Last year when we set out on an annual trip to fish Idaho’s St. Joe, the weather was typical for early July: sunny, and hot. There was a chance of thunderstorms one day, but nothing that even the rangers stationed at Red Ives seemed too concerned about when they stopped by our campsite. They only mentioned it as a “chance”. They were far more concerned about wildfires and issued a friendly warning to watch our campfire closely.

Well, we all now how THAT turned out. If you don’t know how that turned out, and you would like to find out, you might consider reading “Dust to mud: a fishing trip’s early demise“).

As I prepare to depart for the Joe this year, it looks nothing like last, when it had been hot and dry for quite some time prior to our arrival. Then it very surprisingly turned very wet. What was listed as a “chance” of thunderstorms turned out to be a violent storm that dropped more than 4 inches of rain, and much of that within an hour. Very, very, very wet.

This year it’s not going to be hot when we arrive, nor has it been particularly hot or dry up to this point. As a matter of fact, there has been a fair amount of rain in Idaho’s panhandle recently. This year it’s going to be wet; the powers-that-predict are pretty much offering a guarantee on that.

 

Idaho-weatherforecast

But I’m a glass half full kinda guy. I hate fishing in the rain. Particularly in the summer when it should be warm and sunny. I’ll admit that the cool, damp weather will be good for keeping fire danger low (or non-existent). And the cloud cover should bode well for fishing, with one fairly important caveat: thunderstorms, predicted with 100% certainty for Saturday, may not bode well for standing in a river waving a graphite stick, or standing huddled under tall trees.

But could the meteorologists be wrong? Might we actually not have rain and thunderstorms? Could the temps be comfortably in the upper 70’s instead of the mid to lower 60’s (and even cooler)? There’s always a chance that the weather predictors could be wrong.

After all, they were wrong last year.