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Home › Waters › Oregon › Metolius River
River · Central Oregon · Oregon

Metolius River Fishing Guides

A spring creek that starts full-size out of the ground at Black Butte, running gin-clear and fifty degrees year-round through ponderosa forest to Lake Billy Chinook.

A red drift boat on a moss-lined river in the Pacific Northwest

Map of the Metolius River

16 numbered points: 11 campsites, 2 bridges, 1 agency office, 1 spring, 1 USGS gauge. Tap a marker for details. Reviewed Sep 15, 2026.

Printable version →
  • Campsite (11)
  • Bridge crossing (2)
  • Agency / conservation office (1)
  • Spring (1)
  • USGS gauge (1)
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Points are curated from OpenStreetMap and state agency sources; confirm access and hours before you go.

Print it. Bag it. Bring it.Phones die, screens crack, and most of this water has no signal. Print this map, fold it into a zip-top bag or dry bag with your license, and you have a backup your electronics can’t give you. Every marker is numbered so you can say exactly where you are.

Open the printable map
All 16 points on this map
#PointTypeLat, LonNotes
1Metolius Springs
Head of the Metolius		Spring44.43402, -121.63803The river rises here full-size at the foot of Black Butte; the whole sheet reads downstream from this point.
2Riverside Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.44121, -121.63500First Forest Service camp below the springs, on the Camp Sherman road.
3Camp Sherman RV Park
Private RV park, Camp Sherman		Campsite44.45987, -121.64753OSM carries this as 'Camp sherman rv park'; the spelling is corrected here.
4Camp Sherman Road Bridge
SW Camp Sherman Road		Bridge crossing44.46027, -121.64363The village crossing at Camp Sherman, the landmark everyone measures the upper river from.
5Camp Sherman Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.46343, -121.63968
6Allingham Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.47240, -121.63770
7Pine Rest Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.48165, -121.63845Small walk-in camp on the west bank.
8Gorge Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.48519, -121.63947
9Lower Canyon Creek Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.50161, -121.64167At the Canyon Creek confluence, the last camp above the hatchery.
10Wizard Falls Fish Hatchery
ODFW hatchery and visitor site		Agency / conservation office44.52354, -121.63282Open to visitors; the bridge here is the usual dividing line between the upper and lower river.
11Allen Springs Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.52821, -121.62917
12Pioneer Ford Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.55222, -121.62244
13Forest Road 12 Bridge
Lower Bridge crossing		Bridge crossing44.55651, -121.62052The crossing at Lower Bridge Campground; OSM names the way for the road, not the bridge.
14Lower Bridge Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.55765, -121.62035
15Candle Creek Campground
Deschutes National Forest		Campsite44.57512, -121.61912The last road-accessible camp; below here the river runs into the reservation and the canyon.
16USGS 14091500 - Metolius River near Grandview
USGS streamgage		USGS gauge44.62623, -121.48394The lower-canyon gauge; the Metolius is spring-fed and runs remarkably steady year round.

Guides on the Metolius River

Claimed profiles take booking requests. Unclaimed profiles are built from public records so the river is never empty; the guide can claim or remove one any time.

About the Metolius River

The Metolius begins as a spring at the base of Black Butte and arrives as a river, not a trickle. Within a mile it is wide enough to fish and cold enough to hold trout through a Central Oregon summer, and it stays that way for its whole length to Lake Billy Chinook. The water is startlingly clear, the temperature barely moves off the low fifties in any season, and the ponderosa forest along it makes the corridor one of the prettiest in Oregon.

It is also hard. Wild redband rainbows in that clarity see everything, the currents are complicated by spring inflows all the way down, and the standing advice is long leaders, small flies and better drifts than you think you need. Bull trout, some of them very large, live here as well and are pursued with big streamers under strict protections. The river is fly-only for its entire length, with wild-fish-only rules on most of it, and no fishing from a boat.

Because it is spring-fed, the flow is remarkably steady. The Grandview gauge sits well down the river and typically reads in the low thousands of cfs, which reflects the accumulated springs rather than runoff. That stability is the Metolius promise: it fishes in June when the freestones are blown out and in August when they are too warm, and the number you see is close to the number you will see next month.

Camp Sherman is the base, a small resort community with a store and a fly shop, and the campgrounds along the river road fill up all summer. Sisters and Bend are the nearest towns of any size.

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Version 1.0, dated 6 September 2026. Applies to every photograph submitted to GuidedFloats through the contact form, a species page, or the community board.

1. What you give us

By ticking the box on the form you grant Guided Floats, LLC (“GuidedFloats”, “we”) a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to store, copy, resize, crop and display your photograph on guidedfloats.com, in GuidedFloats’ own social media accounts and mobile apps, and in material that promotes the site itself, in connection with the fish, water or community feature you sent it in for. The license lasts until you withdraw it (section 4).

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2. What you confirm

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4. Withdrawing the license

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5. What we may do

We choose which photos to publish and may decline any submission without giving a reason. We may crop, resize, sharpen or colour-correct a photo for display, and we may remove a photo at any time. We will not alter a photo in a way that misrepresents the fish, the water or you.

6. Your details

We keep your name, email address, the credit name, the water and date you gave us, and the network address the submission came from, with the submission record, as our evidence of this license. We hold that record for as long as the photo is published and for the retention period described in our privacy policy. Location data that your camera or phone embedded in the file is removed before the photo is published.

7. Versions

The version of this license you accepted is stored with your submission and printed with the photo. A later version does not apply to a photo you have already sent unless you agree to it.

Fished this water? Add a photo

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Posting to Metolius River.

JPG, PNG or WebP, up to 12 MB. We resize it and strip the location data out of the file.

The name shown under the photo. Leave blank to stay anonymous.

Reader photo license v1.0 — the short version:

  • You grant Guided Floats, LLC a non-exclusive, royalty-free license to publish, resize and crop your photo on guidedfloats.com and in GuidedFloats’ own social posts and apps. You keep the copyright and can use the photo anywhere else.
  • You confirm that you took the photo yourself, that publishing it does not infringe anyone else’s rights, and that anyone recognisable in it (or a parent or guardian, if they are under 18) is happy for it to appear here.
  • Credit is printed beside the photo wherever it appears on the site, using the credit name you give us. Leave it blank and we use your name; write “Anonymous” for no name. Your email address is never published.
  • Withdrawing is one email to hello@guidedfloats.com naming the photo. It comes off the site within 7 days.
Read the full license

Version 1.0, dated 6 September 2026. Applies to every photograph submitted to GuidedFloats through the contact form, a species page, or the community board.

1. What you give us

By ticking the box on the form you grant Guided Floats, LLC (“GuidedFloats”, “we”) a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to store, copy, resize, crop and display your photograph on guidedfloats.com, in GuidedFloats’ own social media accounts and mobile apps, and in material that promotes the site itself, in connection with the fish, water or community feature you sent it in for. The license lasts until you withdraw it (section 4).

You keep the copyright. The license is not exclusive, so you can use the photo anywhere else and license it to anyone else. We will not sell your photo, license it on to anyone else on its own, or use it in paid advertising for a third party.

2. What you confirm

You confirm that you took the photograph yourself (or otherwise own the rights to it), that you have the right to grant this license, and that publishing the photo does not infringe anyone else’s copyright, privacy or other rights.

If any person is recognisable in the photo, you confirm that they have agreed to its being published here, and that a parent or guardian has agreed on behalf of anyone under 18. Please do not send photographs of other people’s catches, screenshots, or pictures copied from other websites or social media.

3. Credit

We print the credit name you give us beside the photo wherever it appears on the site, and record it as the photo’s creator in the page’s structured data. If you leave the credit blank we use the name you gave us on the form. Write “Anonymous” if you prefer no name at all. Your email address, phone number and the exact spot the photo was taken are never published.

4. Withdrawing the license

You can withdraw the license at any time by emailing hello@guidedfloats.com, or by using the contact form, and telling us which photo you mean. We will remove the photo from guidedfloats.com within 7 days of receiving your message and stop using it in anything new. Copies that are already outside our control — search-engine caches, social posts that have already gone out, printed material already produced — may take longer to disappear or may not be recallable, and we are not responsible for those.

5. What we may do

We choose which photos to publish and may decline any submission without giving a reason. We may crop, resize, sharpen or colour-correct a photo for display, and we may remove a photo at any time. We will not alter a photo in a way that misrepresents the fish, the water or you.

6. Your details

We keep your name, email address, the credit name, the water and date you gave us, and the network address the submission came from, with the submission record, as our evidence of this license. We hold that record for as long as the photo is published and for the retention period described in our privacy policy. Location data that your camera or phone embedded in the file is removed before the photo is published.

7. Versions

The version of this license you accepted is stored with your submission and printed with the photo. A later version does not apply to a photo you have already sent unless you agree to it.

Flow alert

Tell me when the Metolius River cfs

Now: 1,200 cfs, read 2:00 am CDT, Mon Oct 19, 2026 (USGS 14091500, METOLIUS RIVER NEAR GRANDVIEW, OR).

We never use this address for anything else and never share it. See the privacy policy.

Access

Head of the Metolius: the spring itself, a short walk from the parking area.
Camp Sherman: village access, footbridge and the most-fished water on the river.
Allingham, Smiling River and Pioneer Ford Campgrounds: Forest Service camps with river frontage.
Gorge Campground: popular upper-river access below Camp Sherman.
Lower Bridge and Candle Creek: mid-river access down the west-side road.
Wizard Falls Fish Hatchery: parking, trail access and the start of long walk-in reaches.
Bridge 99 and the lower river: the roughest road and the fewest anglers.

Seasons

Open year-round with fly-only, wild-fish regulations; the river never blows out.
March through May: blue-winged olives and March browns, cool days, easy access.
June through September: green drakes, caddis and terrestrials; the coldest water in the region.
October through February: kokanee and bull trout activity, midge fishing, snow on the road but a fishable river.

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Questions

What is the current flow on the Metolius River?

As of Oct 19, 2:00 am, the USGS gauge METOLIUS RIVER NEAR GRANDVIEW, OR reads 1,200 cfs, the 15th percentile for this date, with water temperature 45.9 F. Conditions update every 15 minutes.

What species can you catch on the Metolius River?

Anglers target Brown Trout, Bull Trout, Kokanee Salmon, Mountain Whitefish, Rainbow Trout on the Metolius River in Oregon.

Are there fishing guides on the Metolius River?

GuidedFloats lists 1 guide and outfitters on the Metolius River. Claimed profiles accept booking requests; unclaimed profiles are built from public records and link to the business.

Where can you access the Metolius River?

Head of the Metolius: the spring itself, a short walk from the parking area. Camp Sherman: village access, footbridge and the most-fished water on the river. Allingham, Smiling River and Pioneer Ford Campgrounds: Forest Service camps with river frontage. Gorge Campground: popular upper-river access below Camp Sherman. Lower Bridge and Candle Creek: mid-river access down the west-side road. Wizard Falls Fish Hatchery: parking, trail access and the start of long walk-in reaches. Bridge 99 and the lower river: the roughest road and the fewest anglers.

When is the best time to fish the Metolius River?

Open year-round with fly-only, wild-fish regulations; the river never blows out. March through May: blue-winged olives and March browns, cool days, easy access. June through September: green drakes, caddis and terrestrials; the coldest water in the region. October through February: kokanee and bull trout activity, midge fishing, snow on the road but a fishable river.

Where are the fishing regulations for the Metolius River?

Regulations change by season and section. Read the current rules on the Oregon agency site: https://myodfw.com/fishing/regulations