The Field Journal
Rivers & Lakes · Unsurveyed Tributary

Laundry Creek

A small, steep tributary feeding Brewer Creek in the upper Columbia Valley's Dutch Creek family. No fish-inventory records exist for Laundry Creek itself, so it reads as habitat and scouting water rather than a confirmed fishery, worth a field check before you plan a day around it.

Laundry Creek is a small tributary feeding Brewer Creek in the upper Columbia Valley, part of the same coldwater network that Thorald Creek joins before the water reaches Dutch Creek and the Columbia River. No fish-inventory records exist for Laundry Creek itself, so treat it as habitat and scouting water tied to the Brewer Creek drainage rather than a confirmed fishery.

The water

The creek's mouth sits at 50.36158, -116.18022. It runs stream order 4 (mid-range on a scale that runs from 1 for a headwater trickle up to 6 or more for a full river) across a 26-segment channel network, feeding into Brewer Creek before that water reaches Dutch Creek and the Columbia. Brewer Creek itself carries a short but real record, four bull trout, two Dolly Varden and one westslope cutthroat trout, and that is the best available signal for what Laundry Creek might hold, not a confirmed count of its own.

The fishing

With no direct fish records, there is nothing here to book a day around. If you scout it, the honest expectation is small, cold, steep-gradient water that could hold the same bull trout, Dolly Varden and westslope cutthroat family found immediately downstream on Brewer Creek, but that is an inference from the neighboring water, not a confirmed record for Laundry Creek itself.

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Brewer Creek tributary
Feeds the Columbia River
straighten
Stream order 4
26-segment network
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No records of its own
Inferred from the Brewer Creek family
footprint
Narrow, steep
Gradient ~10%, technical wade

Should coldwater fish turn up, a small-stream box covers the likely food base: caddis, mayflies, stoneflies and summer terrestrials. Start with a small Adams or Royal Wulff, move to an Elk Hair Caddis or Stimulator, and fish a Hare's Ear or Pheasant Tail underneath.

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Don't overstate it

Laundry Creek has no confirmed fish records, so keep this page's read separate from an actual fishing recommendation: habitat and drainage structure are documented, catch data is not. A field check would settle whether it holds resident fish or is mostly steep, seasonal tributary water.

Conditions

  • Navigability: the channel-geometry numbers (median width ~3.9 m, narrow; gradient ~10.1%, steep; peak mean-annual discharge ~0.207 m³/s, very low flow) describe small, technical headwater water, consistent with a minor tributary rather than anything driftable.
  • Stocking: no stocking record. Laundry Creek runs entirely on whatever wild fish, if any, it holds.

Access and the rules

No confirmed trailhead, parking area or road-legal access point has turned up for Laundry Creek. Treat it as scout water within the Dutch Creek drainage: check current Forest Service Road status and land tenure on the ground, and expect a walk-in approach typical of small upper Columbia Valley tributaries.

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Before you fish

No individual exception for Laundry Creek appears in the Region 4 tributary review, so regional defaults apply: streams closed Apr 1 to Jun 14, trout and char catch-and-release Nov 1 to Mar 31, and single barbless hook required year-round. Confirm the current Region 4 synopsis before you go.