Cutthroat Fly Fishing in Yellowstone
Last week, I wrote a follow-up article to my experience re-learning to fish, in which I shared a little on my experience getting started fly fishing. I went from barely being able to cast to finally catching my first fish on a fly, a small Brook Trout. The story doesn’t end at the conclusion of that article, so I want to write something of a part three to that article. This story begins sometime in the middle of that last article, when I had made a friend at work who was also new to fly fishing. I want to protect this friend’s privacy, so I’ll call him Kyle. Sometimes, the best friends you can make are the people who are still learning themselves; they haven’t had the time to become jaded about new people entering into the sport, and they’re willing to share the lessons they’ve learned rather than take them as secrets to their grave. That’s another lesson I’ve learned during this journey, and one of the things that inspired me to start writing these articles in the first place. We were at about the same point, developmentally, so we figured one day we would go out to the lake together after work and try to see what we could do, sharing our knowledge as we went.
Kyle and I both made huge strides that day in our casting techniques, and he would typically ditch the fly rod for a spinning reel and a spoon lure eventually. He’d be hauling them out left and right with his spoons, I’d maybe catch one or two on my flies, but we were having a lot of fun doing it. We eventually decided that, with limited time left in the summer, we needed to get out and start looking for other spots to fish. One day, we made the trip out to Soda Butte Creek, which is one of the most popular areas in the park for fishing. It’s also in my favorite area of the park, so I’m always down for a trip there. All the fish in there are native Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout, so it’s all catch and release. While I’ve talked before about how I’m not usually going for catch-and-release, it had become my goal to catch a nice one while I was there, just to have the memory. We didn’t catch a thing, though I did have a few fish investigate my fly before turning away. Once again, a successful learning trip was in the books.
One day, Kyle got word of a few backcountry lakes with some real monsters in them. The lake we decided to go to was a 6-mile round trip hike, but we’d heard from a credible source that there were 19+ inch cutthroats lurking in its depths. I’d heard rumors of fish even bigger. He had been out there once to investigate already and had confirmed that yes, there were certainly big fish in that lake. We packed up our gear on a Tuesday morning, the one day off we had in common, and he drove us down to the trailhead. We hiked the trail in about an hour and arrived at the lake.
A backcountry lake in Yellowstone National Park
Another piece of knowledge I’ve learned since I got started, and something I learned long ago during my high school tournament angling days, is to pay attention to the direction of the waves and ripples on a lake. Generally, insects and other food sources on top of the water will float in that direction and congregate on one side of the lake. Fish follow food. We watched the waves and figured they were headed for the exact spot Kyle had fished at prior to today. Nobody was over there, so we started walking around the edge of the lake and set up shop. It was August, so I figured I’d try using a hopper first. I could see fish top feeding less than 20 feet from the banks, so I walked out to the edge and casted toward them. Within a few minutes I had a fish on, and it was a big one – bigger than anything I’d ever caught prior. It was putting up a good fight, but I felt like I had a handle on the situation. That was, until the tension let off and the line came whizzing back at me. I cursed under my breath and took a look at the end of my line, ready to tie on a new fly, when I realized that my fly was actually still there. Yellowstone National Park requires all fishermen to use barbless hooks, which are the only hooks I use anyway. Barbs can cause serious damage to a fish’s mouth and are much harder to get out of the mouth, prolonging the amount of time the fish will be out of the water, and reducing the chance a fish will survive after being released. If you’re planning on releasing fish that you catch, barbless is the way to go. Usually, it isn’t a big deal as long as you’re able to keep tension on the line. I’ve rarely had fish escape, and was a bit confused as to how this fish had been able to escape. I took a look and realized what had happened – my hook had snapped. The fish was so strong that it had actually begun to bend the hook backwards, and it had snapped off at what was evidently a weak point along the curve of the hook. Another reason I’m glad I used barbless hooks, because that piece of hook most likely just dropped out of the fish’s mouth once it had broken off and the tension was released.
I tied on a new fly and sent it out again. Some time went by, and I was getting lots of half-hearted strikes but no actual takes. Kyle, who had made much more progress as an angler than me, was hauling out fish by now. He’d been using a spoon and was having lots of success. I took some photos for him when he caught some big ones and measured some of them, usually they were in the 15-to-17-inch range. It would’ve been easy for me to get discouraged here because my buddy was catching a lot more fish than me, but I was having a lot of fun just watching his success. I had been in this situation enough by now to know it would be my turn eventually.
Finally, I had a take and successfully set the hook. This fish was another beast, about the same size as that first one. It took me about two minutes to bring it in to my feet. Now, I was faced with the task of handling it. I’d seen people hold trout by the body, but I was having a hard time holding onto it and didn’t want to hurt it. The way I was most comfortable holding a fish was by the lip with a “bass grip”. I assumed, due to inexperience, that people didn’t lip trout because they have sharper teeth than bass. Unfortunately, partly because no one had ever explicitly told me not to do it, I didn’t know at the time that the actual reason for this is that it has the potential to injure them because they have more delicate jaws than bass. I’ve since practiced more and gotten the hang of handling them correctly. I hope that, if nothing else, this serves as yet another lesson for others in my situation. I pulled the fish out of the water and pulled the tape measure out of my pocket. It measured about 16 inches, which isn’t huge for a Cutthroat, but it’s definitely a respectable fish.
My first Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout. “Lip gripping” a trout is never recommended, and unfortunately, inexperience and a background as a bass fisherman led to this mistake.
We stayed out there for a few hours and I eventually managed to haul in another, about the same size as the first, maybe a hair smaller. I did not bass grip this one, to my recollection. Eventually, it came time to pack up our stuff and get moving out of there. The three-mile hike out from the lake was definitely tougher than the hike in, and I was starving, but we got out in about an hour and a half and got back in Kyle’s car. I very nearly fell asleep on the 45-minute drive back to where I’d left my car. I don’t like to fall asleep on friends during social outings, but hunting and fishing both take the energy right out of me. So, I’ve started packing instant coffee with me when I go out into the field to keep me awake when I go out on these excursions with friends.
I haven’t been back to that specific lake since that day. Since then, I’ve moved to New Mexico from Montana, and I no longer haver the luxury of being able to just head into the park after work. However, I have a trip planned for this summer, and I’m also planning to go through the film permit process and bring along a video camera to record the outing, plus maybe highlight some fishing in other parts of the park. My hope is to start doing this more often, and get a video series going to allow you, the reader, to come along with me on some of our hunting and fishing trips, rather than just simply reading about them after the fact. This won’t always be feasible, and we may have to stick to writing for some trips. However, one way or another, going along with Born Again Outdoors’ mission of sharing knowledge and experiences with like-minded folks, we will always be sure to provide some medium for you to come along on our excursions. I’ve got a packed schedule for this year, and I’m excited to see where it goes. As always, let’s learn together.
This post was edited on 2/22/2024 to add context for the photo of the author holding the trout by the lip. The cover photo was also changed to prevent the photo being taken out of context as an appropriate course of action for handling trout.
