Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness trip

[grunt soldier]

very nice pictures. and what a beast of a fish on 2# line thats quite impressive

 

[MT Damascus]

Love the Pintlars, it is my back yard. We were up at upper seymour a few weeks ago.

 

[The Warrior]

That place looks awesome. Thanks for posting. Nice grill, btw.

 

[mtwarden]

Nice pics man...The scenery is amazing.

Those are huge mountain trouts! The ones ive caught in mountain lakes do not get that big. What did you catch it with?

I was throwing some small spinners (1/32 oz Panther Martins) to no avail, my wife suggested trying grasshoppers as we'd seen a few near camp. My "tackle box" has a 1/2 dozen small # 12 hooks, but no floats- I used a small dropper bottle that I keep sunscreen in, unscrewed the top-gave it 6-7 wraps around the threads, screwed the top back down and hoped it would hold. We caught a few small hoppers and my second cast the lunker hit the "bobber" held up as well

"tackle box"

btw I wasn't expecting big fish, 10-12" trout are the normal mountain fare, turns out that many of these lakes in this area hold large trout- not sure

"with 2# test and lots (lots!) of luck I landed this lunker so big we let him go"

Respect.

thanks

 

[Gevonovich]

Wow...Great pictures and fantastic catch. Really like the grill idea...hope you don't mind if I borrow the idea. Thanks for the post

 

[mtwarden]

You Sir are a lucky man to have a wife that is willing to wander into the wilderness with you. My wife and I have been married almost 9 years now and I am just now getting her to the point of car camping, but at least she will do that now. She use to be so bad that she would carry bed sheets with us on trips where we utilized hotel rooms. Count your blessings...

Thanks for sharing. What a blessing to have a wife that will adventure with you.

Love the pics. That really is awesome that your wife will go with you.

agreed- very lucky! we're starting to make plans for our upcoming 30th in late October, the weather can be pretty dicey that time of year, but she's said she's game for a backpacking trip

I do a lot of solo trips for work and while they are enjoyable, they are never as memorable as trips with my wife

 

[lambertiana]

I'm jealous - great location, great fishing, and the wife went along, too.

Am I mistaken, or is that rainbow pink-fleshed? I have seen some Golden Trout in the Sierras with pink flesh (and they were the best tasting trout I have ever eaten) but never a rainbow. I wonder what that rainbow had been eating.

 

[mtwarden]

the fish we ate was a cutthroat (or possibly a cross- see below) and yes the flesh was on the pink side (very good eating btw ), flesh is color is usually based on what they're eating- these fish were definitely on the well fed side- stocky, very thick through the shoulders. Only speculating but could be a fair number of freshwater shrimp in their diet??? possibly another invertebrate that is causing it???

the bigger fish appears to be a "cutbow"- it had faded red slashes under the jaw (in contrast the smaller fish had very pronounced red slashes), but more spots under the mid line than you'd normally see on cutthroat (more typical of a rainbow)- it's not uncommon for rainbows and cutthroats to cross; our dept has spent a lot of $ trying to eradicate rainbows in stretches with native cutthroats.

 

[mtnfolk mike]

awesome pics as always man.. i never get tired of seeing that area.. nice catch on those fish too..and that grill is just bad a$$..:thumbup:

 

[Joezilla]

great pics, love that log portion of the trail.

 

[hung-solo]

simply beautiful

 

[Brad "the butcher"]

very nice pics and fish, I am lucky enough to have a wife that will hike and tent as well.

nice little fishing combo, I have a 7ft 5 piece spin/fly combo rod and a little quantum.
#2 on it and a spare spool of #6 if the shoreline is brushy and snaggy.

My biggest fish on it was a 6lb 12oz rainbow on #2 with a worm and bobber on tunkwa lake, I won the 1997 derby that year with him. 20 to 25 minutes to land and nerve racking as he put me to a few wraps on the reel twice.

I posted "Brad's backwoods bobber" idea a year or two ago but here it is again for an idea MtWarden

Keep 4 pieces of half inch surgical tubing in your fishing kit for bobber making

now get a 4 to 6 inch long stick thats 1/2 to 3/4 thick. debark it and whittle the ends so the tubing will fit snugly.
run your line through two tubing pieces and fit the stick to them.

Does not mark up the line and you can easily slide it up and down to adjust for depth. I started rigging thill bobbers like this 20 years ago and the stick idea came from losing my only bobber.

I like to use a bobber fishing mountain lakes with micro spinners and weighted flies, the shoreline is usually shallow and snaggy and the bobber keeps you in the top 3 to 5 ft

Really nice lupine fields in that area, always loved the look of them in the high places here

 

[mtwarden]

^ great tip!

 

[Hawkeye5]

I know that this is a old post. But I just have to tell ya that I went to a high dollar bike shop in Tyler Texas and they said good luck finding used titanium bike spokes. It was great, thanks again for your post.
Hawkeye

thanks gents

yes- very lucky to have a wife who shares my love of the outdoors, she wants her own pack rod now

whoops on the grill pic

the grill is a diy project, the one aluminum tube is a portion of a Easton arrow shaft, found another just slightly smaller diameter aluminum tube at Ace Hardware- the grate portion are titanium spokes I found on sale at a BMX shop- the one smaller tube fits into the arrow shaft and all the spokes fit into the smaller tube for one small package

 

[mtwarden]

if you can't find spokes and still want a light grill- for $50 you can buy one from this guy http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi...ums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=52472

you could also substitute steel spokes and wouldn't take too much of a hit weight wise, those they should have by the bushel

 

[Joezilla]

I've seen those, interesting items.

 

[sutured]

Great pics!


"with 2# test and lots (lots!) of luck I landed this lunker so big we let him go"

Just as a heads up for next time, holding a fish by the gills is pretty much a death sentence. It's the equivalent of you being held by your lungs. If you're going to release a fish go to great lengths not to touch any part of the gills or gill plates which protect them.

 

[Hawkeye5]

Thanks for the link. I was just trying to find some spokes like you did. I have a ss Purcell grill that works just fine.Just thought is was funny the guy at the bike shop said they only come on $15000.00 bike's.

if you can't find spokes and still want a light grill- for $50 you can buy one from this guy http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi...ums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=52472

you could also substitute steel spokes and wouldn't take too much of a hit weight wise, those they should have by the bushel