Out West

I’m no expert on the American West, but I have to say that my “Out West” experiences are way over-represented in my memories and stream-trout resume.

“Out West” here means Yellowstone, Glacier and western Montana, although the Black Hills (and a lot of South Dakota, actually) captured my interests.  As I approached the “real” west for the first time in 1989, I was compelled to stalk the first antelope I encountered, only to find them to be as common as cattle later on.  I tried to avoid this same enthusiastic mistake with elk and bison later on, but I couldn’t.  It was literally thrilling for this guy from Rhode Island to have finally found his way into the company of these animals, in a variety of such grand settings.

1989 was the year after Yellowstone burned.  There was also talk in the popular media of the day that Americans were in the process of loving their national parks to death.  My college education was still fresh in my mind in 1989, and the questions posed by Barry Lopez in “Of Wolves and Men” were still with me.  And so I approached Yellowstone with low expectations; between fire damage and crowds, I didn’t want to ask too much of the trip.  I did, however, set the single goal of catching, holding, and releasing a cutthroat trout.  So after provisioning in Cody, Wyoming, having picked up some flies and some tips on fishing the park, we made a bee-line of sorts to Yellowstone’s less-visited Northeast section.  We made camp on the banks of Pebble Creek, and I still had some light to work with; so why not go fishing?  Within my first couple of casts, my goal was complete, with a small but wild cutthroat in hand.  Little did I know how much more Yellowstone still had to give me that trip. 

First Ever Pebble Creek Cutthroat

For my liking, Pebble Creek was a little too small.   I loved its upper meadows, and I was surprised at the quality of the cutthroats once I got away from the campground.  I appreciated, too, the very fresh bear scat I encountered on the stream-side trail.  It was a reminder of my setting, as well as to make some noise!  But the stream itself was simply too small; it couldn’t hide its secrets.  So eventually I made my way to the Lamar River.  Here I enjoyed the room to back-cast and the open scenery; but this river was too big for me, even with summer’s low water flows.  I couldn’t safely see enough of it.  But between Pebble Creek and the Lamar runs Soda Butte Creek; I found this stream to be “just right.”

• Scenery; perfect.  
• Wildlife; plentiful.  
• Wadeability; couldn’t be better.  

In a couple of days, this stream pretty much ruined my interest in stream fishing for trout in Michigan, since if I properly executed a cast, I’d get bit.  The fish were all beautiful, and a few of them were bigger than necessary.   It was tremendously satisfying to get this much positive feedback from the fish (something I wasn’t quite used to), and I learned more about stream trout fishing in a week than I had previously in my entire life.

Yellowstone’s Grebe Lake offers a great day-hike experience and an alternative to stream fishing.  After a lengthy stroll through the woods, with generally flat terrain, the trail opens up to Grebe Lake, affording a great view of mountains in the background and meadows and swamp in the foreground.  Meanwhile, the lake contains grayling, rainbows, and (reportedly) cutts. 

I’m not above noticing an attractive woman, and in 1989 I was probably even more enthusiastic about such things.  As I fished the shore of this lake, I crossed paths with an “Orvised-out” damsel.  I continued to fish, perhaps occasionally thinking of this woman, but when I checked in with my wife (who preferred to relax the day away with a good book) a couple of hours later, she had a story.    Apparently Miss Orvis had crossed paths with Amy, too, and when she saw Amy reading, she announced “That’s what I used to do before I learned how to fly fish!”  Amy was kind enough to refrain from the only worthy response; “That’s what I used to do before I learned how to read!”

My actual Grebe Lake fishing had gotten off to a slow start, with just a few small rainbows and a beautiful grayling encountered.  But as the day progressed, I noticed an abundance of blue damselflies.  There was an increasingly fair amount of near-shore surface disturbance, too.  I found a small, silver and blue Kastmaster (made in RI!) in my limited tackle selection, and I have to believe that the trout were keying in on blue, because that lure was on fire.  Like a switch, the fishing became superb; and most casts were interrupted with chunky 12-14 inch rainbows.  The switch flicked “off” when I set the hook into yet another trout; only for it to go ballisticly airborne, giving me a perfect view of the 4-pound-class trout that was simultaneously breaking my line and stealing my only blue presentation. 

 

Next up on this trip was Lincoln, Montana and the Little Blackfoot River.  Here we enjoyed a few days of municipal camping (but it was still a quality experience, because nobody else was there!) and low-key fishing.  The river was wadeable with summer’s low water flow; and whitefish, cutts, brown trout, grayling and a single, bejeweled bull trout came to hand.  I especially recall a specific, wondrous, red-spotted brown trout I pulled from a log jam after carefully wading into the one spot from which his lie was accessible.  While only 14 inches or so, this trout looms large, both in my growth as a fisherman, but also in my collection of fond memories.   Meanwhile, a Laundromat and dirt-cheap but real western steaks for the grill made us temporarily wonder “Why don’t we live in Lincoln, Montana?”

We made our way up to Glacier National Park.  I knew the fishing probably wasn’t as good here, but the scenery would make up for it.  However, a weather pattern of dreary rain and closed-in foggy conditions settled in.  We backpacked all the way across the park without seeing much.  On the second night in, the weather was less miserable, and I was able to fish Lake Ellen Wilson.  Here I encountered some beautiful brookies.  These were old, eager fish with giant heads and lean bodies.  They didn’t seem to have enough to eat in their alpine lake.  How brookies ever got into that lake, I’ll never know.  But they were a wonderful complement to the lake’s surroundings, and I’m glad we met.  The next day, leaving Glacier to the east, I was stunned as we suddenly plopped out onto the prairie.  That different, mountainous world now existed only in my rear-view mirror.

   

A second trip to Yellowstone took place in 1991.  With a little more knowledge and experience, I had some definite ideas on where to spend my time.  I’d loved the park’s northeast section, and so back we went, but this time to Slough Creek.  This trip was more about the park’s back country, and Amy and I day-hiked way back to the stream’s upstream meadows.   The cutthroat fishing was too easy, but you shouldn’t snub 16+ inch wild trout in any way.  One particular highlight was the explosion of a giant cutthroat trout, in clear view, on one of my smaller fish.  I hastily free-lined my trout-as-bait and gave the predator time to eat.  When I came tight, I briefly felt the weight of my prize-to-be.  Unfortunately, the hook didn’t stick; I retrieved only a badly scaled, traumatized small trout.  While I was disappointed at the lost opportunity, I guess this is a better outcome than a gut-hooked patriarch.   And as fantastic as this fishing was, it was (amazingly enough) probably even better in the back-country stretches of Pelican Creek.    Finally, at the time, I was pleased to catch a Slough Creek “Cutt-bow,” a hybrid of rainbow and cutthroat trouts.  This fish was uniquely colored and fought a lot better than the typical cutthroat.   Little did I know that this fish was a vanguard of the unfortunate rainbow trout invasion of Slough Creek; rainbows have now reportedly completely replaced cutts in many sections of Slough Creek that I’ve fished.

 

Day-Hiking Slough Creek

My third and most recent trip “Out West” took place in 2008.  This trip was a little different; we took the train and our kids.   When I woke up in Grand Forks, North Dakota, I relocated to the Viewing Car, and I spent the next 18 hours watching Dakota and Montana roll by.  I was enthralled with each water body, animal, and geologic formation.  The optional, boxed chicken dinners from the stop at Havre, Montana weren’t really all that great, but I recall them with fondness.  Meanwhile, Amy, the kids and I spent a ton of time together, we had constant conversation topics at hand, we played a few mean games of Bananagram, and all in all, I can’t say enough good things about travelling on the train.

After a few days of grandeur in Glacier (including some unexpectedly good fishing for rainbows and brookies at Two Medicine Lake), we set off for Yellowstone.  Arriving near the North Entrance as daylight waned, tired and hungry, I fretted about where to stay.  But as subs were purchased and I gassed our rental truck, I noticed a sign across the street.  The sign was in “Federal Government” brown with white lettering, and with lots of relief, I saw that it pointed to an undeveloped federal lands camp site.  We set up camp before dark, surrounded by not too many neighbors and a herd of elk.  Unbelievable.

Next morning, we broke camp, entered Yellowstone’s North entrance, and made another “bee-line” to the Slough Creek Campground.  We still had to admire every new animal (it was the first time for the kids), but we were able to secure a camp-site for the next few days.  And while Slough Creek was running too high and too cold for good fishing, I did catch a beautiful rainbow (albeit in the wrong drainage system); and our campsite provided an excellent base of operations for our subsequent explorations.

Glacier's Two Medicine Lake yielded this finely camouflaged Rainbow Trout

Camping with Elk!

Yellowstone's North Entrance

A Pure Slough Creek Rainbow

One of those trips was to Grebe Lake.  While the fishing wasn’t fantastic, there was another damselfly hatch; and the rainbows were still there.  I’d go back, any day, for more and better chances at them.

I spent an evening and the next morning trying to catch a Yellowstone Lake Cutthroat.   A good chunk of the evening session was spent finding the right spot; I needed access, but I didn’t want crowds.  And the wind was howling (like it seems to every warm afternoon in Yellowstone), so I slowly whittled down the spots.  I finally settled on a western shore spot that involved a short hike, a muddy wade, and a walk down a long sandbar.  There was an Old Salt fishing, and I suspected he wouldn’t be there if he didn’t have information or experience.  His probable grandson gushed about the three fish caught so far.  The waves were churning up the lake, and visibility didn’t seem great; it was almost like surf fishing on Lake Michigan.  Not much good happened, but in the hour and a half I actually fished, I did have a solid swing-and-miss, and the wind was dying down.  Given Amy’s permission, how could I not be there for the following sunrise?  All it cost was sleep!

I was in position the next morning before first light, and as the sun awakened the day, I was stunned by my surroundings.  And when I let the Thomas spoon flutter just a little deeper than the previous cast, and I felt that “thump!” I was looking for, I was immensely pleased to be connected to a chunky, 18+ inch, bright silver Lake Yellowstone Cutthroat.  My picture does not do this fish justice; have I ever caught a more significant or beautiful fish in a grander setting?

Sunrise on Yellowstone Lake

Yellowstone Lake Cutthroat Trout

But please realize that this fish is in ecological danger from the introduction of Lake Trout.  I’d really rather not think this is the case, but it seems to be.  Hopefully some stable coexistence between the species will develop, but to date, the expansion of the lakers, and the inability of the cutts to tolerate the char, both seem to indicate an unfortunate end to this story.

Our trip concluded with a return to Glacier and a 3-day rafting trip down the North Fork of the Flathead River.  We were treated too well by our guides, the scenery was nice, and the trip was a ton of fun.  It wasn’t a fishing trip, but I’d brought a few rods, and I was allowed by the guide to fish whenever we were not floating.  I spent a good portion of the first day looking into the water.  While conditions were clear, I didn’t see many trout.  However, when we pulled the rafts to shore for the first night’s camp-site, I saw several sizeable fish scurry from the shallows.  They sure looked like trout (actually, they looked like char with light spots on a dark body), and I briefly allowed myself to think that they could have been bull trout. 

Before dinner, I fly fished.  I wasn’t expecting much, because I hadn’t seen much.  I also wasn’t feeling much, because I was wet-wading, and Glacier is aptly named (or at least was as of 2008.)  On about my third cast, before I’d found any rhythm at all, my drifted fly stopped; I struck and promptly broke off an athletic cutthroat of 16 inches or more.  Pleasantly surprised, I started to focus, and I caught several more cutts, but none as large as that first one.

My guide congratulated me for my casting abilities and self-guided skills.  I accepted these gladly.  On further thought, I probably should have questioned the value of these compliments, however, because this same guide later claimed to have been attacked by a mountain lion.

 

After an amazing dinner, I returned to the river, this time equipped with light spinning gear and my favorite trout lure, an S5 sinking Rapala with one hook removed and the other crimped barbless.  On my first cast, I was disgusted with myself for getting hung up, but then the bottom just barely moved; and I realized that I was hooked up to a nice fish.  It took awhile, and while the fight was unspectacular, it was dogged; but I was ultimately awed to be in the presence of a 4- or 5-pound bull trout. 

I caught another before I stumbled off to bed, seriously hypothermic.  I thawed off enough to get another the next morning.  Each was a treat, but none was as special as the first.

The next night, we camped near the confluence of a feeder stream.  I quickly caught a couple of nice cutts, but the next fish was another bull trout.  Farther downstream…bull trout.  Bull trout are a federally threatened species, and one can’t target them in Montana.  If you catch one, fine; let it go and proceed.  Just don’t target them.  Yet, about all I could catch…was bull trout!

I awoke the next morning, my last chance to fish for the trip, prepped with a fly rod.  I wanted to target the larger cutts I knew were available, and I love swinging streamers.  I hoped the cutts would like feathers more than the bulls had liked hardware.  First cast, first swing, first twitch; the streamer was pounced on by a nice bull in the 4-pound class.  It was quite a treat on my 5-weight, and it was released unharmed, like all the others.  Next cast; bull trout!  I moved downstream to the next hole and went 3-fish-for-3-casts with bulls from 15 to over 20 inches.  At this point, I had to ask myself; was I really fishing for cutts?  Or was I, empirically, fishing for bulls?  Without an answer, I simply stopped fishing and enjoyed the morning’s double rainbow.  It was possibly the best fly-fishing of my life; but I had to cut it short, because who’d have thunk that I was a Bull Trout Savant?  And I’ll admit, it’s a bit of a curse to be gifted with some taboo skill.  Here I am, over fours years later, and I haven’t touched the fly rod since.  I know there’s nothing comparable for me here.  I need to let that rod cool down a bit before I start anew.

Glacier's send-off included this Double Rainbow and 5 Bull Trout on the fly; in 5 Casts!

So I’ve enjoyed my time Out West and I suspect I’ll go again.  I’d love to spend some time out there “off season.”  I could swing some streamers for fall-spawning browns, or catch the Lewis River laker run.  I’d love to visit Yellowstone Lake’s Thoroughfare region, and if I were to visit, say Fernie, British Columbia, I could fish for bull trout legally.  There’s a lot left to be experienced.

I hope I’m able to do so, and I hope these opportunities are still there.  I've some doubts for the latter.  Just in the course of this essay, I’ve touched upon cutthroats threatened by rainbows and lakers; bull trout threatened by everything, but especially lakers and loss of habitat; and I haven’t even mentioned the loss of glaciers in their name-sake park.  Because those glaciers feed the streams that I was wet-wading.  It was clear to me that these waters were icy cold, even at the height of summer.  The bull trout need that water; the bull trout are the Numenon of these streams, just like the Yellowstone Cutthroat is for the Yellowstone watershed.  I’d hate for these streams to become simple, picturesque rainbow trout streams.  I’d hate for Yellowstone Lake to become a laker destination.  Nothing against rainbows or lakers (I certainly love them here in Michigan!), but won’t something have been irrevocably lost at that point?