We love fly fishing for trout. However, targeting trout in Alaska is a bit different than targeting trout in other parts of the world.
A high abundance of food within a short growing season makes them more opportunistic than most, allowing us to target them with a bunch of different techniques, some of our favorites of which are as follows.
- Mousing. Yes, trout in our neck of the woods eat mice. In fact, in 2014 researchers from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service actually found a trout on our river with 19 mice in its stomach. Technically speaking, they were shrews, but it certainly sheds light on why skittering big mouse patterns across the surface works so well at Alaska West during the first half of our season.
- Smolt Poppin’. Each spring on our home river at Rapids Camp Lodge, salmon smolt by the millions make their way towards the ocean only to be corralled by schools of aggressive rainbow trout. Big Naknek rainbows force the smolts to the surface creating a ‘bust’ that allows us to find the concentration of hungry trout where we’re able to target them on the surface with smolt-imitating poppers. It’s fast paced, surface action, sight fishing for huge trout. What’s not to like?
- Boondoggin’. At Alaska West, we run 18 foot aluminum jet-boats with 40 horsepower jet-drive outboard motors. We’ve mounted oars on each hull to allow us to row them in traditional ‘drift boat’ fashion, with one angler fishing from the bow and the other from the stern. It allows us to bang the banks with everything from mice and streamers to flesh and egg patterns, while covering the most amount of water possible. Its an effective way to target trout in our neck of the woods, and one of our favorites.
- Spey Fishing. Swinging for trout on foot with short spey and/or switch rods is another one of our favorite ways to catch trout in Alaska. We’re really lucky to be situated on one of the best rivers in Alaska to swing for trophy-sized resident rainbows, and we don’t take it for granted. Just how good is it? Check out this video to see for yourself.
- Sight Fishing. Stalking intimate side channels to spot brightly colored rainbows in gin-clear water is one of our favorite past-times at Alaska West. Think bow-and-arrow casts, with your guide crawling on his hands and knees to avoid being spotted, to watch a trout snatch your mouse fly off of the surface. Yes, its just about as fun as it sounds.
Interested in catching trout using any of the techniques mentioned above? Drop us a line for more information.
These 5 techniques to fishing for trout are all great, I’m from Northern Nevada and rainbow trout is all we’ve got! I’ve never used these methods to fish a rainbow trout before, usually in the reservoir or in the mountain streams of northern Nevada the best way to catch a trout is to use good ‘ole night crawlers, they go crazy for them! Now I don’t know if the smaller stream trout eat mice, but I know that the large salmon/trout mix in my reservoir are definitely big enough to eat some of those critters, I think ill give it a try! But definitely sight fishing is the most primal and exciting, it takes a true fisherman to stalk down a rainbow trout and get the line out just right to catch the sucker! Thanks for all of your insights!
I read your 5 favorite ways to catch rainbow trout. You said if I wanted more information to contact you. I live in Anchorage and I mostly fish lakes for rainbows from my canoe, with Summit Lake on the Kenai being one of my favorite lakes to fish for rainbows. I am particularly interested in information about mousing and smolt popping for rainbows. I’m not sure how well fishing with a mouse pattern would work on a lake but I have been thinking of fishing the Kenai River late at night with a mouse pattern. I recently read an article about someone fishing with poppers for rainbows in an Anchorage Lake so that technique would likely work well in south central lakes. I would appreciate whatever information you could provide to me about these two fishing techniques.
Hi Frank,
Thanks very much for your note, we hope you’re enjoying our content. Actually there are a few of us here on the team that grew up and still live in Anchorage. We’d be happy to talk with you about your fishing pursuits. Please feel free to give our office a call anytime at, 907-563-9788. Thanks again for being in touch and we look forward to hearing from you.
Our best,
The Deneki Team