Fishing in Yellowstone National Park has been a long held dream of mine. I was lucky enough to get to fish there in August.
It’s funny the impact fishing has on you. The way it shapes your life, the people you hang around with because they fish too and the way you view things through a fly angler’s eyes.
As we entered the north entrance of Yellowstone National Park I knew that if I wasn’t a fly angler there might be a chance I may never have visited. But because I do fish, it was a place I always felt I HAD to fish. Whether this is some kind of deep subconscious calling or simply that the fishing is the stuff of legends, I don’t know.
After we’d paid to enter the park we were quickly following the path of a river and I was starting to get just a little excited.
We’d been told the park would be busy with anglers but with over 2,500 miles of running water it isn’t exactly going to be combat fishing and although we did see a few cars parked that looked to my untrained eyes as though they were probably fishing cars it didn’t look like we’d be fighting for space.
Eric made a quick swerve into a vacant layby and as we tackled up I asked about the big cloud of dust we saw on the horizon. Buffalo was his reply. This really was Yellowstone.
I’d been wet wading most of the week and here was no exception. Wading out to the head of a pool meant I had to wade just a little deeper and I registered just the slightest intake of breath as the cold water, that was yet to be warmed by the sun, reached my waist.
I cast my nymph into the seam at the head of the pool and just a few drifts later I was landing my first Park cutthroat.
The cutthroat is one of the three native fish we were to be fishing for, along with the artic grayling (who mainly live in the lakes of the park but move into the rivers to spawn) and a fish I have a real soft spot for: the whitefish.
We also went on to catch brookies, brown trout and of course rainbow and cuttbows too.
I’d been doing some research and had learnt that although the park has three million visitors a year just 75,000 of them are anglers. So if August is what they call busy it must be amazing at other times of the year.
To fish in the park you need to buy a licence ranging from $18 for three days up to $40 for the season. I mention this because the licences raise around $36 million and it goes straight back into managing and preserving native fish populations.
I caught another fish and watched Gavin and Daran fish ahead of me, working pocket water with dries. When all of the pockets had been picked Eric took us back to the truck and then on to a spot he liked to fish himself.
There is nothing like being shown these sorts of places where a guide will fish when he has some time on his hands. You have a feeling something good might happen.
It must have been a dream for Eric. Gavin was soon into a large cutty and I heard a shout from Daran who was into another fish.
I walked a short distance downstream of where Gavin was fishing and fished my nymphs through a pool Eric had suggested I fish. I didn’t catch a fish and decided to get out of the river, pass Gavin and Eric and see how Daran was fairing.
I had to climb up a high bank that gave me a good view down into the clear water. Behind a large boulder I spotted a good sized cutthroat lazily picking off nymphs that floated just close enough for it not to make too much effort to chase them down. Walking back downstream I got myself into place and despite the sun position not allowing me to get a good view of the cutthroat, I was pretty sure I had him marked. It was two casts and he was on. On the first cast I’d noticed a deeper spot just to the back of the boulder that looked like it must hold a fish, so when playing the fish I played it a little tougher to keep it out of the hidey hole where it might spook some of the inhabitants. It reminded me of grayling fishing when you hook the fish at the back of the shoal and keep it from swimming upstream and spooking the rest of them.
Eric and Gavin were a short distance upstream and watched me bring the fish in. Eric wanted a few pictures and landed the fish and gave me 18 inches for it.
After releasing the fish I took a short step upstream and threw my nymphs into the dark hole. The indicator jagged against the flow of the current and I set into what felt like a better fish than the 18 incher. I would love to talk about an epic struggle and a game of give and take in the fight but it didn’t happen like that. The fish used its weight a bit and then let me quickly get it. It was a bigger fish, probably 20 inches. I admired it for a short time and watched it swim right back to where I’d caught it from.
The day continued in a similar vein. Fishing spots Eric felt would produce and then working our way back to the truck catching fish on a variety of both dries and nymphs.
We caught mainly cutts but also some good browns too. We fished three rivers but the names aren’t important. If you are lucky enough to fish in the Park then there is so much water to fish that you’ll find some by doing what we did and staying relatively mobile or perhaps parking up, hiking downstream and just fishing your way back. Fishing this way I suspect you would just have you and the fish for company.
I have fished the American Midwest a fair bit now but not in the Park. It had been a long held ambition and one that I am pleased to have realised. It won’t be the last time either.
We travelled out to Montana on a trip organised by Mat Mchugh from Fly Odyssey. Vist his webiste HERE
Pete Tyjas is a fly fishing guide and instructor based in Devon. Visit his website HERE