[epic]

Been gone for a week, BUT I was fishing. ;D Went upto Almont and stayed with the inlaws. Fished the Taylor river, the East river and the Gunnison river all week. Used mostly royal stimulators and copper johns (red and copper) as the dropper and was slaying the browns and a few rainbows in the mix too. Man the fish up there are big, the average was around 13 inches. I had a couple that were in the 20's but my inexperience with the fly rod and trout that big (use to the ark) I was unable to land them. Had the most luck on the Gunnison by Cooper gulch area (I think thats what it was called, just outside Gunnison) I dont eat fish but I have to say these were pretty good as far as fish go. Rented a boat wed. and hit Blue Mesa (or Blue Mesa hit us) rained alot Cody caught 1 rainbow and the rest of us got skunked, went back to the Taylor by Almont and first cast caught a 15 inch brown. We decided on Thursday we would have a fish fry so we slayed some fish, both Thursday and Friday. Was driving up by cement creek and had to stop to catch me a brookie, I was going to try to catch all 4 species and a golden trout but I ran out of time for some reason when you go on vacation with people you have to go with them alot. Did alot of sight seeing, rock crawling, mudding (cause of rain) fishing, hiking, photography, and even a little boating, broke a few rods (including my fly pole so if anyone works for a fly rod company and needs me to demo a pole shoot me up ) all in all a good trip. Hopefully I'm recovered enough to fish Sunday at Chatfield.

Here are a few of the 600 pics I took.

The first fish of the trip (father inlaw is new to digital cameras)

Cody fishing at Lake Irwin (side stop on one of our adventures)

Cody with the stringer we caught ar Irwin, after catching about 15 or so we gut hooked one and decided we'd keep the rest to eat.

Cody's rainbow? from Blue Mesa.

Thursday's catch... (thats the biggest trout I had caught on a fly) I hooked bigger ones up there but suck at playing them I get to excited or something.

My brookie, DOW please hold all master angler awards I dont need them.

After the rain the river was muddy, so I gave up the fly rod and used the old night crawler, we couldnt keep the fish off our rods.. here are 2 rainbows me and my girl landed at the same time.

Here's the big rainbow of the trip, the father in law caught 16 in rainbow so I had to top him one with this one.

Friday's stringer, this just me and my girl's catch, her grandfather (also on the trip caught 3 more and everyone else took the skunk along)

Here's friday's catch with her grandfather's fish (the bottom 3 ) we had a good fish fry friday night and the inlaws took a couple fillets home for a friend.

 

[Guest]

beautiful fish epic, souns like a fun trip, i love that area

sure thats not ajust a silvery rainboow and not a koke? my experience with them has been that they don't really have spots, but just a darker upper half? could be wrong

sounds like a fun trip

 

[kokaneeking]

nice fish i love gunnison, im heading there this friday to fish for the kokanee, that picture looks more like a rainbow then salmon, nice fish tho, i like fly fishing and cant wait for this friday

 

[epic]

Maybe it was a rainbow... I have been known to be wrong, he was just very shiny and even tasted different then the other bows we ate.

 

[kokaneeking]

sometimes kokanee can be hard to determine, some trout look like salmon but arent, most silver salmon salmon have a almost black upper part of their body with black dots and then are very bright silver on the bottom, kokanee definetly taste better then trout and have very different taste, epic did you see any kokanee in the east they are making their way up to spawn in the hatchery ponds

 

[epic]

sometimes kokanee can be hard to determine, some trout look like salmon but arent, most silver salmon salmon have a almost black upper part of their body with black dots and then are very bright silver on the bottom, kokanee definetly taste better then trout and have very different taste, epic did you see any kokanee in the east they are making their way up to spawn in the hatchery ponds

I dont think they have moved that far up... I was told some of them have been moving up the taylor and most of the places I fished had signs that said no keeping salmon August 1st threw when ever. But I mostly hooked into browns and when I switched from fly fishing to night crawlers I mostly caught rainbows. I defenately like the fight of the brown better then the rainbow, man can they run the current.

 

[Pete]

Right-on Epic, a lot of smiling and faces and fish; sounds like the perfect trip.

 

[kokaneeking]

i cant belive that some are in the taylor thats inuasual , anyways i wouldent keep any salmon there, the salmon there play a important roll in the restocking program of the state, blue mesa produsces the best salmon run, last year the run was kinda weak but this year it sounds better, i also cannot believe how many salmon go below shadow mountain i snaped a video of them jumping up waterfowls, its an awesome sight , every year i look forward to salmon running its an awesome experience

 

[gotmusky?]

Great to have you back ePic. Sounds like you had a blast and hope to meet you tomorrow at Chatfield.

 

[epic]

i also cannot believe how many salmon go below shadow mountain i snaped a video of them jumping up waterfowls, its an awesome sight , every year i look forward to salmon running its an awesome experience

Where is shadow mountain?

 

[kokaneeking]

shadow mountain is between granby and grand lake its in the middile, there is a spillway and below is were they are you cant catch um for about a week then they close it down !! no snaging !! at all tho i fish it with orange tubes, they usually setup no fishing signs but last year these duma$$ people were fishing they told me they were fishing for trout, i love to watch the salmon there they purpose every second and i love when they try to jump the waterfowl