Devan S.

Stocked Apache: Now full disclosure. I realize these are stocked fish but they are so pretty and pictures can't do them justice. I assume Arizona raised these fish and they do it right because these fish did not have the usual look of stocked fish. No skinned spots, no missing fins. There was only 2 things that gave away the stocked status.: 1. Internet 2. Their eagerness to bite ANYTHING MOVING.

PART 6- NOT SO ARTIC GRAYLING Arizona maybe the southern most Artic Graylings in the country. I'm not 100% sure of that but I know for a fact it didn't feel like a place to catch them. In fact, I was hesitant to plan on needing them in my quest but here we are. We had originally planned to fish this small stocked lake for Grayling and stocked apache on day 1 of Arizona. As luck would have it, I found out they were planning to stock the week of the 16th so we pushed our arrival back hoping for a stocking. We arrived to this. Really a pretty place and all to ourselves. It didn't take long and we see tons of fish cruising. It felt so easy it was almost like cheating. We probably caught 15 or so Apaches and 1 grayling each. Hindsight being 20/20 we both wish we would have just stayed and beat up on these fish. They were eager compared to everything else this week. Grayling:

PART 5-FINISH LINE IS IN SIGHT My buddy took off below the lake which gave me time up top to look for tiger trout. He committed to bailing by 9:30 so I had a solid 3-4 hours of dinking around and fishing. No tigers but the next best thing. I probably caught somewhere north of 30+ of these. Nothing huge. Honestly was a nice break from lots of hiking and running and gunning. He comes up right at 9:30 with his brook checked off. Headed East and back into the White Mountains and the stream that had Wild Apache and the Brookies. We decide to split. He heads about half way up the meadow and I start right at the car and almost immediately check off the Apache. I keep fishing on and catch another Brook. At this point I'm done with Brook so I am starting to get concerned that I may be working fish he needs so I tie on a much bigger dry hoping to limit myself to a better fish. Not long and he is walking back to me. He got his brook checked off too so off we go. Headed father east and south this time. Picture of where we were fishing with horses in the background.

PART FOUR- LOST MOJO Monday was great.....Tuesday was well......bad. Plan was to hit the west fork of the Little Colorado above Greer(sheep's crossing) early. Rumor has that it is home to wild browns and apache. My best guess is they were on vacation too because we didn't see anything for miles. Our second option was another wild Apache stream not far away. We showed up to a nice meadow with horses. I had 2 or 3 fish absolutely crush a dry but nothing would stay buttoned. My buddy did manage an Apache and had a nice brookie on(this is actually the stream that has brooks that aren't supposed to be there). At this point, we can add sunburn to our mosquito bites. Frustrated we return to the Little Colorado in town looking for browns. My buddy has no problem catching them but I can't get them hooked. Finally I landed 1 fish to salvage a bad day. I had mentally hoped we might be able to catch all the apache we needed and a brown or 2. Now we're gonna head west looking for Gila trout in Az. We stopped by a second brookie spot and scoped it out on the way west. I was worried so I used my phone a friend. He assured me fish were there so we carried on and will fish it and the lake above for tigers the following day on the way back. Spent the night in Payson and drove up to the creek the next morning. The pressure of 1 small creek after a bad day was terrible and we fished until 10am and I couldn't catch them. Heck I couldn't see them but my buddy finally caught one. I had mentally given up and decided I would add AZ Gila to my return trip. I did however commit to dipping all the pockets on the way out and it finally happened. We fished the East Verde river as well for stocked Gila trout as well. Fairly confident they were on vacation too. We headed back east to the lake with tigers and the creek below with brookies. Met a guy walking out and he said its on but 3 people in front of us. Small water again. At this point, my luck would change. Quickly I caught a small brown which meant I was done with browns in Az. This was my micro-fishing part of the trip. I think I caught 4 browns this size prior to a brookie. whew a whopper.....if your keeping track I'm now 3/5 on wild fish and 4/6 on the stocked or wild fish. However my buddy hasn't caught a brookie yet so he has to have one here. From here on out we begin feeling the pressure at every stop. We need very specific fish in very specific spots. We will camp at the lake here and try again in the morning for his brookie and I will fish for tigers above in the lake.

PART TRES- PLANNING ON THE FLY We had assumed rainbows in Luna would be easy but cutthroat could be hard. Camping was nearby but were we willing to waste time on stocked fish? Luck struck and cutthroat and rainbows happened and in less than 2 hours we had to build an expedited game plan. Arizona is a lot like New Mexico in that brook trout show up but generally game and fish focuses on Apache and/or Gila. I had 4 options for Brook trout but 2/4 had low prospects and limited information even from AZGF. 1 option shows up in some protected Apache waters, isn't documented online and as I understand game and fish is actively trying to remove the brookies. I basically had 1 option where a contact said yes they are there and in catchable numbers. We decided to take off into the heart of the White mountains and scope out one of the 2 streams that shows to have wild brooks but has zero information available about it. We hiked and hiked and hiked and cleared the meadow and headed up the mountain. True pocket water covered in dead fall. Dipping and looking but not seeing fish scare. Finally we spot movement. Start focusing more dipping more pockets when this happens. I feel like this fish is a giant. This water was smaller than the NM cutts. All the other fish we saw were tiny. Hindsight being 20/20 I wouldn't do the hike again. Mosquitos ate us up something fierce.....like swat your arm and kill 5 or 6 at a time. This is the only brookie we caught here. Now knowing what I know there are other locations where the time and outcome is about the same but this is the fish I'm second most proud of on this trip(another teaser for @Johnsfolly) We head into Greer, Az to camp and chase wild trout again. 4 fish species day for me so today is a high......want to guess how tomorrow goes?

PART DOS- HIGHS AND LOWS We knew this trip was aggressive. New Mexico slam is 5 fish. Arizona is complicated. 5 wild(bows, browns, Brook, Gila, and Apache) but a second challenge includes those 5 plus 3 stocked fish(cutties, artic grayling, and tiger trout) you only need 6 of 8 of those. The only problem is doubling up on species in same river is not allowed(can't catch 2 wild browns in the same stream and count for both). This means Arizona basically requires 11 distinct species in different waters. We always assumed we would end up short some specific fish and have to make a follow up. So what do you do waste time against reccomendations or go after them. Well another 4x4 road and a short hike and we find rio cutts. This not only satisfies our NM slam but checks a box for Western natives. I will readily admit at this point, my picture taking sucks. I tried to document but these aren't stocker RR fish so I tried to be quick too. We found both fish in small 5 gallon bucket pools about 200 yards apart. I mean small water and no casting just dipping and sneaking. BTW that's a running theme this week. Also I will defend the fly shop. If people came asking about this creek I would say the same thing they did. I cannot imagine this isn't a super fragile resource. If your keeping score......I'm still short a brown too so back to fly shop. They make some reccomendations but high water and forest closures have really done a number. At this point, my googling says the San Juan is my only good option but that's travelling the wrong way. Remember the part about accepting were going to be short somewhere? I've accepted day 2 brown in NM is my short and someday I'll come back and do ballonfest and trinity site and get my brown. Off to the Gila National forest we go. Camp in Datil well campground. Nice campground. Arrive at dark and out at daylight. Black fire due west in Gila National Forest. Growing 20k+ acres per day ignited day we got here. Big plums again. Let me add here. I've exchanged a bunch of emails with people in NM G&F and AZGF. All of them have been absolutely 100% helpful and responsive. @BilletHead went to one location for Gila trout and we decided on another based on ease of access. The Gila trout biologist for NM G&F had a slightly different option that didn't include a popular recreation area and would be less pressured. We in effect had A,B,C options and A and B were only 30 minutes apart. Guess what? We didn't need option B. This spot was amazing to fish in. Again not a lot of casting and fish were spooky....but they would hammer anything you threw in a pool. Just like that were headed to Arizona by noon Monday. Good news is all the spots got much closer together. Our next target was Luna Lake in Alpine, Az looking for stocked fish.

PART UNO-PLANNING AND BACKUPS/ARRIVAL New Mexico slam requires you to catch one of each species(Rainbow, Brown, Brook, Rio cutt, and Gila) Original plan was to arrive via Alb...drive to upper Pecos to fish jacks creek, upper Pecos, rio mora then jump over to tecolote creek. Rio cutts, bows, and browns and brook trout. All withing a short drive. Minimize drive time maximize fish time. An ill timed prescribed fire led to the largest wildfire in New Mexico history (300k acres and counting). Currently this fire has gone over the divide and is creeping toward the Pecos and other watersheds. Tecolote creek has burned. Brook trout have very limited range in New Mexico. Last week I began prepping backups based on Santa Fe and Carson national forest closures. New plan called for Cabresto lake for Brooks and ask fly shop in Taos, NM. Land and head north and see this Large smoke plumes for 40 miles straight north. We know we have to be fast as evacuation orders are moving north. Fly shop gives us confirmation on cabresto lake and reccomends rio costilla for browns, bows, and cutts. However Rio cutts from Costilla is not on Western Native challenge but we have a backup option....fly shop says creek is too small and waste of time. Minimize wasted time and maximize fish time. We made it to cabresto lake in a chevy traverse. Google says the road is 4x4 and it's awfully close. The guy I'm with only needs Cutties and Gila so all of the pressure is on me here. I do what I feel comfortable with. Tie on a Lilleys jig and start casting......7 casts later and boom done. Off we go another 45 minutes north to rio costilla hoping to check several more boxes. We fish several hours with only rainbows. Sorry @Johnsfolly no pictures yet. Teaser for later. We fish until dark:30 only to realize cash is needed for camping fees. Back to town we go. On the way back after dark we manage to hit an elk. Lucky slowed way down and car is limpable to town for hotel. Grab cheap motel in Questa. Minimize travel time now means limited driving in dark which isn't maximizing fish time. Rio costilla the next morning until noon and still no browns or cutties. What to do? Skip our backup creek or no? Fwiw Google doesn't have any information on backup creek. It only shows up on Western Native Challenge fish maps. So add in fly shops information and we are really negative about finding true Native cutties.

Ahhhhh man.....I'm ready for it. Will have to wait a week or so...heading west next week to chase slime rockets.

I've been hearing some rumblings about some topwater action....but haven't checked it out myself.

2 casts.....man if it could always be that easy. Edit to add after re-reading: Is said he drove 3 hours and hiked 1.5 miles to get to his spot. I know it said 2 casts but clearly there was some time spent there so the 2 casts is deceiving. Virginia looks to do a lot of really cool Trophy and Master angler challenges but its just not worth the drive for me. haha

Their new pool policy didn't amount to anything. Little bit of massaging the regulating stages at Newport and Georgetown by a couple feet or days here or there. Min flow was 950cfs and they doubled it to 1900cfs which they had been running that or more for weeks if not months now. 30-40,000cfs is an entirely different magnitude. The only real change as I recall was instead of pulling it back down 1129 after this type of event, it'll be 1127 to give them a little more reaction time.

Glad someone finally said it. Heck in 2 months there will be 5x the traffic, bigger waves, and people falling off tubes, skis, and wake boards all over.

As a local, the idea that this is just "one big event a year" couldn't be further from the truth. There has been complaints about amount of pressure for over a month by people out there fishing everyday. The amount of pressure is growing every year and its not just the one 400+ boat tournament. I would highly doubt any local businesses are making or breaking their year on the 3 days of the BBT. In fact, most of their cash cow shows up late next month. At this point, to my knowledge, there is nothing stopping this event from being a weekly or monthly shindig. LOZ does something 2x/year, Grand 1x/year, BBT is multiple lakes. Heck smaller outfits are even running this type of tournament. Who would consider Holiday Island a location for a big bass tournament setup but they do it. Obviously there is a ROI so what prevents it from becoming a one big event a year to a non-stop onslaught. I think Fish's concern is that he is just a hop-skip-n-jump away on a lake that was much like TRL was years ago and he gets where things are headed and he doesn't like it.

Beaver was spilling almost 4k over the top yesterday.....down to 900cfs over the top today.

Beaver was running gates and generating. Shut down the generator like 5 or 6 days ago and just gates now.

Guide curve changes either tomorrow or Friday downstream of BS I believe. May not effect the gates at Beaver or TRL but probably will BS.

My last 2 I have just called the Rogers office....paid over the phone and in a couple days a new pass shows up.

Beaver bumped up this morning about the time they bumped Table Rock up.

16 1/4 is getting awfully close to 3lb anyways.

I understand the idea behind peaking plants. It wasn't that long ago that power companies doing rolling blackouts in the middle of the deep February freeze...yet we weren't running these plants 100% then either. My point being you still have the Arkansas River and numerous other lakes in the area with capacity that I think if you looked at the numbers are all utilized far below 50%. How long has it been since any local lake has gotten remotely close to the minimum power pool? Wouldn't increasing generation percentage also increase flood storage capacity? Are those goals # 1 and 2 in the water control plan?

Beaver, TRL, BS, and Norfolk dams have a combined generating capacity of 841 MW. How much of that is actually utilized? Is it even 50%?

EIA monthly data already indicates domestic production is at Jan/Feb 2019 levels. Dallas Fed did a survey with oil execs and 60% said Investor pressure is slowing them down. Only 11% cited environmental, social, governance issues and 6% cited government regulations. Haven't we been natural gas independent for years? Why did it double or more in costs?

Been that way everyday for 2-3 weeks that the sun was shinning.

I hate standard time with a passion. Of course if you don't have a job with set hours it doesn't matter.

I've done it from the boat up James river years ago. Interesting to go out at midnight opening night for a first timer. Last year I did it in the tailwaters below Beaver dam from the bank with floodgates open. If I cared and had my choice from the bank at the tailwaters is far more fun.