Typical run off for mountain streams

[AspenCreekOutdoors]

I was planning a trip to either south ram river or castle river in June

Question is typically when is run off end of June and July?

[scel]

Originally Posted by AspenCreekOutdoors

I was planning a trip to either south ram river or castle river in June

Question is typically when is run off end of June and July?

Run off usually starts last week of May and carries through until last week of June.

I think the Castle is closed until 16 June (I might be wrong though).

The rivers are usually fishable after 21 June. June tends to be the rainiest month and the rivers can blow out for a couple days at a time even if they were previously fishable.

Personally, other than a recon trip to some of rivers closer to Calgary, I will avoid the mountain streams until July.

[Parker Hale]

A couple things to consider with spring run off. The amount of snow accumulated in the mountains and how warm and early the spring arrives. I fish a lot in the East Kootenays, some springs mid July others it was August before water levels came down to where I could comfortably wade.

[jgib01]

Originally Posted by Parker Hale

A couple things to consider with spring run off. The amount of snow accumulated in the mountains and how warm and early the spring arrives. I fish a lot in the East Kootenays, some springs mid July others it was August before water levels came down to where I could comfortably wade.

Year to year variation can be significant. In my short few years of fly fishing, I've seen everything from high runoff into early July, to one year with no appreciable change in levels past mid May. Seems to be a decent snow pack this year (150cm base at Castle Mt.)... but who knows really.

[SlimChance]

Annual flow rate charts can be found at: https://rivers.alberta.ca

As others have mentioned, year to year fluctuations can be pretty dramatic, but those charts can be helpful for determining when spring runoff usually occurs and are pretty useful if you can't get out to look at a stream as they're generally up to date.

[jgib01]

Originally Posted by SlimChance

Annual flow rate charts can be found at: https://rivers.alberta.ca

As others have mentioned, year to year fluctuations can be pretty dramatic, but those charts can be helpful for determining when spring runoff usually occurs and are pretty useful if you can't get out to look at a stream as they're generally up to date.

That's where I go to for my real time info during game on, but I've never been able to figure out how to get long term historical info there. For that, I usually go to the Feds site here: https://wateroffice.ec.gc.ca/google_...ce&province=AB

[Caustic]

Originally Posted by jgib01

That's where I go to for my real time info during game on, but I've never been able to figure out how to get long term historical info there.

If you look at the yearly graph there are lines for the upper and lower quartiles - dashed and dotted lines in a sort of purple colour. Those are your yearly averages. Pretty obvious when you look at them when runoff generally starts and tapers off.

[Mr Flyguy]

Never mind. Due to global warming there will be no run off this year.