USA Troutfishing Utah

Utah provided some good fishing - and that was without fishing the famous Green River in the Flaming Gorge region. The Green River is mainly fished by floating down it.


It can get quite crowded!













I had originally heard about the river when we had been skiing in Utah some years before. We had met up with the Head Instructor of Snowbird and he happened to be a troutfishing guide on the Green River in summer - what a job! He had told me that on a floatfishing trip down the Green River, you could expect to pick up 20-30 trout averaging 3 lbs in a day's fishing.

I had been given a few spots by some USA fishing buddies where you could access the river and fish it by wading.















There seemed to be some good fishing to be had on foot. Unfortunately I had a presentation to make in Park City so that meant there was no time to see the Eastern part of the State. So I wangled a day's fishing on the nearby Provo River while Sue took in the myriad art galleries of Park City.
The Provo River was pretty easy to find - you just had to look over the edge of the highway bridge that crossed it several times.

































I pulled off the highway and drove down to the river, following signs for a Public Access point. There was a small office in the car park with a sign giving information on the stream restoration project that had been going on for some years. I remember this was a State government project but can't recall now if Trout Unlimited were involved. I suspect they were.
I walked down the track to the river and found myself looking at some beautiful water. In these upper reaches, it was just a stream really, about the same size as say the upper Esk River in Hawkes Bay or the upper Owen River in Murchison.
There was a sequence of classic pools seperated by rapids and the stream looked very 'trouty'.







This photo was obviously taken in winter
but gives you an idea of the type of water














I tackled up and fished my way upstream with a combo rig. The fish seemed to prefer the nymph so I took off the hopper and fished with a double nymph rig. I landed a dozen or so fish from memory - not large, but a good size for the water. The best of them went around 4 lbs.
After a couple of hours, I caught up to an angler fishing above me. He was fishing very slowly, but probaby much more effectively than me. I did not want to jump ahead of him so I retreated downstream and fished below the carpark area. The river was a bit bigger here but the fishing was not quite as good. I fished it thoroughly but only another couple of fish were taken. It was very pleasant fishing with the 5 weight on a lovely summers day. I had expected to see some fish rising but maybe they left that till nearer dusk.
I did not see another angler for the rest of the day and returned to the car well satisfied by a great day's fishing.


One river I did not fish was the Virgin River that flows through Zion National Park.
























We had walked alongside the river during our trek through the park. There did not seem any sign of fish and we were told by the ranger that the river flooded quite often. However another ranger back at the exit told us there were indeed fish in the river but downstream of the canyon. He did not know if they were trout but said he had seen reasonable size fish being caught by the locals. When we left the next day, I kept stealing glances at the river from the road that followed it for miles - it did look 'trouty'. Oh well, maybe next time ..............