Upper Kananaskis Lake

[cougarcreek]

I was out on the lake Sunday and I noticed schools of trout ~ 4 to 6" go by the shoreline ( I believe they were cutthroats). I cannot find any thing about this lake being stocked so I assume this is from natural reproductions. Interested if anyone knows if my assumption is right.

[blackmamba]

They could be natural , but this is a stocked lake ..

[Calgaryguy1977]

I could be wrong but I don't think they've stocked this lake for some time. They are naturally reproducing at Rawson lake and going down to upper k as far as I know.

[Kingfisher]

I highly doubt they are going all the way to Rawson Lake to spawn and coming back down. Have you ever hiked the creek all the way up there? I am not talking the trail. I am talking the old trail that used to follow the creek all the way to the lake. I wouldn't say it's impossible that they are going up there as I know fish go some crazy places. But not likely. More likely that the cutthroat are spawning part way up. Not only that creek but there are also several other inlet creeks that have good gravel in them for spawning chanels.

They do stock this lake. And likely that is the source of the small fish. There are plenty of bulls that will be happy to clean up the newly stocked fish. It seems they only stock it these days to feed the bulls.

[RayL42]

A few years ago they built some spawning beads where Rawson creek enters the lake, however I understand that they got destroyed during the 2013 flood. So I would guess that any fish that size are from a recent stocking.

[Krush]

I have seen cutthroat spawning in the Kananaskis River upstream of Upper Kananaskis Lake.

[KWO]

They used to stock rainbows and the fishing was great. Would catch the odd cutthroat as well. A few years ago (maybe 4), I was loading my boat at the ramp and a fellow came up and asked how the fishing I was. I said it had gone downhill since the province stopped stocking rainbows and started stocking cutthroats and bulls (bulls are not indigenous to the Upper). I said that I had heard that the province did this as an experiment to see if the cutthroat would reproduce. At this point he grinned sheepishly and said that he was a biologist involved in the project. I asked if the experiment worked. He said nope, not so far.

I hope that the cutthroat are now reproducing. At least that would be something. Based on observations the last time I fished there (2 years ago), the rainbows seem to be gone, the cutthroat are small and the bulls were big and everywhere. I used to really enjoy the 3-5 lb rainbows we used to catch.

[TROLLER]

Don't think they have stocked upper K for years now.