E posts their schedule, including freshet releases of 1,200 to 1,500 cfs that make the canyon unfishable for three weeks every other year.

Pit 3 carries the strictest rules on the system: artificial lures with barbless hooks all year and a two-fish limit with an 18 inch minimum during the harvest season. Check the current CDFW Inland Trout regulations for each reach and the PG&E release schedule before you go, and do not fish the remote canyon alone.