Best Bull Trout Story

Fishing4Trophies · #1 10-09-2017, 06:42 PM

Hello folks, lets hear your best Bull Trout story!

i love fishing · #2 10-10-2017, 03:24 PM

the best one is that

On no day, I never caught a bull trout

morinj · #3 10-10-2017, 05:18 PM

This happend almost 2 decades ago, but I remember it like it was yesterday! My father, a family friend, and I were fishing the Crowsnest river. Fishing was very slow which is quite unusual, and neither of us had caught anything in the three days we had been there. This was very frustrating, because the Crow has always been good to us! On the third night, we had just finished eating a late dinner, and being that it was mid September, it was already dark, and not just dark with a bright moon, but very dark. I heard something splashing around in the water earlier on in the day, and I thought to myself, maybe I should throw on a giant hopper, and go give it a try, after all you will never catch fish if your fly is not in the water, anyways after my very first cast I heard a super splash, and as I could not see what was going on, I pulled back my rod as if setting the hook, and low and behold, I had a giant! I screamed like a school girl, not even knowing. My Dad, and friend came rushing down to the river to se me retrieve a beautiful 24" bull trout. This is not the biggest bull trout I ever caught but definately the most memorable!

lucky_magic_stick · #4 10-10-2017, 07:28 PM

How we saved a Cutthroat Trout(Pic Heavy) by Timo can't get the copy to paste sorry. It's on this forum guess maybe I'll bring it back to life for you Cheers Andy

Timidhc · #5 10-10-2017, 08:02 PM

I'm just waiting for Ben to chime in with his!

NSR Fisher · #6 10-11-2017, 10:19 AM

Well it was a bit of a struggle to tie into them. We started off our trip to the Abraham area trying to wade a section of the NSR below the dam.

No luck though we did see other people fishing. We moved closer to the damn and caught a couple small lakers as well as a small rainbow trout. We then moved up the dam and tried to shore fish the reservoir in a few different places with no luck.

Eventually I suggested we move to the Cline river where it dumped into lake Abraham. I had heard of some big Bulls and the occasional Cutthroat being caught there so figured why not. It was also getting pretty windy on the main lake and I figured the tree-lined river would offer more protection.

We get there and almost immediately I caught a nice chubby 17" lake trout. Probably my 2nd or 3rd cast. We were right near the mouth so the lakers do come and go through the lower section of the river I guess.

We kept fishing and within an hour or so I had 3 lakers on shore and one had broken me off in close (using 6 pound test) and Jeff had caught a few by this time as well. All around the same 17-20" range.

Just as the sun was setting and it started to get dark, I tied on a chartreus Blue Fox spinner, and tossed it into a juicy looking pool right behind a big rock ledge. Two cranks of the reel and I had a solid thump. Fish on. He fought well, I was standing on a ledge over hanging the bank and the Bully had my rod bent right over as he dived into the cut-bank underneath me and back around the side of the rock I was on. Jeff managed to scramble down to the shore and grab him.

He was solid muscle, big head with a slim body. The feel of their skin is so weird. He was about 20" or so, and had a huge scar on the top of his back where it looked like maybe a hawk or some bird of prey had grabbed him before dropping him. We put him back and I ended up getting another one about the same size the next day using a brown trout colored rapala in the same spot! It also had some big scars on its back.

Fishing4Trophies · #7 10-11-2017, 06:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by i love fishing

the best one is that

On no day, I never caught a bull trout

Hey, one day you will get one, they are pretty easy to catch if you know what to do

jednastka · #8 10-22-2017, 11:01 PM

It's not my story really, but I play a role. Very good friend (now passed on) was a fly fishing fanatic, and took me under his wing and taught me to fly fish (early 80s). When he thought I was ready, we went to the Little Smokey and spent a day catching hundreds of grayling. Late afternoon we got back to my car at one of the bridges on the Kaybob gas plant road. He had told me he only ever fly fished. So I pulled out my spinning rod to demonstrate my method, put a cast under the bridge, and hooked into a 12 pound northern. My buddy was impressed, and told me that he and his brothers and father regularly go to southern BC (I think it was on the Skookumchuk?) a fly fish for trout at their "secret spot". He said fishing was amazing, but that they lost a lot of trout to the very large bull trout that would often rise off the bottom and nail their hooked fish. With their light leaders, it was a very short fight. He said they tried for years to get the bull trout to bite on a fly, but they never would.

I gave him my spinning gear with 12 pound monofilament, and Rebel rainbow trout pattern floating plug, very similar to the standard Rapala. They went as planned, and a week later returned, minus my lure. My friend was glassy eyed as he told me that the moment the bulls started to hit their trout, he switched to my spinning rig. The first one he hooked into he said was close to 20 pounds based on ones he caught later. He had it on for almost an hour, and then it threw the lure. Over the next three days, he told me hooked about 10 bull trout, and landed half of them. The biggest he landed was 16 pounds! He lost the lure on the last fish. He had never before fought a fish over 5 pounds, and was amazed at the experience. His family almost rejected him for giving up the hallowed flyrod, but were grateful he dealt with the bull trout. He told me that he was almost ready to expand his fishing horizons, but needed to think about it. Sadly, a few months later, he had an MS attack that laid him out, and put him in a wheelchair. He never fished again.

Vic