The Billethead's Adventure 2014

[jdmidwest]

Wonderful.

[ness]

Great trip report Marty. I've been flipping back and forth between google maps following your journey. Interesting the different colorations and shapes on the fish. Some were really chunky, then the long skinny one with hardly any spots, silvery one. Maybe some cuttbows?

[Guest]

Awesome, count me jealous. I need to get out west really bad.

[bfishn]

Now that...

...is a !

Awesome!

[BilletHead]

Thank you all for the comments. Also letting us share the trip. Ness you are right about the hybrid strains of the fish. Yes cuttbows especially on the North Fork of the Shoshone. We caught many there. Some 100% of Rainbow or cutthroat. Like most Hybrid fish though a better fight in those that were hybrids. As far as the Cutthroat in there ranges some hybrids there too. We got to see a couple of years back in the Daniel fish hatchery the four native strains of Cutthroat. The color of the near 100% of the four fish strains were amazing. The fellow explained what thy were trying to do in places killing the streams and reintroducing the native strains. He also told us that where they stocked cutthroat for put and take and other places where they were not concerned with pure strains the hybridization fish had a good survival rate. I suppose it is natures way of survival. Taking the best of the species crossed for the niche where they are? We caught three of the four in there traditional ranges. We almost dropped to Salt Creek a bit further South of Alpine to catch the Bear River / Bonneville strain and repeat the slam again.

BilletHead

[cnr]

Very nice. I'm jealous. And the pedicure...that's just showing off :-) Very lucky man to share that with your better half.

[BilletHead]

Yes CNR maybe showing off just a bit I count my blessings everyday that I have her. We spent our 37th year together out there fishing. Now to the pink hopper deal. Another rather large fish will be coming up from another smallish water stream. On that very same hopper. Guess I will have to tap into my feminine side and "think pink" next time we get to go out there.

BilletHead

[BilletHead]

So with the mud plug coming down the North Fork we decided to make a push to the East and the Bighorn range for a spell. Had time before our fishing trip with a friend out of Cody. A short stop in Cody for gas, water and some ice and then onward East. There is a kind of round trip we take. Highway 14 to 14a will be the circuit in the Bighorns. First stop will be Shell Creek and the Shell Creek campground if there is room. This little creek is plum chalk full of tiny colorful rainbow and brook trout eager to smash your fly. Made it there and set up quickly. Ready to fish again we hit the water a stringer in our pocket. Yes I said stringer. Many fish here and trout will be on our menu. This is the only place we had planned to keep a trout dinner. Did not feel bad at all keeping the little non native heathens!

Then there is my bride cleaning fish for the feast.

A meal of trout, Missouri home grown tomatoes and some kind of rice side. Pretty darned good eats!

Fishing right out the camper back door,

BilletHead

[mic]

Nice... keep them coming.

[BilletHead]

Well after an early rise to rain again we packed up from shell creek and took the northern loop in the Bighorns. North and then into a westerly direction. There is another little gem of a creek up there we wanted to visit. Picked a spot and set up to a cool Northerly wind as the rain quit. Got Sadie out for a romp while we got the fishing stuff ready. This stream is again on the smallish side but don't let that fool you. There are some nice ones in here. It winds through meadows in and out of timber with some nice plunge pools in the steeper sections. Here is what we were greeted with,

Some of the meadow section. OK by now some of you might be thinking cutthroat are pretty easy to catch? Well not in this section. We caught some but you had to be very stealthy. There are some cut banks with overhanging grass where fish were hiding. You had to creep and throw upstream and work your fly back to you. Just when you think you did the right thing and start to move fish would dart off from hiding. We did see one enormous brookie in the bottom of a hole but no making him bite.

Here is one looking back to where we had just came up,

Not sure how far we had gone, I know a long ways so we started back hitting a place or two going back,

Getting closer to the camper near where the creek swung towards the hill side I see the Mrs. tying on the pink hopper again. Oh boy here we go again as she pitched it in a run next to a deep cut. Wham splash I hear and again her rod bends. She screams with glee "I got a good one" and I get the net and do a scoop,

This is the fish in the teaser photo on General fishing.

We get back to the camper for a time check and a cold drink. She says guess what time it is? I have no idea when she tells me we had been gone on our walk five hours! Time for a dog romp and another action plan. After resting we decided to head downstream, this was a first not knowing what to expect. We soon ran into a deep channel the creek had turned into. You could step across it. Lots of grass overhang too.

We caught more fish, Brookies!

No real casting here unless you were a pro, A narrow run. You just had to pitch out your fly and let out line as it tracked down the channel. If you did not have a take on the drift as you stripped back they would hit. Again we spooked many, many fish.

Then we came upon a LARGE beaver dam. In fact it had about a half acre of water backed up. You could see fish crusing around. BONANZA I shouted ! We began to fish it with dries. Caught fish after fish. Than I dug through my pack and tied on a small leach pattern. Throw and strip, strip, strip. Bulges of water came from different directions and at times I had two or three fish fighting over the fly. Crazy fun! A mix of cutthroat and brookies,

Mrs. BilletHead was getting tired and she just set down on the hill side of wildflowers,

Home in the distance,

I just kept fishing and a nice brookie showed up,

We then trudged across the meadow back home and got ready for eats again. As the Charcoal got ready I took a couple of photos of another fix er upper,

Complete with box springs and mattress! Wood stove in there too.

Time for food, yes more duck,

Mallard, hash browns and a salad.

Next morning we awoke to 39 degrees and eight assorted moose, plus ten mule deer around us. Life is good out there.

More coming after the move again,

BilletHead