Welcome to my trout fishing site

My name is Jackie Hunter and I’ve always been very fond the great outdoors. When I was a child my mother called me a “river rat” because I would spend hours down at the river bottom just sitting in a blind watching the wildlife. As a child, I had never eaten trout because my mother had never cooked it. She always talked about fish as being a big pain and even dangerous to eat because of all the bones.

I didn’t become a fan of trout until one day when I ordered it in a restaurant. The trout was brought to me with the head still attached, its eyes glaring up at me, which freaked me out. However, I remained cool and calm while the waitress proceeded to de-bone it as I watched. She made a cut along the side of the trout and pulled the tail up, lifting out the bones in one fell swoop, along with the head and those glaring eyes. I was eternally grateful to her for that because I had no idea how to go about eating that fish. It was delicious, and I had no trouble with any bones. I impressed my date at being very sophisticated, and my fears of choking on a fish bone were overcome. It was an experience I will never forget.

Armed with the knowledge of how to eat a trout, I became a trout lover, and would cook trout at home, but I had never actually gone fishing for trout. So I decided I really wanted to learn. The problem I had was getting started. I quickly became lost in a sea of information overload and bad advice about how to fish and how to catch trout in particular.

Here on my website, you’ll find a number of resources to help you learn more about how to fish for trout and how to get started catching them in the quickest possible way.

The best resource I have found for becoming a successful fly fisherman in the simplest possible way that will insure that you will out fish all of your fly fishing friends is the book “Fly fishing for trout, by Wayne Smith.

This course is streamlined to focus on one objective. That objective is to learn how to catch trout in the quickest possible way without having to wade through tons of information about fishing from dozens of different sources like I had to or without having to use hundreds of different flies.

If you are setting out to learn how to fish for trout on your own, you may have to purchase waders just to get through all the information and jargon. It shouldn’t be that complicated. After all, its just a fish, and its not all that complicated. Most of what you have heard about fly fishing may not be true at all.

Wayne Smith has discovered a secret that will open your eyes to how to catch the big fish. He will give away a prelude to his book before you decide to purchase it. If you want to catch trout, you will want to get this book, no kidding!

Jackie

Very few knots will ever be at 100% of the rated strength for a line. However, if you moisten your knots before you pull them tight they will be much more effective. Make sure to tighten them very slowly and keep an open eye out for any weak frays. Test every knot by making sure to pull it hard. Test every knot by making sure to pull it hard. This will reduce the chance of a knot failure occurring at that moment when you need it to hold true. You don’t want to have to tell a story about the big one that got away, so learn how to tie your knots correctly. When I started learning to tie knots, I was thankful to my uncle who had taught me to tie a hangman’s noose when I was young. I found some of these fishing knots to be very similar.

Different uses for fishing knots and how to tie them

The Arbor knot is used to attach backing line to the fishing reel, (the arbor) This knot is easily learned and effective. To tie it, pass the line around the arbor. Then tie an overhand knot around the line. Make sure there is enough line to tie a second knot on the free end. This prevents the end from sliding through the first knot.

The Snell knot

The Snell knot allows the leader, or tippet, to be directly tied to a baited hook. To tie it, pass the leader through the eye and then through it again in the same direction. Wrap the loop around the shank of the hook about 7 times. Pull on the standing end to shrink and tighten the loop. When tightening the knot, hold the turns under your fingers to ensure they snug down neatly. The Snell Knot is one of the older knots and is claimed to provide a reliable connection which preserves the strength of the line – particularly if the thickness of the eye is greater than the line diameter.

Natural Trout Fishing Bait

Trout fish and salmon have a highly developed sense of smell, more so than most other game fish. It is understandable why natural bait would appeal to them. The can detect dissolved substances in small amounts. They not only use this sense of smell to find their way home to spawn, they use it to find food.

Natural bait fishing will out produce fishing with flies early in the season when the water is cold and there are not very many insects available. In streams where there are not many insects, natural bait works very well. In a heavily fished stream, the large trout are very wary and anything out of the ordinary will be passed by. If they are feeding on natural bait, they will stay clear of imitations. Its not that they know they are imitations, its just that when they can smell the food, they will usually ignore the fake flies. Scent a powerful thing.

When Not to use Live Bait

Don’t use live bait if you plan on releasing your trout. Even a small trout will swallow the bait deeply so that it is impossible to remove the hook without causing injury. Don’t make the mistake of using the wrong tackle when fishing trout with live bait. Large hooks and bobbers might work with other fish but it won’t do well in hooking a trout.

Any trout will take a worm. There is an endless variety of live bait for trout fishing and some of them being worms, salmon eggs, leeches, crayfish, crickets, minnows, nightcrawlers and larval insects. But bait fishing does not have to be live bait. You can use cheese, marshmallows, corn, and other grocery bait.

If you run out of bait you can just look around for it by turning over some rocks. In the late summer trout are often found near the bank waiting for grasshoppers to get blown into the water. If you have a net you can round up plenty of grasshoppers for bait. The advantage of grasshoppers are that you can use the dead or alive.

Crayfish can be found in the stream bed under rocks. If you can, try to get them when their shells are soft. Hook the crayfish through the tail from the bottom up. If you are out to catch a trophy trout is crayfish live crayfish rigged on a set of size 8 gang hooks is a hard bait to beat.

Many options are available to trout fishermen who are using live bait. Nightcrawlers are a fail safe when it comes to fishing for trout. They work on several levels including the fact that they are easy to get and they are the right weight for the long cast. Although using live worms can sometimes be too small or hard to cast, many trout fishermen like to use them.

Hellgrammites and water worms also known as insect larva also work well for trout fishing. But, they can be harder to find as the summer goes on. Also, they can be a little hard to work with if you are casting distance. Small minnows make good bait for trout fish especially early in the season when the fish are a little sluggish. Some more experienced trout fishermen like to use a chunk of chub or sucker meat when they are planning on trying to catch a large trout.

Trout fishermen can also explore the world of using synthetic bait. Synthetic bait is man made and comes in a large array of colors, patterns and styles. For some unexplained reason, hatchery trout are extremely attracted to synthetic bait. It is the choice to use if you are going to be still fishing in a lake that is stocked with trout. In many cases, they will do better then live bait. When it comes to synthetic bait, experimentation is the key. You may have to try a couple of different colors, etc. in order to have some success with the trout.

In the past when fishing typically consisted of going out and digging to find worms, there were a couple of traditional baits that seemed to work every time. A couple of these “old fashioned” baits were corn and cheese. Cheese in particular works very well with hatchery trout as well. You can rig a piece of cheese on a set of pre tied gang hooks and use it as bait when fishing in still fishing.

Depending on what kind of bait you are successful with it is not uncommon for trout fishermen to go through several different types of bait during one fishing excursion. You might be successful with one thing one day and another type of bait another day. They bottom line is that sometimes it is very hard to predict what trout fish are going to be attracted to. Try giving them a little of your own lunch and maybe you will be having them for your lunch.

Trout is the common name that is given to a number of species of freshwater fish belonging to the salmon family, Salmonidae. All fish that are properly called trout are members of the subfamily Salmoninae, but the name is used for fish from all three genera in the sub-family: Salmo, which includes Atlantic species; Oncorhynchus, which includes Pacific species; and Salvelinus, which includes fish referred to as char or charr including brook trout.

Brook trout fishing requires an excellent knowledge of the trout nature and the environment it lives in so you can be successful in your fishing.

Brook trout are one of the tastiest trout to eat and can mainly be found in cold moving water throughout the Rocky Mountains including creeks, lakes, rivers and streams. They prefer medium to fast flowing water that is on the cool side with in the range of 57 to 60 degrees Fahrenheit as well as water that contains lots of oxygen like spring fed streams and pools.

During the spawn they can be found in clean shallow pools that contain lots of gravel on the bottom. They are described as being stationary and can also be found under the cover of logs, rocks and undercut banks. The larger, older brook trout commonly inhabit the deeper pools and move to the shallow water in order to feed.

Since brook trout, also known as brookies, mostly live in colder water, they are slow moving and have a life span of up to about eight years. One of the identifying characteristics of the brook trout is their long, streamlined body and large mouth which extends past their eyes.

Their body color can vary slightly and includes blue-gray, olive or black above and their bellies are typically silvery white. Brook trout also have striking red dots with blue halos making them one of the easier fish to identify. Although, the biggest tell tale markers used to identify brook trout are the spotted dorsal fin and worm like marking along its back referred to as vermiculations. In general their tail fins are square but some rare specimens have been seen with a slightly forked tail fin. They can also easily be identified by looking at their lower fins that have a white front edge and black with the rest of the fin being reddish orange.

The male brook trout can appear as very bright orange-red along their sides during fall which is their breeding time.

The key to successful fresh water fishing is to walk slowly and steadily and avoid making a lot of splashing motions because this can scare away the fishes. Wade in the center of the creek and then cast your line towards the bank. Do not worry if the water is a little shallow, brook trout will amaze you as to the places that they can hide. Although you are able to gain access to more places if you wade in the water, it is possible to fish from the bank.

With either place you choose to fish from, just make sure that you are seeing the bottom so you know just how deep the water is. Brook trout are voracious feeders and have the potential to consume a large number of different bait such us crustaceans, fishes, worms, terrestrial insects, zooplankton and aquatic insects. You can use various lures and baits in brook trout fishing including wet and dry flies, crickets, worms, grasshoppers, spoons and spinners.

Rainbow trout prefer the cooler clear water, so you aren’t’t likely to find them in the warmer part of the state except for the stocked fishing areas. Even then, when the season gets too warm, the fish will seem to be gone or very hard to find. In season, if a cool rain storm graces your area that is the best time to go fishing. This is when there are many worms and other organisms being flushed out of hiding and washed into the rivers. Worms are the natural food for trout at this time. If the water is a little murky, this will be in your favor.

If you have done river trout fishing you probably already know that a rainbow will find a live worm very hard to resist. If it is late in the season, you may find they don’t seem be as eager to take the bait. Its not that they have all been fished out, they are still there, probably hiding in a deep pool under a shady bush.

The best worm fishing is done between late February and early June. You normally don’t want to underestimate the wariness of a large rainbow trout, and you should always approach quietly and with stealth.

The lakes and ponds in the warmer regions that have been stocked from fisheries will probably be easy pickings for trout because fishery trout may not be so wily. On the other hand, trout born in the wild are more adept at survival from preditors.They have been learning to survive since they hatched; so they have gotten good at it. Wild trout have also been used to finding their own food and if the bait doesn’t look natural, they may pass it up.

You should use small hooks for fishing trout, nothing larger than size 6 is one recommendation, although some trout experts insist that they should be not larger than size 4. Its important to take care in hooking the worms so as to present them to the trout in a natural looking way. You should match the size of the hook to the size of the worm or night crawler.

You can catch the large trout with smaller hooks. If you present the worm so that is looks natural you will have better luck. You can do this by using a set of pre-tied gang hooks. The top of the worm goes on the top hook and the middle of the worm goes on the trailing hook. A live worm rigged in this way looks more natural.

The technique is simple. You cast out, and then just let the worm drift with the current as it would if it had been washed into the river naturally. Earthworms or night crawlers are a natural food of trout and are one of the greatest baits you can use when fishing for trout.

Don’t try to put a small worm on a large hook or a large night crawler onto a very small hook. The large worm will come off easily when you cast your line. A small worm on a large hook will be avoided by the trout if it sees the protruding hook. You don’t want to get much larger than a number 4 hook for certain, but most worm fishers swear by number 6 and 10.

Casting is best done where the river goes from shallow to deep, or where there are small pools or pockets were the shallow water flows past. The trout will wait for their food to come to them in a pool where the shallow water meets with the deeper water. Don’t move around a lot because trout can see quite well up onto the riverbank. Don’t make any unnecessary noise or movements because they are easily spooked. Look for natural cover where a trout might be lying in wait to ambush its prey.

Rainbow trout prefer the cooler clear water, so you aren’t likely to find them in the warmer part of the state except for the stocked fishing areas. Even then, when the season gets too warm, the fish will seem to be gone or very hard to find.

In season, if a cool rain storm graces your area that is the best time to go fishing. This is when there are many worms and other organisms being flushed out of hiding and washed into the rivers. Worms are the natural food for trout at this time. If the water is a little murky, this will be in your favor.

If you have done river trout fishing you probably already know that a rainbow will find a live worm very hard to resist. If it is late in the season, you may find they don’t seem be as eager to take the bait. Its not that they have all been fished out, they are still there, probably hiding in a deep pool under a shady bush.

The best worm fishing is done between late February and early June. You normally don’t want to underestimate the wariness of a large rainbow trout, and you should always approach quietly and with stealth.

The lakes and ponds in the warmer regions that have been stocked from fisheries will probably be easy pickings for trout because fishery trout may not be so wily. On the other hand, trout born in the wild are more adept at survival from preditors.They have been learning to survive since they hatched; so they have gotten good at it. Wild trout have also been used to finding their own food and if the bait doesn’t look natural, they may pass it up.

You should use small hooks for fishing trout, nothing larger than size 6 is one recommendation, although some trout experts insist that they should be not larger than size 4. Its important to take care in hooking the worms so as to present them to the trout in a natural looking way. You should match the size of the hook to the size of the worm or night crawler.

You can catch the large trout with smaller hooks. If you present the worm so that is looks natural you will have better luck. You can do this by using a set of pre-tied gang hooks. The top of the worm goes on the top hook and the middle of the worm goes on the trailing hook. A live worm rigged in this way looks more natural.

The technique is simple. You cast out, and then just let the worm drift with the current as it would if it had been washed into the river naturally. Earthworms or night crawlers are a natural food of trout and are one of the greatest baits you can use when fishing for trout.

Don’t try to put a small worm on a large hook or a large night crawler onto a very small hook. The large worm will come off easily when you cast your line. A small worm on a large hook will be avoided by the trout if it sees the protruding hook. You don’t want to get much larger than a number 4 hook for certain, but most worm fishers swear by number 6 and 10.

Casting is best done where the river goes from shallow to deep, or where there are small pools or pockets were the shallow water flows past. The trout will wait for their food to come to them in a pool where the shallow water meets with the deeper water. Don’t move around a lot because trout can see quite well up onto the riverbank. Don’t make any unnecessary noise or movements because they are easily spooked. Look for natural cover where a trout might be lying in wait to ambush its prey.

If you are fishing with flies, how do you know what to use? Picking the right fly is important in trout fishing and you may even call it an art, but don’t worry too much about it. The important thing to do is to take the first step and get out there and go fishing. Brush up on the trout fishing news in your area, get your gear and go fishing. Experience will teach you a lot and it will be great fun.

Every time I think about flies, I remember helping a friend with a charity garage sale where a woman donated an entire collection of flies that had belonged to her husband, now deceased. To her, they were just a bunch of creepy looking fake insects. Of course she knew they were for fishing, but she had no idea what their value was. I knew very little about flies at the time. A young boy came up to the sale and asked how much they were and the woman said 25 cents each. I watched as his eyes widened and he reached deep into his pockets for his last coin to buy as many as he could. Then he whispered with excitement to his friend and they ran home to get his father. The boy’s father came within minutes and bought all the rest of the flies. I was thinking “oops!” We could have gotten a lot more money for those weird looking bug things. He confided in me “these women don’t know what they have here.” He was right. (Neither did I, but I was not about to admit it.) These were beautiful hand tied flies. That guy probably still talks about the day he found that great garage sale bargain. It was a fisherman’s dream.

Wet Flies
Flies can be broken down into three categories; dry flies, wet flies and nymphs.
The difference between a dry fly and a wet fly is that a dry fly floats on top of the water and a wet fly sinks beneath the surface. Dry flies are easier to fish with because you can see if you are getting any action from the trout. Wet fly fishing takes quite a bit more skill and attention to be able to tell when you have a nibble.

When it comes to fishing for trout, I have noticed an unspoken pecking order of skill sets at work. It is not enough that you can catch trout in mid season with worms or other bait. Where you get the most respect in the fishing community is when you can catch a trout any time, early or late in the season. This is usually done by the avid fly fisherman. You have reached the top of the fishing elite when you become an expert wet fly fisherman. So now you know why fishermen use flies. It is because they can snag a trout after all the worm and bait fisherman have given up and gone home. Some fly fishing experts frown on using spinners and other hardware, and the idea of using natural bait is even further down their list of tolerable tactics. Granted, there are times when a natural bait fisherman will out fish a fly fisherman and be very smug about it. A fly fisherman purist might view that kind of fishing simply unsportsmanlike conduct and just one up from using dynamite.

Fishing with a wet fly is very effective in catching trout although you won’t find many anglers who specialize in wet fly fishing. Wet flies are good in fast currents and they are much smaller than dry flies. They have less wind resistance for casting. When casting a wet fly you are actually just casting your line because the fly itself is lighter than the line. A wet fly is soft and absorbent for quick sinking. The standard wet fly has a feather wing. For most trout, use size 10 to 8 wet flies. For steelhead and salmon, use sizes 2 to 8.

When casting with a wet fly, cast across stream and allow your fly to float into the calm pockets around rocks, logs and other objects. When the fly reaches its target, you should feed some line into the current so it will rest there and not be swept away. A wet fly dragged too fast won’t get many strikes. A slight drag is okay.

Dry Flies
The purpose of a dry fly is to float on the surface of the water, rather it is moving or still water. As a fisherman, your goal is to coax the trout to mistake them for food that just fell in the water. Therefore, you should not be tugging or dragging on the line, but let the fly drift naturally down the current. There are basically two kinds of dry flies. One is the imitative fly and the other is the searching fly. If you are familiar with the current hatch of insect in the area you might see if you can mimic the same look and movement they might display to feeding trout. A dry fly that mimics the look of a particular insect present in dominating numbers is called an imitative dry. The other kind of dry fly is a searching dry. In the absence of rises, or with sporadic rises all over the place, that is when you use a searching dry. Searching dry flies are very visible and are used when trout are alert for something adrift on the surface, but aren’t’t being selective to any particular abundant insect.

Nymphs
If you would like to increase the amount of trout you catch you should have an array of nymphs on hand in your tackle box. Trout spend most of their time on or near the bottom feeding on natural nymphs. Nymphs and larvae are more the color of the bottom so your nymphs should be drab in color.

Nymphs are weighted according to where you want to present them. If you want them just beneath the surface, when trout are feeding on emerges, don’t use any weights at all. These are usually flies imitating mayfly, stonefly nymphs or caddis and midge pupae.

The middle depths are rarely fished, but a very light weight is used in that case. Most of the time you will present your nymphs at the bottom. These flies are usually heavily weighted.

In order to try to catch a good sized trout, the size of the fly, the color, its style, and its adaptability in different water and fishing conditions should be considered. The size of the fly is determined by the type of water conditions that you are fishing in and what the trout seem to be feeding on.

You need a fly that is 2 to 3 inches or more in colored water or cold water. The clear water of early summer requires small flies. The color of the fly is an important part of the decision when you are trying to pick the right fly for the conditions that you are fishing in.

Another thing that should be considered when selecting the right fly is what kind of trout you are fishing for. Rainbow trout fish are more aggressive towards lures whereas, on the other hand brown trout are not. Most brownies are attracted to imitations like a nymph breaking the surface of the water. Most fishermen out for brown trout will use imitations of original fish in order to attract them. The only time when the brownies might be tempted with an artificial insect lure is in the beginning of the year. So go get your fishing pole and prove me wrong.

Both trout and salmon belong to the family Salmonidae. They have been considered superior game fish for a long time. If you want to be good at catching trout its a good idea learn much as you can about them. If you have never fished for trout, I hope this website will be a help to you.

Many people just learn as they go when it comes to fishing. If you like the great outdoors, trout fishing is a great past time. You will never forget that first big one that you land! The questions you have to ask are, “Where can you find trout?” “What is the best way to catch them?” What bait should I use?”

The wary nature of trout has many people believing that they have superior intelligence, but there is no real evidence that they are any more intelligent than other game fish. As soon as they hatch they face attacks from insects, crayfish and other small fish. The ones who don’t develop wariness don’t survive. If you learn to think of a trout’s basic needs you will have no trouble finding them. Then, you must approach them with stealth as a preditor would.

Trout fish can typically be found in cool, clear streams and lakes throughout North America. They can also be found naturally in northern Asia and Europe. Most trout can be solely found in fresh water, but many, like the steelhead spend their adult life in the ocean and then they return to the streams where they were hatched to spawn. This is called anadromous reproduction and is also seen in salmon. Brook trout, brown trout, cutthroat trout, bull trout, and Arctic char also have populations that run to salt water as well.

There are many different species of trout and many of these distinct populations show no significant genetic differences besides color and pattern. Typically, the colors and patterns of trout fish are used as camouflage based on the surroundings in which they live. However, The same species of trout that live in different environments can have dramatically different colors and patterns and may be named differently. The colors and patterns will change as the fish moves to different habitats

The cutthroat trout, for example. has 14 recognized subspecies (depending on your sources), such as the Lahontan cutthroat trout, the Bonneville cutthroat trout, Colorado River cutthroat trout, Yellowstone cutthroat trout to name a few.

On the other hand, sometimes the difference in colors and patterns results in the same species being called by completely different names. The brook trout and the aurora trout all have physical characteristics and colorations that distinguish them to be different but, genetic analysis shows that they are one species, Salvelinus fontinalis.

Trout that is in, or has just recently returned from the sea, can look very silvery while the same “genetic” fish living in a small stream or lake could have pronounced greenish speckles with much more coloration.

Trout have fins that are completely without spines, and all of them have a small adipose (fatty) fin along the back, near their tail. They are actually somewhat bony fish, but the flesh is generally considered good eating.

Because of their popularity within the fishing community, trout are often raised on fish farms also known as hatcheries and are then relocated into heavily fished waters. Replenishing the water’s supply of trout is part of an effort to minimize the effects of over fishing.

Many different fishing methods are available for trout fishing including spin fishing and fly fishing. Fly fishing was developed primarily for catching trout but has now been extended to target and catch other fish species. Part of the fun of trout fishing and the thing that has made it so popular is that trout will provide the fisherman with a good fight when caught with a hook and line.

Depending on the body of water that you are fishing in you will find different trout. The bait that is used to catch trout fish can be different depending on the species of trout and the size of the trout. Trout generally feed on soft bodied aquatic invertebrates, such as Diptera, mayfly, caddis fly, and stonefly which would make using a worm or nghtcrawler a successful bait.

Larger specimens of trout regularly feed on other smaller fish like minnows. Using a spinner might be more appropriate in this situation since spinners are made to resemble the movement of small fish.