Native Trout and Salmon of North America- South Central Rocky Mountains

Acristickid

Acristickid

Well-known member
Joined
Apr 25, 2007
Messages
5,359
Location
NV, AK
Maybe your journey is flyfishing when you can get out and escaping into the outdoors, even getting away for an afternoon fishing- maybe it’s been this for 25 or 50 years.

Or is it that you are out with fly fishing buddies and spending time with them or is it particular fish that you may be after.

Maybe your journey has changed with a spouse , son or daughter and now that you get to fish with.

I’d say my journey has changed in the last 25 years a few times.

The first part of my journey was just getting out, learning and getting better and catching fish for the first five or 10 years. Probably a familiar journey for many fly anglers.

At some point , like many fly anglers from PA and more common today with the advent of social media, anglers are drawn to destination fly angling.

I dabbled in fly fishing while on vacations out west a bit but the first real taste came on a fly fishing trip based out of West Yellowstone. Fishing in the park was great as was fishing the Madison. It was on this trip where I caught my first cutthroat, a Yellowstone cutthroat in the Lamar river.

At that time , I didn’t realize the seed was being planted with cutthroat and native trout. That trip was about 20 years ago now and boy does life and time fly by.

My journey has evolved since 2011 when a buddy and I went on a week long trip in pursuit of the Wyoming Cutthroat Slam. The WY cutthroat slam is catching 4 native cutthroat in Wyoming with no time limit. As mentioned we had already caught a Yellowstone cutthroat in a previous trip so we were looking to catch a Bonneville, Colorado and a Snake River fine spotted cutthroat. Well in a weeks time we were able to knock them all out, they were all in a relatively close proximity to each other. Anyhow , my fishing partner was down to the wire the last afternoon of the trip and he was blanking on the fine spotted when I had already landed a half a dozen or more but he did seal the deal when we went home happy and a month or so after we got home our Wyoming cut slam certificates had arrived.

I don’t fish for a piece of paper but it is good reminder/symbol of an excellent trip, one of the finest trips that I’ve ever been on and I’ve been a lot of places on a lot of trips.

Getting back to the journey aspect, that really sets the stage for the trajectory of my journey which seems to be almost a lifelong journey at this point which is to catch all of the native trout and salmon in the United States.

Dogged persistence, many miles and dollars spent I can see I’m coming down to the wire on the fish. My only fear is my health fails before I’m able to complete whether it takes another year or 10 years.

I write this this morning as I am awaiting return calls from biologists in New Mexico to finalize my plans to catch the newest confirmed strain of cutthroat which is a Rio Grande Cutthroat- Pecos strain. Which has been verified as a separate sub species, it also has the largest spots of any cutthroat which can be found in New Mexico in its name sake waters.

This fish would be the last of the cutthroats that I would need to catch in order to of caught them all. However, in the same trip I plan to drive to Utah to catch a Bonneville Cutthroat subspecies-Bear River Cutthroat. Even though the science I follow has not specifically made this a separate sub species I’m willing to check it off and leave no doubt.

This NM trip will also give also give a chance to catch a Gila trout pronounced Gee la. Among one of the rarest trout.

Some of the reflections I have on my journeys of tens of thousands of miles across the country, don’t know how many states, in which was in many areas I didn’t know I was on this journey and could’ve driven an hour and check some of these fish off then I’m now having to cross country again go way out of the way for one or two fish that’s not close to anything else.

Everyone’s journey is different based on their own life, goals and expectations. This is my journey and it’s something that I think about each and every day in passing at least once and probably several times a day.

I will raise my arms and Exalt when and this Cutthroat journey is concluded.

It helps when you don’t get married till your 49 and was able to take several month long fishing and camping adventures.

I only know of a handful of people that have caught all the cutthroat trout in the United States. I’ve also had the pleasure of catching all of the red band species in the Pacific Northwest- with even fewer people catching those. I am a pink salmon away from catching all 5 of the pacific salmon.

One of the hardest aspects of all of the native trout fishing is to try to catch all the native trout of California. California has 11 native trout and salmon I am down to the final three in California, an Eagle Lake rainbow out of its name sake lake, the little Kern and Kern River rainbows which require some effort in the back country to get to which has been closed this year due to fires.

I wrote this before I went on my trip last week- I have Exulted!!!!!!

Caught the Pecos strain of the Rio Grande Cutthroat!!! For good measure I caught the Bear River strain of the Bonneville cutthroat trout. Also was also able to catch- a Colorado River, Bonneville, Yellowstone and Bear River Cutthroat, the four native cutthroat to Utah for their cutthroat slam!!!! Caught all 13 subspecies of cutthroat was an epic journey. Not to mention one of the worlds most rare trout the Gila. It was beautiful weather all week. 45-75 and blue skies all week.



These are the remaining fish that I need to catch before I die:

Atlantic Salmon-maritimes or Iceland

Pink Salmon- Pacific Northwest

Little Kern Rainbow and
Kern River Rainbow - California

Lake Trout -many northern lakes

Eagle Lake Rainbow- CA

Sunapee char- Maine

Champagne will pop if I get so lucky on the remaining list.

https://imgur.com/a/L1OOhfg

https://i.imgur.com/RRABUrA.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/JyweiZG.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/zpKt7VD.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/x4UHweR.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/ElzOArw.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/yRRQfQu.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/aNZ12M9.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/ylVMkqY.jpg






 
PA anglers only have 2 native salmonids (NJ has only 2 native freshwater gamefish period) so the west is a haven for trout species. Therefore, I like to try for different species when I am out West, but I don't take special trips. My son lived in NV and they have 6 native salmonids - led by the huge Lahontan cutthroat. The first one I caught was 24" long so I took a picture - that's a huge trout for me. Locals laughed and told me to throw that "shaker" back in. One needs to get a 12 to 15 lbs fish to get much attention. Unfortunately one has to travel great distances to find some of them. There is one rare one, the Paiute trout, in the nearby CA Sierras that you can't even fish for.

The New England char go back and forth. Originally the Sunapee Golden trout and the blueback trout were different and now they are the same.

When I first went to CO I tried to ask fly shops where I could catch the different cutthroat species. I didn't want to catch the same trout I do out East. However, had a hard time finding people who cared for the native fish. Most people said why not just go after the giant tailwater rainbows. That's OK for a day or two, but want something different. BTW, brookies are an invasive species in CO and you can kill 10 a day. My fishing buddy out there is a displaced PA guy and he loves that he can have brookies for breakfast or dinner any time he wants. I find a lot more people interested in natives in PA.
 
Jeff- nice.

One thing, you can fish for a Piaute cutthroat in a few refuge streams. I took a horse 14 miles one way into the wilderness to catch them
Earlier this year. The CA biologist helped me and my plan to catch them.
 
Nevada is an interesting place to fish. Did you fish off a ladder Jeff?

Like you said lotsa different natives.

Didn’t fish there but there is a town way back in northern central NV where the last stagecoache robbery occurred that has a redband and bull trout.

Fished for a Humboldt cutthroat in the Nat Forest off RT 225. These fish take you too very far off corners of the country.
 
wildtrout2 wrote:
JeffK wrote:
PA anglers only have 2 native salmonids...
Click to expand...
I'm only aware of one native trout found Pa, the eastern brook trout. What is the other one?
Click to expand...

Lake trout
 
If you want to put the fly-caught Lake Trout notch on your rod handle without all the expense and fuss of being dropped by parachute into some remote lake in northern Ontario or Manitoba, Algonquin Prov. Park about 4 hours north of Toronto is a pretty good bet and not all that far away. You have to paddle/portage in, but there are a lot of lakes with good pops of Lakers. I got quite a few up to 5-6 lb. on flies up there back when I still wasn't completely sure which end of the rod was which. They're pretty easy once you find them. You just have to be there when they are still shallow the first few weeks after ice out. Mid May to June 1 is about right...
 
I picked up the two PA natives years ago with the Lake Trout falling to a streamer, fishing Mouth of 20 Mile. I think it was 25 or 26" Long But it as years ago I think it was the 2 or 3 year I was fly fishing for lake runners. Back then Salman, Brown, Lake run Rainbows could be caught.
The lakes in northern Ontario are an excellent place to fish and canoe camp but bring bug spray..
 
I never used a ladder on Pyramid lake. It is sort of like surf fishing; when they come in they can be right at the beach, but when they are out they are usually farther than I can cast a flyrod. I never fished in the middle of winter where ladders/milkcrates are used to get one out of the water to stay warm. Near the spawning areas in the spring they cruise shallow and can be spotted better from on high, but that is a zoo and I avoid it. Some guys go lazy just sitting on a ladder and doing drift after drift of a nymph under an indicator. Mostly I would chuck streamers near drop offs or points. NV has gotten very careful about stocking non-native fish. For example, no one can stock sunnies in a farm pond. That was tough because when the grandkids were small it was tough to find easy fishing.

Fishing NV is interesting since there isn't much of a trout fishing culture. Many of those desert streams flow down from the mountains in vanish into the desert. There is some section of most streams between the alpine zone and the desert floor where the temps are perfect and the trout grow large considering the size of the stream. However, fishing can be tough because the water can cause a jungle of shrubs for a small distance around the streams. Many of the streams in the west of the state start in the CA Sierra and flow into NV. In CA there are all sorts of trout fishermen in the latest garb. The instant the stream crosses into NV the fishermen spread out and they are more of the old school cowboy hat, flannel shirt, jeans and hip waders fishermen.
 
Nevada does offer good trout angling in several pockets around the state. I fished for the Columbia River redband on an Indian reservation in northern NV- one of the few strains that isn’t cutoff to a larger body of water like most of the redbands. In Oregon (same with a couple in extreme northern CA) where most of where the redbands are located are in generally small headwater streams that in most years are not running enough water to connect to larger bodies of water. Especially this last decade.

Anyway here are a list of the redbands -

Columbia Basin redband
Fort rock Basin redband
Harney-Malheur Basin redband
Catlow Basin redband
Warner Lakes redband
Goose lake redband
Chewaucan Basin redband
Upper Kalamath lakes Basin redband
Sacramento River redband
McCloud River Redband trout

I also think California is an amazing place to fish, such diversity although it’s under assault currently with drought and fires. I tried to go for the two Kern River and Little Kern this summer but the National Forest where I need to go was closed. I make that states fish a priority since I think some of these fish might be off limits soon.

Several years ago I was fishing for an Apache trout which was very close to the Gila trouts native waters but that fish was off limits then. Since then AZ and NM have collected many natives in peril and remediated several streams to restore the native fish and a few are now open to angling. This also is a good sign- CA has created several refuge waters for the Piaute Cutthroat that are located outside their native range in otherwise previously fish less waters in an effort to save them since their native range is only one medium sized drainage. Another fish , 10 years ago you could not fish for and I had to go back.

Also, another good sign is US fish and wildlife along with NM fish and game have identified a relatively new Cutthroat strain - the Pecos strain of the Rio Grande and had to go back for that one too. I guess it’s a good sign since there are 1 fairly large drainage and it’s open to angling. But as mentioned most if not all these fish are in extreme headwater areas that require wilderness travel to reach.

Before anyone else discovers any other new fish I can hopefully says I’ve caught them all before that happens. Hah.

Here is a list of all the Cutthroat-

Coastal Cutthroat
Westslope Cutthroat
Yellowstone Cutthroat
Snake River finespotted Cutthroat
Bonneville Basin Cutthroat
Colorado River Cutthroat
Greenback Cutthroat
Rio Grande Cutthroat
Pecos Rio Grande Cutthroat
Lahontan Cutthroat
Paiute Cutthroat
Willow-Whitehorse Basin Cutthroat
Humboldt Cutthroat

Bear River strain of Bonneville Cutthroat- this is recognized by the state of Utah as a subspecies but not Dr Behnke , but I caught one anyway

*Yellowfin Cutthroat - extinct
*Alford Basin- extinct ( I did try my hand at the stream but no luck)

I follow Dr Robert J Behnke’s ( preeminent native trout biologist - deceased) list of natives. But also the books by Patrick Trottier, Robert Smith, Micheal Graybrook and RM Montgomery.

Some of these streams were absolutely amazing- so that they actually held natives and were 2-3 feet wide and sometimes ran through deserts. Most were at the end of a dozen miles of dirt road to the end of the line and then a hike into the wilderness. It been great experience to see such amazing and diverse places as well as a physical and mental challenge.

Thanks to you guys with the lake trout suggestions- I take advice especially from those who have gone there and caught these fish. I will ask you again as that time draws near for further details. Moon also has good suggestions- he knows the northeast well.

Even after 20 years of essentially chasing natives I’m still highly motivated and interested.
 
The Finger Lakes are the closest primary lake trout waters, but they can be tough for the fly fisher since they are so deep. One opportunity is in late spring when the alewives are inshore to spawn. The lakers will come in 40 to 50 ft deep to grab them, but that is an extreme depth for me. The other opportunity is about now in Skaneatles Lake. Skaneatles is so oligotrophic, and has no alewives, that it is the only Finger Lake where the lakers feed during the spawn. They run about 18" long and look like big skinny brookies (in the alewife forage lakes they get to about 8 to 10 lbs). However, they feed off points and reefs 20' to 30' down and you can take them on buggers/streamers. Plus, the jumbo 15" plus yellow perch will be feeding in the same areas so a perch fry may be in order. The lakers are stunted so there aren't any qualms about saving one or two for dinner.
 
JeffK wrote:
(NJ has only 2 native freshwater gamefish period)
Not sure how you figured this. I guess you don't consider the majority of their fish gamefish, but I do. I'm curious, what are the two that you do consider? Pickerel and Brook Trout? What about redbreast, and the catfish that are native, and shad, and yellow perch?
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Click to expand...
 
The easiest place in the world for lake trout on a fly is the niagara river. It's debatable whether they are native because they are thought to have been extripated from Lake Ontario. There is no doubt in my mind there is natural reproduction of Lake trout in Lake Ontario and the Niagara River.

Average size is 12-14#.
 
Sunfish, catfish, yellow perch, etc. aren't traditional freshwater gamefish.

Traditional northeast freshwater game fish would be bass, trout, pike (northern and muskie usually), and walleye.

I'd say the 2 native gamefish to NJ are brook trout and stripers.

I agree that today gamefish can mean anything. And calling anything a trash fish is a faux pas.
 
moon1284 wrote:
Sunfish, catfish, yellow perch, etc. aren't traditional freshwater gamefish.

Traditional northeast freshwater game fish would be bass, trout, pike (northern and muskie usually), and walleye.

I'd say the 2 native gamefish to NJ are brook trout and stripers.

I agree that today gamefish can mean anything. And calling anything a trash fish is a faux pas.
Click to expand...

I don't know where you got this information but I can't imagine a time when any of the basic panfish weren't considered gamefish. All those old timers slinging worms on cane poles for sunfish we're after "rough fish" and not "gamefish." Weird.
 
Don't forget about chain pickerel. I had a blast fishing for them when I lived in NJ.

 
The calls on gamefish are tough. Stripers and shad are considered saltwater fish, but the are caught in freshwater. The yellow perch call is tough in one way. When I was a kid NJ had only one world record freshwater fish for a 4 lbs+ perch caught in 1864. That was removed and put into the historic record category which bummed me out. That record seemed reasonable since a friend and I caught 3 to 3 1/2 lbs yellow perch at a secret spot in the same watershed, so the 4 lbs perch didn't seem out of reach.

Redbreast sunfish are our largest sunnie and I think they are heads and shoulders above the introduced rock bass and bluegills.

That said, rainbow, brown and lake trout, smallmouth and largemouth bass, northern pike and muskies, walleyes, rock bass bluegills, crappies, and channel cats are all introduced so nearly all my NJ fishing is not for native species.

Also, native salmonids get plenty of attention, but warmwater fishes occasionally get some love. When I was at NC State there was a small group of people interested in the native varieties of smallmouth in North Carolina and one of the biologists in NJ is interested in rare sunfish in south Jersey.
 
Yeah, NJ has more than 2 gamefish that are native. White catfish, Yellow Perch, Brook Trout, redbreast sunfish, chain picks......those are all native to NJ and all gamefish in my book.
 
What exactly constitutes a game fish? I thought just the pursuit of a certain type of fish made it a game fish, no?
 
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