Devan S.

Rumor has it there has been some top water activity on the pond to the south.

Could you imagine....dark foggy and suddenly all heck breaks loose- hand to hand combat with a hooked goose 30 or 40 yards up river? Or gunshots? His original post said killed, not found dead so I assumed he knew the backstory or had some proof.

I'm intrigued by the goose killing. Did someone hook it and beat it to death? Was it shot in the dark? Killed and thrown over the dam from the top?

I am beginning the process of planning for Alaska most likely year after next. Historically our western native trips involve camping/sleeping/boondocking in the car just as we go vs. a set plan. We loosely plan but generally hotels and the like are just not where we want/need them to be(and I assume its worse in Alaska). My question to those that have gone and done is this method reasonable for Alaska? Tips/tricks/concerns? Target would be Grayling, Rainbows, Dollies, Artic Char, and Lake Trout. The last 2 being "nice to catch" vs. must catch due to logistical challenges. Probably a drive between Fairbanks and Anchorage and back as I think I want to explore and fish the Chena river. Is there something that is a DO NOT MISS? This will be my first time in Alaska but not likely my last.

Thats even worse.

Neighbor down the road blast em like crazy....think they do the cut sunflowers or something....I have power lines zig zagging the farm and several ponds.....boy they really load up the lines over the pond about 2 minutes after neighbor's crew pops off a dozen shots. Haven't seen or heard any shots this year. Have thought about busting 5 or 6 just for some poppers just haven't yet.....

FWIW I pulled the trigger on the outbound short. It was in my cart prior to digging around and finding more options so I will start there.

Historically I have used a 3wt. More dipping and less casting....plus I'm rarely having to cast far. I don't know for my historical usage it matters a whole lot. I had the outbound short selected and then dropped it. If I just go to Rio, SA, ect. and select lets say my givens: Freshwater, WF8F you get 5 or 6 or more options for every selection. I'm second guessing myself. I guess functionally none of this matters......my form is crap.

How do you go about fly line selection? For example: 8wt rod, want a floating line, want something for big streamers for trout if I so choose, maybe a trip to pyramid lake, but most of all good casting ability in early spring chasing top water striper. Fairly confident in WF8F but how do you pick down below that without just banging out $75 over and over and over until you find something?

I have tinkered with the big umbrella rigs and caught some fish. Mostly 4-8lb fish. My boat trolls at 2.8-3.0 mph so that's the speed I pull them at. Big gear, big rod holders, and make sure its all in good working condition. I use heavy metered braid to get my approximate depth of the rig and try to keep it just above anything I see on graph. Common sense but make sure you are moving as you drop them over the side otherwise they go to the bottom, tangle up, and get hung. Most of my fish were caught in locations where top water was present a few hours before.

Overtime: We had about 1.5 or 2 days extra to fish. I had scoped out some Bull Trout locations in Idaho for bonus time but overall we had settled on Yellowstone/Grand Teton and after Grand Teton we were 100% headed that way. In the car we started counting up what we had and making sure we met the second level of the Western Native Challenge. I am down to Alaska and Kern River drainage/Golden Trout in California(I'm going to still get a real Eagle Lake Fish at some point). I have a Pyramid/Eagle lake trip in November scheduled already. @Prifish did not catch a Lahontan at Pyramid lake so he still needed Nevada and a LCT to get him to the second level of the Western Native Challenge. On the fly we formulated a plan for Gance Creek, NV and stream resident Lahontan/Humboldt Cutthroat. Gance Creek comes up often for Nevada LCT but its never really discussed well on how or where so we mostly flew blind. There is lots of discussion about how difficult it fishes and how people miss out on fish and the brush/thorns are bad. We showed up right at dusk and checked things out. Definitely found some nice beaver pond pools that each had multiple fish. They were spooky and took some stealth but they ate.

Yellowstone National Park The only fish we were missing on this stop was Yellowstone Cutts. We setup home base in Cooke City, Mt but developed some side quest. Several river closures and hoot owl restrictions on the NE corner so we needed things to do in the afternoon. @Prifish caught a nice fish on the Lamar. My first fish got loose before a good picture on Soda Butte Creek. So I had to catch another to get a picture. Not chancing it this time. We half heartedly fish Trout Lake. Saw some good fish cruising but no interest in our offerings. Our side quests led us to a small Creek for Westslopes. Pretty fish in small brushy pocket water we like. Too bad it was a mosquito pit. Our final side quest was chasing Goldens at Daphnia Lake just off the Beartooth HWY. Nice little lake and fish were rising but the wind was howling. We did get bites but did not connect on any fish. Wyoming Cuttslam done!

Montana-Westslope As previous discussed, Montana has rules about "fishing contest" therefore they only count stocked locations for the Western Native Trout Challenge. I had picked out Elk lake for 3 reasons. 1. You could drive right too it. 2. Location compared to Yellowstone NP 3. Large Westslopes, Grayling, and Lake Trout. We showed up mid-day. It was hot, the lake is deep, the easy spots to fish were shallow and weed choked. The deep spots had nearly vertical brush lined sides. We saw zero fish cruising and zero surface activity. The lake is 280 acres much to large for us to fish the whole thing. We gave it a try and raced back to phone service to make a new plan. What ensued over the next 24hrs was nothing more than scrambling. We headed north towards Butte, Mt. We fished Homestake lake right off the interstate and the water was very dark stained. Zero confidence and sketchy people milling about. We bailed. Maney Lake, it was stocked in the last month. People fishing/swimming having a good time. 1 bite but a local said normally he tears them up on a white rooster tail and confirmed stocking recently. Others caught fish. We stayed the night in Butte. Back at the lake first thing. I managed a nice Brook trout. The best of the trip. My only claim to fame. @Prifish ends up seeing a fish surfacing near a log. Ties an elk hair caddis on a spinning rod and dips out a westslope. Ticked off and scrambling I start to consider finding stream fish. We head toward Bozeman. Stop at White Hall, Mt and fish the community pond. Stocked last month immediately I catch a fish. It might be the ugliest Westslope ever to exist....no way I am submitting this fish. Onto Bozeman and just south Big Bear Lake.....Did not drive all the way to lake. Hiked last mile due to road. Glad we did as it made us stay longer than we would have since we were scrambling. Success for @Prifish on the fly. Lots of short strikes on jigs in same area. Finally one hammers it on a steady retrieve. @Prifish wanted to try for a better fish on jig. Took a few casts and said last cast. I said take 5 more. If no bites we can leave. Last cast and he catches this. Pretty darn good upgrade. We hiked back down just as it started to rain. Montana done! Onto Yellowstone to finish up the Wyoming Cuttslam! Definitely on pace to finish early.

Wyoming Snake River-Grand Teton NP We had both really looked forward to this location. Scenery and rumor had it Lakers could be caught in the river and potential for big Cutthroat. It also gave us a chance to sling jigs. I quickly caught 2 decent Cutthroat before @Prifish could get rigged up. He showed up and put on a clinic. I don't recall the final tally but know he caught nice browns, lakers, and Cutthroat. I probably had more cutthroat but he caught more fish overall than I did by a mile. He caught a really nice cutthroat but I do not have the picture so he can share if he wants. Oh did I mention scenery? From here on out I had one concern. The funny rules of Montana and could we catch Westslope in a pond. Since it concerned us, we bailed early on Grand Tetons with intent to come back later if we got done in time. We probably only fished about an hour in total.

Wyoming Colorado Cutthroat: Heading on up further into Wyoming. A neat little place-Tri-Basin divide. The road in from the west runs for miles along Smiths Fork which contains Bonneville/Bear River Cutts. Flowing North off the divide is Greys river which has Snake River Cutts. Flow southeast is La Barge Creek which has Colorado Cutts. We drove along side the Smiths Fork for miles and it looks incredibly fishy and we saw very few if any people. Never mind seeing another fisherman. We did not travel on down the road to the Greys River but my assumption would match Smiths Fork and La Barge. Lots of places to fish all within a couple miles down desolate dirt roads. Medium size stream with enough challenges and hiding spots to spend a whole week exploring. We moved on from here and fish the Gros Ventre briefly but did not catch anything. Also stayed the night on the side of the road in a mosquito pit.

Wyoming Bonneville Cutthroat Heading North we passed right along Salt Creek. We both enjoyed and caught multiple fish. I am fairly certain @Prifish wore a dozen out in one hole. Maybe even some whitefish on top. Also this is where things really get dicing with our picture taking. Streams and fish begin to all look the same. Date and time stamps tend to get mixed up when downloading/saving/sharing from Google photos. We both enjoyed this creek. Easy to fish and full of fish and as far as we could tell, the only ones around. 10/10 would return.

Utah Bonneville Cutthroat- Up early and had to wait for the gate to the park to be opened. I had a really nice fish swipe on Cutler Creek in a plunge pool below a culvert that I just couldn't get to commit. Up over the ridge and we were off to check the last fish off. I have to get my digs in here. @Prifish generally caught fish before me on every stop and in every case but 2 he caught much better fish(bigger) than me. I am a bull in a china shop...he is much more deliberate in picking spots and approaching the river. This is his fish. Utah Slam Complete + Tigers and Whitefish. Off to Wyoming.

Utah Bear River Cutthroat- @Prifish already had his Bear River fish from the Logan River but I still needed one. On the way back towards the Upper Bear River we saw a turn off for the East Fork Bear River. I pulled 2 fish from the first spot we fished back to back. We fished around a bit more but only found Brook Trout. Upstream from this point was multiple off road vehicle crossings of this river. The road in/out was filled with open range sheep. At this point, we both were 3/4 and missing the Bonneville Cutthroat trout. We had zero confidence in the upper Provo so instead of heading onto WY we head back toward Salt Lake City to formulate a new plan. We were looking for something East of SLC but a bit more north knowing that we would head to WY next. Utah says the upper reaches of the Ogden river are managed for Bonneville's. @BilletHead said the North Fork worked for him and there was camping nearby so off we headed. No need for a roadside sleep in the car.

Awesome! Rio's are some pretty fish.

@BilletHead no worries I got the tiger. I hear they are getting really big at the White...maybe that should be my new goal. I cannot express how busy it was....even Washington lake overflow parking was full and people parking along the road in/out. Just chaos. We got to Wall lake at maybe 7am and there was people camping there...already swimming burrrr. A pretty place no doubt but busy busy.

Utah Colorado Cutthroat- East we headed. We met several groups of campers packing up heading back west and the farther we went, the less off road vehicle traffic we met. We still met a bunch of vehicles but nothing compared to the pavement of the Mirror Lakes area. We finally settled out at the East Fork of the Blacks Fork Campground. 3 cars in the lot and some horses. Did not appear to be fisherman around. Water looked good and fishy and easy access. We split up and got to work. Brook trout, whitefish, and our target Colorado Cutthroat. Splitting up makes fish+human pictures harder. See exhibit A But I did manage net pictures. Probably better for the fish anyways. We did not have to wade far and this was probably our favorite stream in Utah.

Mirror Lakes/Upper Provo- The goal here was Bonneville Cutts in the river and Tiger Trout in the lakes. We decided on a early hike to lake and then fish the river after lunch. Hindsight being 20/20 I would have just skipped all this chaos and proceeded but we tried to fight through. People everywhere, traffic, and poor signage for such high use areas. We got turned around and started at Washington lake. Took off hiking looking for Star lake. Could have bushwacked but didn't feel like it after a couple hours of sleep. Ended up on easy trail to Wall Lake. no service so we did not know what had been stocked or what to expect. Ended up with 1 brookie, I think. No picture. We fished the Upper Provo in a half a dozen spots. Caught several brookies and 1 tiger. No Bonnies. By this point, we were beginning to get frustrated with the numbers of people and lack of fish besides Brook trout. It was mid-afternoon and we started to wonder about where we might find a spot for some sleep. We made a call the head to the upper Bear River closer to the WY line. Found good water, jumped in waded to the first bend and ran into 3 guys. Disgusted we packed back up and headed East looking for more remote areas. Have I mentioned all the SxS, 4 wheelers, and dirt bikes in the area? Everywhere ripping down the dirt roads.

As we came back east from the Raft River Mountains we made a quick pit stop along the Logan River. Hwy 89 runs along the river for miles and while technically we wanted to go way up we just did not have time. It was light in the flat land but the sun was low on the horizon and getting dark fast in the mountains. We made a quick stop just above Dam 3 and fished briefly for our Bear River Cutt. @Prifish was successful really quickly and I zeroed. We made our way back to town for supplies and to make a plan on for sleep. Our original plan had us driving up along the Mirror Lakes area but we had the option to sleep at the Logan River but there was no camping available in the lower parts. We never ventured very far along Hwy 89. Unfortunately poor planning on our part. Pioneer day was last week in Utah so every campsite we had marked down as a potential sleep site was full. We even tried to find hotels but again zero availability. We basically ended up sleeping in the car on the shoulder of the road along the mirror lakes area. Finally arriving around 2am the next morning.

Well we got back home today. Started out with a change of plans. We landed in SLC and headed directly for the northern side of the Raft River mountains. We decided with short time to try and check off the "hardest creek" first. @BilletHead instead of stopping right at the bridge over onemile, we went up farther and packed over the ridge directly down into Sawmill Canyon(flatlanders at elevation right away). We instantly started spooking fish. Tight quarters but I like this style of fishing. If you can handle the frustration of weaving a rod through the brush without spooking fish. You dip anything around these fish and they hit it like they are starving. We had a little bit of daylight left so off we raced to another stream before dark. We can worry about places to sleep and rations later.

Definitely fished the Deschutes in Washington. Your description of it is spot on....small, brushy river/creek. Fish were likely small resident fish vs. true sea run. Not a destination and as you said many much better places to fish.