Washington fishes in two halves divided by the Cascades, and the fish on each side are different. West of the crest the rivers are rain-fed, run high and green all winter, and are steelhead and salmon water first; coho, chum, Chinook, sockeye and pink salmon are five of the eight most recorded gamefish in the state. East of the crest the rivers are snow-fed, clear by July, and hold rainbows, westslope cutthroat and summer steelhead in canyon country that gets little rain at all. The Yakima, a tailwater in the middle of the dry side, is the one river everyone agrees is the state's best trout stream.
The Yakima from Cle Elum to the Lower Canyon
The Yakima River is Washington's Blue Ribbon trout water, and it runs backwards from most rivers: because it carries irrigation water from the Cascade reservoirs to the farms downstream, it runs high through summer and drops in September when the deliveries stop. That fall drop, called the flip-flop, is when the canyon below Ellensburg fishes best. Rainbows and some browns rise to Blue-Winged Olives and midges in spring, Pale Morning Duns from May into August, caddis all summer, Tricos in August, and the October Caddis in September and October. The upper river from Cle Elum through the farm country to Ellensburg is a summer float; the Lower Canyon around Umtanum is the fall wade. Flies run from Zebra Midges and Griffith's Gnats in #18 to #24 through PMD Comparaduns and Harrop PMDs in #16 to #18; ideal flows are 300 to 3,000 cfs on gauge 12500000.
Winter steelhead: the Skykomish and the Puget Sound rivers
The Skykomish River above Gold Bar and Index is the wild winter steelhead river closest to Seattle, and January through March is its season, swung with Intruders, Purple Perils and Green Butt Skunks on two-handed rods in flows of 500 to 8,000 cfs that can double overnight in a rainstorm. It also holds sea-run cutthroat and bull trout, and the summer months bring coastal cutthroat fishing with small streamers and soft hackles. The Skagit, Stillaguamish, Nooksack and Snoqualmie, all gauged, are the Sky's neighbors and share its runs, its rain-driven flows and its frequently changing steelhead seasons. The Cowlitz, to the south, is a hatchery steelhead and salmon tailwater below the Tacoma Power dams. Sea-run cutthroat along the Puget Sound beaches are a fly fishery of their own.
Summer steelhead and cutthroat east of the crest: the Klickitat, Methow and Wenatchee
The Klickitat River drops out of the Mount Adams glaciers to the Columbia Gorge, and it runs milky with glacial melt on hot afternoons; mornings and cool spells are when it clears and the summer steelhead take a swung fly from July through October, with the October Caddis on the trout in the fall. The Methow through Winthrop and Twisp and the Wenatchee through Leavenworth and Tumwater Canyon are North Cascades freestones with westslope cutthroat and interior redband rainbows, fishable once runoff drops in late June, with Salmonflies in May and June, Golden Stones, caddis and Pale Morning Duns through summer. Both have summer steelhead runs whose seasons open and close based on returns; the trout fishing is the sure thing. The Kettle and Spokane, gauged, are the northeast's rainbow rivers without pages yet.
The Olympic Peninsula
The Hoh, Bogachiel and Elwha are all gauged, and all are wild steelhead and salmon rivers draining the rainforest side of the Olympics. The Hoh and Bogachiel hold some of the last strong wild winter steelhead runs on the coast, fished in December through March in weather that defines the word; the Elwha is recovering after the largest dam removal in the country and has been closed to fishing during that recovery. None have guide pages yet. The peninsula's regulations shift yearly and its rivers are the ones most likely to be closed in a given season.
Stillwater: Pass Lake and Lake Chelan
Pass Lake on Fidalgo Island near Anacortes is the state's most historic fly-only stillwater, a small lake, long managed under fly-only and catch-and-release rules, fished almost entirely from float tubes with chironomids in spring and fall. Lake Chelan, the deepest lake in the state, is a lake trout and kokanee fishery at the mouth of the Stehekin. The state has hundreds of managed trout lakes beyond these, many fly-only or selective-gear, and the spring lake opener is a Washington institution.
Before you go
Washington sets salmon and steelhead seasons in-season based on run forecasts, and rivers open and close on short notice; the trout fisheries on the Yakima, Methow and Wenatchee are more stable but have carried selective-gear rules on some reaches. Check the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife emergency rule changes before every trip, not just the regulations pamphlet. On the west side, read the gauge and the rain forecast together. See the Washington fishing hub for every gauged water in the state and the Washington trout page for trout detail.