Wenatchee River, Washington

Lake Wenatchee to Tumwater Canyon

The Wenatchee leaves Lake Wenatchee at Plain, gathers the Chiwawa and Nason Creek and drops through Tumwater Canyon beside US-2 into Leavenworth. It is spectacular water and it is closed. From the Icicle Road Bridge upstream to the lake the river is closed to all fishing, and the tributaries carry their own rules; the Wenatchee's wild steelhead and spring Chinook are ESA-listed.

Leavenworth to Cashmere

Below the Icicle Road Bridge the river runs past Leavenworth's parks, the Icicle Creek mouth, Peshastin and Dryden to Cashmere. Under the standing WDFW rules this reach is closed to game fish year-round; it opens only when WDFW issues an emergency rule for a salmon or steelhead season, and that is when the boat launches and bars here get busy.

Cashmere to the Columbia

The lower river passes Monitor, where the USGS gauge sits, and reaches the Columbia at Wenatchee. This is the reach most sockeye and hatchery Chinook are caught in during the seasons WDFW opens from the mouth to the Icicle Road Bridge, typically August and September in strong return years.

Sockeye and Chinook salmon

When the Tumwater Dam count clears the escapement goal, WDFW has opened the Wenatchee from the mouth to the Icicle Road Bridge for sockeye, most recently with up to four sockeye and two adult hatchery Chinook in a six-fish limit, coho and wild Chinook released, selective gear rules with bait allowed and a night closure. Seasons are announced in July and cancelled in weak years, as they were in 2024 for Chinook.

Summer steelhead

Upper Columbia summer steelhead are threatened, and the Wenatchee steelhead season exists only when WDFW opens it by emergency rule, usually with mandatory retention of hatchery fish and release of wild fish. These are Columbia summer-run fish, not the Idaho B-run the old copy described. Swinging flies in the Peshastin and Cashmere runs is the game when it is open.

Season and regulations

Runoff peaks in May and June, when the Monitor gauge averages 8,000 cfs, and the river drops to 650 to 1,200 cfs from August through October when the salmon and steelhead windows fall. No shop publishes a fishing flow for the Wenatchee, so this page compares the Monitor gauge to 500 to 1,500 cfs, the late-summer and fall band in the USGS record when the seasons are open.

There is no trout season on the Wenatchee main stem: from the mouth to the Icicle Road Bridge it is closed to game fish year-round except as opened by emergency rule, and from the Icicle Road Bridge to Lake Wenatchee it is closed to all species. A Columbia River Salmon and Steelhead Endorsement is required when those fisheries open. Check the WDFW emergency rules page before every trip; the printed pamphlet will not tell you whether the river is open this week.