Road Trip, Part 3

Last Pictures

Our competition on the Madison River:

The view of Henry's Lake from the cabin:

Lamar River Valley

Yellowstone National Park

Lamar River cutthroat

Lamar River

Lamar Valley

Slough Creek cutthroat trout

Slough Creek cutthroat trout

Slough Creek cutthroat trout

Slough Creek cutthroat trout

Lamar River cutthroat

Bufflehead family on Slough Creek

More Slough Creek

Slough Creek

Slough Creek is probably my favorite place to fish.  It's sight-fishing with dry flies for native cutthroats.  How can you beat that?  Oh, and some of them are rather large.

We didn't run into an epic grasshopper day like last time, but we did catch quite a few nice fish.  The camerawoman even got into the action.  After some frustrating misses and small fish, she finally caught a really nice fish.  And then another.  I think the pictures tell the whole story.

Yellowstone River

The Yellowstone River inside the park has a certain allure to it.  Historically, it was one of THE places to fish.  Unfortunately, due to a Lake Trout invasion (for more info and to donate to the cause, click here) and whirling disease the run of fish from Yellowstone Lake is not what it used to be.  However, there are still a few large trout that run up the river to spawn and hang around to feed before moving back into the lake.  These fish are survivors who have overcome long odds and the harsh realities of nature (as well as the man-made curve balls).

Thanks to Britt's spotting and ML's spot picking, I got an opportunity to cast to one of these trout.  At first she was cruising around and ignoring any offerings.  (Prompting someone, who will remain anonymous, to refer to the fish as a "jerk.")  As the daylight faded, this fish took up a feeding position at the edge of the current. I placed a cast to drift my fly at the edge of the current and it was fish on.  A few minutes later and the largest cutthroat of my life was in the net.  What a beautiful fish.  Clearly an old hand who had seen many tough Yellowstone winters.  (After seeing how pretty the fish was, she was no longer considered a jerk.)  As I let her go, I hoped she will be back a few more years.  Hopefully, several of her offspring will return in the future.  Maybe then there will be more cutthroat in the lake and river.

Saving the Yellowstone Cutthroat in Yellowstone Lake

There was a new article on this yesterday. It's actually pretty encouraging compared with what we had been hearing (that's not saying much).

http://www.eastyellowstonetu.org/files/billingsgazette_2-23-2012.pdf

To donate to the cause, I found these addresses from this site:
http://www.eastyellowstonetu.org/images/savetheyellowstonecutthroat.html

Tax deductible donations are being accepted at:

Save the Yellowstone Cutthroat, P.O. Box 3008, Cody, WY 82414
Wyoming Council of TU, YL Project, 250 N. 1st St., Lander, WY 82520

New York Times Article on Saving Yellowstone Lake's Cutthroats

The latest efforts to save Yellowstone cutthroats in Yellowstone Lake. They are releasing "Judas" lake trout with transmitters to try to find where they spawn, then they can more effectively kill them. The story does a good job of talking about the current program and the different sides of the story. The one thing the article doesn't touch on is how Yellowstone Lake is one of the last strongholds for the Yellowstone cutthroat. Here's a link to the article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/24/us/24trout.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=judas%20fish&st=cse

If you want to donate to the cause (and others), here's a link:
http://www.eastyellowstonetu.org/images/savetheyellowstonecutthroat.html

Yellowstone Fish Management Plan

Slowly Yellowstone is beginning to put more and more effort into protecting native fish. Not sure Yellowstone Lake will ever be the same again since there doesn't seem to be a way to eradicate the Lake Trout. I do think they need to put lots of effort into keeping their population in check and maybe someday we'll find a good solution (or better yet Mother Nature will).

http://www.nps.gov/yell/parknews/11046.htm


One more week of classes and one review session then I'm free for the summer (well, until I teach). I think some fishing is in order as it has been a long Spring with little time on the water.

Help Protect the Yellowstone Cutthroat

Yellowstone National Park is proposing increased efforts to remove non-native species and restoring native species. I have been fortunate to visit Yellowstone the last two years and I feel that it is truly special place due to the native cutthroat trout that swim in its waters. Take a moment to make a comment on the proposal and let them know what you think.

Comment here:

http://parkplanning.nps.gov/document.cfm?parkID=111&projectID=30504&documentID=37967

More Pictures

More Yellowstone Pictures

Got some pictures in the mail from my parents so I thought I'd put them up here.

Hopper Madness

Slough Creek is a special place. There are not many creeks where you can watch large, native cutthroats cruise around in search of food. In fact, Slough Creek is the only creek like this that I've seen. The trout act like they are in a lake as there is little current in many places. The morning started off slowly with only one fish in the first couple hours. In was particularly still section large cutts were cruising picking off spruce moths from the surface. We thought we had the right fly, but there was one problem...our flies wouldn't flutter and flap their wings. The only bugs we saw get eaten were flapping their wings and try as we might we couldn't replicate this.

As the sun warmed the meadow up and the wind started blowing we notice grasshoppers begin to fall into the water. This sent the fish into a frenzy. Not a striper attack everything craze mind you, but a Slough Creek cutthroat craze. The fish would still slowly rise, inspect and then slowly take the grasshoppers, but they began to lose some of their caution as they got greedy. This was good for us and led to several nice trout brought to hand. Britt caught a nice 16" fish, PJ caught several nice fish and had a couple very large fish just elude him and I managed to catch some nice fish. The order of the day was still to have more fish look at the fly and maybe nudge it before moving on. The other problem we encountered was a lack of patience. When an 18" trout slowly swims up to your fly and opens his mouth it is hard to remember to wait to set the hook. The British fisherman who fish stillwater say "God Save the Queen" in their mind before setting the hook. This same theory can be applied to Slough Creek. I try to wait for the fish's head to turn down. Unfortunately, this thought eluded me on the nicest fish I had rise all day, but it's a lot easier to take this when you know just around the bend there are trout just as big to cast to.

Lamar River

If I had to choose a small area where I had to do the rest of my fishing, I would probably pick an area that included the Lamar River and Slough Creek. To me those rivers are just the perfect size. You can easily cast across them, but they aren't little trickles. It doesn't hurt that they harbor many Yellowstone Cutthroat that are looking up for their dinner. We had to search for fish, but when we found them often an Adams was all that was needed to rise several nice fish. The fish are beautiful and you could argue the scenery is even better.

After hiking back from an afternoon/evening fishing the Lamar we were met by a crowd of wildlife watchers who asked if we had seen the bear. We weren't sure what they were talking about as we had seen nothing other than a couple of bison on the other side of the river. They explained that they were heading up the road following a bear that they spotted on the other side of the river heading upstream. This was news to us. It's a little unnerving to know that we were so close (not sure if it really was that close or not) and have no idea that such an impressive animal is around. It was a relief to not have run into this Grizzly, but I would have liked to have seen it.

Yellowstone River

Yes, that is a bison on Fishing Bridge.

On the first day in Yellowstone we decided to check out Hayden Valley and the Yellowstone River. I knew it was lat for fishing the river and returns from the lake have been low, but that wasn't enough to keep me away. As evening came to the valley I spotted a few large cutts rising. After many unsuccessful casts with assorted dry flies, I realized I was just seeing large tails, but the fish weren't breaking the surface. I put on a wet fly and shortly after that I felt a strong pull. After some thrashing around just a few feet from me this large decided to make a break for it in the fast water. I know most people consider cutthroat to be weak fighters, but I think they use the current to their advantage much better than other trout. After a long bolt downstream I was able to start making some ground. I had deep water to my left and fast water to my right. I decided I was stuck there for better or worse. Pulling a big fish upstream is not exactly what I choose to do, but sometimes there aren't other good options. I was able to get him up to the point where I could see the leader and then the line went limp. The fly had pulled out. I fished for a while longer with no more takes and decided to pack up.