Noyo River

Start with the rules, because on the Noyo they decide almost everything. In winter the only water that is both open and public is the tidewater, about 1.7 miles from the mouth at Noyo Harbor up to the Georgia-Pacific logging road bridge, and a good part of that is docks and marinas. The next reach, from that bridge up to the South Fork, closes on October 1 and stays shut all winter. The canyon above the South Fork reopens, but private timberland and the Skunk Train right-of-way enclose it with no public road. So this is a small harbor and tidewater fishery for wild winter steelhead, a short drive from downtown Fort Bragg. Hatchery steelhead are long gone, so every steelhead you hook goes back. The run is a fraction of what it was: CDFG put it near 8,000 fish in 1965, and a 2000 redd survey counted enough for about 260 adults.

The Noyo drains about 113 square miles of redwood hills with no snow and no dam, so it rises hard and clears fast. In January 2026 it peaked at 1,850 CFS at the gauge near Fort Bragg, read 420 four days later and 129 after two weeks. Roughly 400 down to 100 CFS on the drop is the window. In the tidewater the river matters less than the tide. Fresh fish hold in the slow pools above the harbor and push up on the flood, so a morning high tide on a falling river is the setup you want. Most of it is too deep and soft to wade. A kayak or small boat out of the harbor reaches the quiet upper tidewater, where you strip or slowly swing a sink-tip with a shrimp or baitfish pattern. Bank access is a few harbor spots and gravel bars at low tide.

Two things trip people up. First, the Noyo's own gauge does not decide whether it is open. CDFW closes every Mendocino coast stream when the Navarro gauge near Navarro reads under 200 CFS, and the Noyo runs at about 40 percent of the Navarro, so it closes when its gauge reads roughly 90 to 120 CFS, which is still fishable water. Check the "Mendocino Coast Streams" row on the CDFW North Coast low-flow page, not this hydrograph. Second, the gauge on this page sits in the reach that is closed all winter, so read it for conditions only. The canyon from the South Fork to Camp Noyo is legal, about 10 miles of redwood pools and boulder runs that almost nobody fishes, but walking the railroad tracks is trespassing. You need landowner permission or a guide with an access agreement. The coho that spawn in the South Fork are endangered. Keep any fish you hook in the water, and leave the canyon alone if you have no way in.