This has year has broken all records for the Sierra snowpack and with it all records for questions from people wanting to know if they will be able to fish the Sierra in 2017. The answer, of course, is “it depends.”
Summer snow isn’t like winter snow. It isn’t bright and fluffy with the prospect of reindeer over the horizon, but grubby with pollen and dirt and looking punk. To most, it may be skanky, but skank is in the eye of the beholder. I like summer snow. After you scrape off the surface gunk, the clean, hard snow underneath is made for chipping out with a boot heel and topping off with gin and lemon-lime powder. Hard summer chunks last much longer than winter snowballs in your drink. It keeps fish cold until supper, and it makes for awesome glissading or butt sledding. With winter snow, it is easy to forget where you buried the fish, and sliding down slopes is best reserved for having sticks on your feet, or at least a piece of plastic under your rear end.
Summer snow also isn’t like winter snow in that it gets soft in the afternoon and usually hardens up overnight. Hiking on it in the mornings is heavenly. Otherwise impassable brush fields and talus slopes become white carpets, and travel is painless and fast. The same path in the afternoon can become an endless slog of post-holing and breaking through slabs of crust. Walk in the forest, and you’ll likely slide into a tree well; walk near boulders, and the thin shelves of ice will break under your weight. Ankle-twisting sun cups caused by the uneven melting of the snow’s surface can add to the agony. Hiking on snow can result in near-instantaneous sunburn if you aren’t swathed like a Bedouin and lathered in sunscreen.
Unlike normal summer conditions, when the Sierra is benign and welcoming, with summer snow, death and agony lurk around every corner. In late May, on the east slope of Mount Whitney, an unfortunate backpacker took what seemed to be just another step along the path and broke through a snow bridge some 60 feet above a raging torrent. She was swept to her death. Another hiker fell to his death when traversing a snowfield in the near vicinity of the snow-bridge incident. On the west side, a backpacker got swept off his feet during an icy river crossing, and the rescue unfortunately devolved into a recovery. As we write, the carnage continues. Now that you have been properly warned, and now that I hope I’ve absolved myself of liability, I will tell you to get out there and enjoy the Sierra this summer despite the dangers. The truth is, most people don’t die, and outside of sunburn and skinned shins, not many get hurt, even when they do stupid things and deserve to feel some pain.
With an abundance of runoff, there is little need to carry elaborate “hydration systems.” That said, keep in mind that Giardia and many other pathogens are not rendered harmless simply by being locked away in winter snowpack. In the unfortunate event that you choose to fill a water bottle several feet downstream from last year’s toilet, be prepared for the consequences.
With the abundance of runoff, keep in mind, that the small creek you easily waded this morning might be a seething maelstrom come late afternoon, when the snowpack is melting at its peak. The snowmelt pulse might originate many miles away, from unseen peaks, so throughout the summer during a heavy snow year, keep a mindful eye on any stream crossings. Some high trail passes will be snowbound this entire season. The best time to cross is late enough in the morning so that the snow has begun to soften and the ice has given way to a layer of slush. Instep crampons and an ice axe are cheap insurance should you be planning to cross many high passes.
The state of the Sierra fisheries is likely to have been changed dramatically and in many waters, possibly forever. The unprecedented snowpack will certainly have led to unprecedented winter kill of trout populations. Winter kill occurs not when a lake freezes solid, but when the snow cover atop the lake’s icy surface becomes so thick that the sun’s rays cannot penetrate into the water. With ice and moderate snow cover, the sun’s energy can reach into the lake and drive photosynthesis in the vegetation. A byproduct of photosynthesis is oxygen, and when the air/water interface is covered with ice, this oxygen is the only reason trout can survive. In a winter such as we just experienced, many lakes will not enjoy the oxygen enrichment of photosynthesis.
Historically, all lakes in the Sierra were managed with a one-size-fits-all strategy. Every two years, an airplane would swoop down and dump hundreds or thousands of baby trout into the lake. It didn’t matter if the lake’s fish population had no access to spawning habitat and survived only because of these plants or if the lake was self-sustaining and overpopulated — they all got their allotment of trout. During the 1980s, it slowly dawned on the state’s resource managers that not only was this one-size-fits-all management plan a tremendous waste of money, but it also had major negative effects on the native ecosystems. Each lake was then systematically evaluated, and each lake basin was given a custom-tailored management plan. Some basins would receive no fish and be managed for the benefit of the native ecosystem, and others would be managed as fishery resources for anglers to enjoy.
Many lakes fit somewhere between the two extremes of the alternate plans. These lakes had sufficient spawning to keep a fishery alive, but in the event of a situation in which the fish died, the lack of future fish plants destined the waters to become barren of trout. Only time will tell how many lakes that were previously inoculated with trout whose populations were then maintained by self-reproduction will return to their fishless state.
From an angler’s perspective, some of the finest fishing, normally available only in the early summer, will present itself throughout the season this year. Over the course of a winter, insects become trapped in the ice and snow covering a lake. As the ice cover recedes, like a vending machine, the melting ice deposits the insects into the water. Trout will line up just beneath the ice’s edge and expect dead bugs to fall into their mouths. It can result in incredible fishing opportunities, sometimes bordering on the boring. Cast a small nymph on the ice shelf and gently pull it off and into the water with a satisfying plop. The pain, suffering, and possible near-death experiences endured crossing the hot summer snow will be repaid in spades.
