The Main River is Newfoundland's prestige salmon river with a well-managed scheduled-season structure and wilderness character. Excellent Atlantic salmon runs (June–September), plus significant resident and sea-run brook trout populations. Granite-based upland geology shapes this river. Atlantic salmon are managed under DFO conservation rules — mandatory catch-and-release of large (multi-sea-winter) salmon applies in most areas, with any grilse retention strictly limited by zone; check current regulations before fishing.
The Main River was the first water in Newfoundland to be named a Canadian Heritage River, and it earns the title — fifty-seven kilometres falling seven hundred metres out of the Long Range Mountains of the Great Northern Peninsula to White Bay at Sop's Arm. From four headwater ponds it threads softwood forest, floodplain meadow and arctic-like barrens, gathering in the calm reach of the Big Steady before it plunges through steep valleys to the sea. It carries one of the healthiest salmon stocks on the island. The character is genuine wilderness freestone: cold, clean water over hard glaciated rock on a steep, stepped gradient, with the best holding water in the Big Steady and the lower reaches. Wading is bold-water work on uneven rock, and the steeper whitewater reaches are no place to be casual.
Wading: Steep whitewater reaches between the steadies
- Granite
- Partly confined
- Step pool
- Pool riffle
