The Taylor

Every year it has become a tradition to head south and fish one of my favorite spring fisheries, the Taylor River. Home to the largest rainbow trout in the state, it’s not hard to understand why any angler would not want the challenge of landing the largest trout of their life. We loaded up the trucks and headed out Thursday evening with visions of spotting big red sides, perfect casts and holding on for dear life hoping not to get busted off wondering just how big that fish was. Thankfully we had enough beer and whiskey to settle the nerves.

We arrived at the C&R around 6am with the wind howling, blasting snow sideways and temps in the single digits. Typical spring day on the Taylor! Surprising to us, there were no other anglers on the water. Once we gathered up the courage to hit the water we were pretty dialed in to fish. I started out fishing at the Avalanche Hole and hooked into a nice fish on my first cast of the day only to be broken off as I fumbled around for my net. I proceeded to catch two more within about a half hour and had visions of a pretty epic day. Because of the wind and overcast conditions the visibility was pretty brutal, so site fishing was at a minimum for the first half of the day (at least for my old eyes). We decided to fish the lower section of the C&R as it is more a pure nymphing run not relying so much on spotting the fish. We were catching fish on an assortment of patterns, with nothing real consistent. Early on I had the most success using a palomino midge #22. Around 10am we decided to head up to the upper section and got into some nice slabs on egg and Mysis patterns. The viewing lanes started to open up and the larger fish were on the move. Landed a nice male around 8lbs and brought to hand a few in the 3lb to 4lb range. We continued to fish the upper section until we could not feel our hands any longer and called it a day.

Saturday we arrived at the C&R around 730am (whiskey from the night before) with hopes of better weather and more consistent fishing. As soon as we parked, it began dumping snow. It pretty much snowed all day long! We were pulling fish out of the upper section, but nothing in the size class were looking for. We chased a few fish well over 10lbs, but nothing to the net. Visibility was slightly better than yesterday, but the snow made it tough. We hit it hard until 1pm and headed back to the cabin. A couple of us headed home in hopes of making it back for Easter. The rest of the crew stuck around to fish the afternoon/evening. The report was the same as it had been all day long.

As all good things come to an end, so has this year’s Taylor trip. In addition to the fishing, it is great to get together with my good buds. We will continue to head back year after year with visions of huge, Mysis fed Rainbow Trout and the stories that follow.

Effective patterns:

Mysis, eggs, palomino midge, juju baetis, blood midge

Thanks for the story Jeff!!!