Someone who fishes these rivers built this
HereFishyFishy exists because I got tired of checking four websites before every trip — a gauge here, a weather forecast there, the regulations PDF somewhere else — and still driving to water that turned out to be blown out, too warm, or closed. It now covers eleven Ontario rivers, reach by reach.
What this actually is
Every river page here pulls live flow from the Water Survey of Canada gauge that actually covers that reach, current weather from Open‑Meteo, and cross-references both against run timing and the Ontario regulations. It tells you whether to go, where on the river to start, and what to bring — and, increasingly, whether the stretch you had in mind is even open today.
That last part turned out to matter more than I expected. Ontario closes trout and salmon on most water on September 30, but named lower reaches stay open — some to December 31, some all year — and the boundaries are described in the regulations by bridge and railway line rather than by anything you can see from the bank. Several fish sanctuaries sit in the middle of the best water at exactly the wrong time of year — the Ganaraska closes its town reach for six weeks of the run, and the Credit shuts a long stretch from mid-August to the end of December. Getting that wrong is worse than a wasted drive.
How I think about it
- Wrong is worse than missing. If I am not confident about a regulation or an access point, it does not go on the site. Every page says where its facts came from, and says plainly when something needs checking on the day — see the closure notes on Bowmanville for what that looks like in practice.
- Live data over general advice. “Fish after rain” is true everywhere and useful nowhere. Whether the Ganaraska is at 2.4 or 11 m³/s this morning is the thing that changes your plan — and how long it takes to drop differs river to river.
- Written from the water. The river pages are things I have learned fishing these rivers, not rewrites of other people’s pages — the euro nymphing session that took three fly changes, or what a October morning at Port Hope is really like. Where I have not fished something, I say so.
- Free, no account, no ads. It costs me very little to run and I would rather it just be useful.
Who I am
I go by TJ. I fish Southern Ontario — mostly the Credit, which is where I caught my first steelhead years ago and still the river I fish most, plus the eastern creeks — the Ganaraska and Bowmanville — when the salmon are in, and the Grand and Saugeen when they are not. Float rod, spinning rod and fly rod, depending on the water and the season. I am not a guide and I do not sell anything.
I also film some of it. The channel covers the same rivers this site does — euro nymphing the Upper Credit, steelhead in spring, the salmon run in autumn — and is generally where the techniques on these pages come from. Several videos are embedded on the Credit River page.
Fishing with TJ on YouTube →
Where the data comes from
Flow: Water Survey of Canada real-time hydrometric gauges, matched to the reach rather than the river — the lower Credit reads at Streetsville, not Cataract, and getting that wrong puts you 40 km off.
Weather and water temperature: Open‑Meteo. Water temperature is estimated from air temperature where no probe exists, and the site says so rather than pretending otherwise.
Regulations: the Ontario Fishing Regulations Summary, current edition. Seasons, sanctuaries and gear restrictions are encoded per reach, not per river.
All of it can be wrong or out of date. Confirm the regulations for the exact stretch you plan to fish before you fish it — the official summary is the authority, not me.
Getting in touch
If something here is wrong — a boundary in the wrong place, an access point that no longer exists, a closure I have missed — I would genuinely like to know. The YouTube channel is the easiest place to reach me.
Start here
Check conditions for today and the app will pick a river, a reach and an access point for you. If you would rather browse, there is every river we cover and the full set of guides.
If the salmon are in, start with the river-by-river run timing guide, then the river you are thinking of: the Ganaraska, Bowmanville Creek, or the Credit. For the drift itself, the three float fishing tips that matter most in crowded water. And once the salmon are done, where steelhead hold in a river carries you through to spring.