USA Troutfishing Wyoming

USA Troutfishing - Wyoming

This is the Cascade Stream that flows into Lake Jenny in the Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.







We hiked around the lake for an hour to reach this stream. I looked pretty silly carrying my troutfishing rod and wearing my fishing bum bag among a horde of poseur Yanks in their designer jeans and famous brand sneakers. I managed to ignore the stares and astonished expressions and we marched on.
Reaching the stream, I spied a lovely pool at the base of a big waterfall that obviously prevented any fish access further upstream. 'Got to be a few in there' I thought.
I scrambled down the bank, climbed over the log in the photo and commenced fishing. First cast saw several small brook trout fight over the right to engulf my fly. One six inch brookie won the battle and soon was dragged to the shore. That was my first brook trout - what a beautiful fish they are.


I can't think of any freshwater fish that comes close to matching the colours of a freshly-caught brook trout.



It was pretty obvious that these trout had not seen a trout fly for many moons. I had already discovered that USA flyfishers were not that keen on walking far for their fishing and so it was no surprise that this small creek was not much fished.
I chucked in my nymph back into the small plunge pool.
Several small brookies headed for the fly. But they were elbowed aside by something a lot more substantial. A large fish snatched the fly and my rod tip was arrested in its upward movement. Normally in USA, such a strong strike would have seen an innocent six inch long trout propelled over my shoulder into the woods behind. Not this time. There was a solid feel to the fish that was confirmed by a disconcerting bend in the rod. My audience of around 20 poseurs seemed suitably impressed. I was too busy trying to contain a rather large trout in a rather small pool to worry aboutn putting on a show for them.
The trout seemed intent on regaining the safety of the lake only 100 metres downstream. Several adventures and 15 minutes later I landed a 24 inch beautiful cutthroat trout - my first ever. I would have been proud to catch such a fish from any similar-sized NZ stream. This was a 'trophy trout' by USA standards and I could not believe just how easy it had been to catch such a prized trout.



Cutthroat trout - so named because of the red slash under the jaw.



Further north, another lovely cutthtroat was landed in the gorge section of the Lamar River in Yellowstone National Park. I had not intended to fish the Lamar, having had my US friends steer me towards Slough Creek, just up the road. They told me of excellent fishing to be had in this small stream. But when we got to the carpark, there was a sign warning us a rather unhappy grizzly bear roaming around the area. The 1500 lb female bear had surprised four camping anglers by jumping on their tent - while they were inside! None had been hurt but another tramper had been mauled by the bear the next day. We decided that the bear could have Slough Creek to itself - I would fish elsewhere.
We had passed over a nice-looking river just down the road so I decided to head for there and just fish up from the main road bridge.












A few hundred yards up the river, I came into a rugged gorge.



It was like a mini Ruakituri River gorge with big boulders and deep pools.










Like the Ruakituri, it was necessary to bushbash and clamber over the odd bluff. This meant there was a distinct absence of anglers as you have to be a bit crazy to go to these lengths to get a trout.
But it was worth the effort as ten trout were taken in 3 hours fishing, the best being a six lb cutthroat - a good fish even by NZ standards. And I never saw another angler. It was a bit of a scramble to get up the cliff to get out of the gorge but once up on top, I could cross the fields and walk back to the van on the road.
The fishing was a bit mixed in the rest of Yellowstone. The problem was that it had been a very hot summer and water temperatures were very high - so high that the Madison and Firehole Rivers were closed for fishing. They did open the day we left Yellowstone so at least I got the chance to flick a fly in these world-famous rivers. but the trout were all small and not in good condition.
I was able to fish the Gibbon river and again the trout were mainly small - except for a four pound fish that shot out of the cover of the bank, slashed at my hopper imitation and just as rapidly disappeared under the bank again.




Gibbon River where it wanders through the meadows










Gibbon River Falls









The best fishing I had in USA was on private water. There is a lot of that type of prime troutfishing water that is not allowed to be fished by the general public. The reason is that in states like Montana and Utah, the landowner also owns the bed of the river. So you cannot set foot on the bed of the river. If the river is large enough you can fish it from a boat but you cannot stop to get off to fish on foot.
This was the case with the section of the Powder River in Wyoming. Fortunately, the son of the owner belonged to the local fishing club and his fishing mentor was my host in Casper - Ron Dutton. So Ron arranged for us to fish for half a day on the Hole in the Wall Ranch that contained a pristine section of the Powder River.
Ron first put me into a spring creek tributary of the Powder and the spooky trout in there proved a bit much for my modest angling talents. Just the wave of the rod was sufficient for them to depart into the weed beds. I did manage to hook one nice fish that looked about 3 lbs but it soon broke me off in the weed.















Ron took pity on me and we set off down to the Powder River. This is a small stream, very similar to a New Zealand stream with rapids at the head of small pools that were only a metre or so deep at best.



Fishing the Powder River watched by the son of the owner of the
Hole in the Wall Ranch.









The fishing was pretty easy and every pool or run held several fish, both brown and rainbow. I started fishing a combo rig with a terrestrial dry fly and a small beadhead Hare & Copper nymph. Most of the fish took the numph so after a few pools, I discarded the dry fly and just nymph fished exactly as you would up a typical NZ creek.
The fish ranged from small nine inchers up to a few that were twice that size - not a bad size for such a small stream. We worked our way leisurely up the river, taking fish after fish. Ron stuck with a big hopper pattern but was plagued by small fish that seized the big hopper ith relish. Some of them were not much bigger than the hopper imitation! The bigger fish seemed to be hugging the bottom and the weighted fly was producing better results.







Typical Powder River pool







After a few hours, we came to a much larger pool where the river entered a canyon. Ron explained this was the start of the public water. If you were prepared to walk down a track down the steep canyon walls, you could fish this section. Problem was it took 2 hours to climb back up so not too many bothered.
The pool was said to be the place where Butch Cassidy's Gang tethered the horses to make their way up the canyon to their hideout - The Hole in the Wall.

There was a deeper gut against the canyon wall so I put on a heavier nymph and chucked it in at the head of the pool. First drift saw a large fish intercept the nymph. It headed downstream and it was obvious that this fish was a lot bigger than what we had encountered to date.





Fish on in the Horse Pool
on the Powder River








Fifteen minutes later, a big 5 lb rainbow lay flapping in the shallows. A quick twist of the forceps and he was back in the depths of the pool. We decided that was enough for the day - we would not be likely to top that fish. I had caught around 30 trout in four hours fishing - incredible! I had never thought USA could produce that quality of fishing. Thanks to Ron and his connections, I had experienced superb fishing, the equal of anything in dear old New Zealand.