Just curious how many others around the country and around the world depend on the streamflow websites to help with timing, to hit some of your favorite haunts at 'prime time'.

I know some of you can look out your window or check it out as you cross the bridge on the way home from the store (I used to be able to do that...). But for some of my favorite places to fish in my region, I now have to cross a pass or two, and sometimes dropping everything for a couple of days of of fantastic fishing in the middle of the week on short notice can make a huge difference in the course of a year. Especially since I am not retired yet, and time off is still coming at a premium.

Anyway, any others out there that pay special attention to the streamflow websites like https://waterdata.usgs.gov/ or others around the world, for timing some of your fishing?

I also know that guides can be invaluable...but I doubt that any guide in the world would have taken me where I was this past week, when the water levels were as perfect as they were....it was like writeups I've read of the South Ram in Alberta, but I was still south of the border.

I use https://www.dreamflows.com/ for a number of rivers in California. It is white water kayak/raft centric, but many whitewater rivers are also great fisheries.

My electronic journal includes a column for USGS flow rate, and I rely heavily on this information. In fact, I just visited the USGS site to check flow on a creek I was considering for this morning. From past experience, too low so I hope it gets a shot of rain soon.

after years of monitoring my local streams via USGS data,
I know the "fishable range" for each.

quite helpful.

I have made many last minute changes to fishing plans based on the USGS streamflow data.

Chris

I always check the USGS streamflow data before any day of fishing. The USGS data often determines which river I fish, as CFS and gage height are good predictors of how actively fish are feeding and when a river is blown out or too high for safe wading. The graphs are even more useful when water temperature and turbidity are included in the data.

I often go back and reference the dates in photos from past months or even years to compare current water levels to the water levels when I last fished the stream.

Brocton-The GRCA also has a website for water flow and temperatures and just about anything else you want for the Grand River watershed.I am glad you put that on for wateroffice because I had forgotten what it was .

Ditto! How did we live without this tool years ago. I remember several times traveling from N.J. all the way to the Poconos or the Catskills to find that there was a storm and the streams were up and coffee colored only to turn around and waste the day. This tool is awesome!
Here in Montana once I have fished a stream that was perfect I document the stream flow and use that number to dictate when to fish it or go to another place.

Another thing I have learned from the USGS site is how to extrapolate that data, geographic knowledge and rainfall reports to other streams or stream sections that don't have gauges.

For example; two of my favorite local streams are minutes apart but only one has a gauge. To the uninitiated, one would assume after a heavy rain both would be high, especially if the gauge on the stream that is monitored says it is. However, the headwaters and major tributaries of both streams originate in completely different geographic areas. So IF the stream with the gauge is high, but it didn't rain or rain as hard in the geography where the headwaters are for the stream without a gauge, it isn't necessarily high as well and vice versa.

I do this kind of checking all the time in many locations, even large river systems where there are main stem gauges and but no or limited branch or major tributary gauges. So if one fork is getting blasted with rain but the main stem isn't, I'll avoid the main stem 'cause I know it's a-comin'.

Bottom line, study your streams and know from "whence they come."