Iowa's Only Urban Trout Stream

Last weekend I drove over to Cedar Rapids, a town about two hours from my home, to visit a coffee shop and check out this small stream I had heard about through some people in Des Moines. I packed my thermos and waders, and made the drive with one of my friends. After we had our fill of coffee and an excellent breakfast sandwich, we began to search for the stream on Google Maps.

After a couple of minutes, we found it, rigged up, and drove a couple of minutes outside of town to the stream parking lot. When you look up from the bank of this stream you can see cars passing you on the major highway running in and out of town. McCloud Run is Iowa’s said only urban trout stream, and it sure was. I started fishing with a double nymph set up, but after seeing a bit more of the water and reading its geography, I quickly switch to a smaller streamer pattern to hit some of the banks. Winter fishing is quite interesting. Not only are the fish not feeding, the sun isn’t out, but half of the stream is frozen over.

So when you round the corner and hope for a promising run, chances are it is covered in ice. Nonetheless it was awesome to toss my line in again. In a way it reminds me of the summer days in Wisconsin with the sun hot and the fish jumping for you size 20 Klinkhammer dry fly. The days where you have to wear you buff all the way up so you don’t get eaten alive by the mosquitos, and go to bed with the bugs hitting your cheeks from hours before.

Throughout the years I have been fishing in the Driftless, the sunrises, days on the water, fishing, and sunsets go unmatched with all other fishing destinations. Cannot wait to tie on that bulky dry fly, toss some dry shake on it, and wait for a set.