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My brother and I decided that we needed to plan a real fishing trip without all the hastles of family and work projects to get in the way.
Saturday morning we fished Bitch Creek upstream from Hwy 32. Caught 6 or so cutthroat, the largest was 15 inches so we couldn't keep any.
Sunday we drove down powerline road in Felt and walked down to the outlet of the dam diversion. Caught cutthroat and rainbows. The largest was a nice 18" cutthroat. I fished mostly with worms, but did catch one on a perch rapala and some other spinners. My brother fished almost exclusively with his fly rod and did finally get a nice rainbow.
One last thing. I must be out of shape because the hike out of there was exhausting. My calves and shins are pretty sore this morning, but it was worth it.
The first pic is from bitch creek, the others are down on the teton.
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Did you see any rattlesnakes down there? There are some monster 'rattlers down through there...
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Nice fish! That looks like a lot of fun.
About how far up Bitch Creek did you go?
Do you know if there is river access between Highway 33 and the power plant?
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Didn't see any rattlers, we mostly stayed on the little island between the regular flow of the river and the outlet of the dam. Also it was a cold morning, and cool throughout the day but very pleasant.
We drove all along the canyon from the dam up to Hwy 33 and couldn't find any public access (there is one gate that had a walkway next to it, but no signs to say if it was a public access for foot traffic only or not. It was just before the teton enters the canyon.). There are a few nice gravel roads we could see on the west side of the river heading down to the water, but I don't know if any of them are public roads.
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Right after the highway the river drops into a series of really huge waterfalls. It is really rough. The whole canyon is really tough. I actually have ways of hiking from the power plant to the bitch creek inlet. It is dangerous if you don't know what you are doing.
By the way I keep hearing about these rattle snakes. I have found their skins, but never seen one.
Windriver
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Yeah, I believe you. I looked at it a little more on Google Earth, and frankly, it looks pretty ugly to get in there anywhere even if you could find access.
And --- It does look like snake heaven!!
But --- it is a good thing that it is so far away or I might be tempted to try a few spots.
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Every time I go in there I have some sort of near death experience. Then on the way out I am always glad that I went.[laugh]
Windriver
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We drove around and found the BLM road and the trail down to where bitch creek joins the teton. I'm not scared of heights but they do make me nervous and just looking down the trail makes me think I don't ever want to go down that way. It looked steep enough I could just see myself sliding a little on the dirt and tumbling the whole way down.
Windriver, I read your post from 2005 or so when you lost the soles on your boots, you do tend to get into trouble down there.
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Nice Fish! Love the teton, we usually fish it lower than that down in the canyon. Go down at lindermans or park at the polygomysts place. Some crazy good fishing down in there when you hit it right.
May be headed in this weekend unless I get talked into the pheasant opener.
Craziest snake event down in that canyon Ive heard was my ole man. He was fishing in waste deep water when he looked down and he had a big rattler on the up stream side of him sorta hooked around his body head out of the water sorta backed away just starring at him. Said he about soiled himself and just slowly turned and let the current pull it off of him. I wont fish that place in the summer without a pistol... Had way too many close calls. When those guys are molting they can get super aggressive.
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I've never seen markings like are on the fish in the third picture before. Very unusual, I'm thinking.
Sounds like a lot of fun.
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I didn't check for sure, but I think that was from spinning in the net. The slime frothed a little and made it look like that, but not positive.
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Yeah, I had a couple buddies fish there this summer and they ran into a TON of those rattlesnakes!
I guess they both missed being bitten a bunch of times. They said they were some of the biggest snakes they have even seen in the wild...
We're talking rattlesnakes that are 4-7 feet long and 2-5 inches wide!!!
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Those are fine spotted cutts. The Teton strain is especially fine spotted and special. Anybody who fishes down there please remeber that all cutts must be released. Treat them gently. A place like that can be fished out quick. If you want a meal you can keep the rainbows which there are plenty of.
Also this is not a warning to scare off people it is just a warning because I feel it necessary. If you try to travel up and down the upper canyon be really careful. There are huge holes that have strange currents. You can be hurt badly down there. Steep cliffs, strong strange currents, etc... I love it down there, but I am not kidding when I say I have had many serious incidents.
Please be careful.
Windriver
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That spotting on the cutthroat in the Teton is caused by a parasite passed to the fish by birds.
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