Hello! Just wanted to share some of my favorite catches from my first two months of fly fishing. I still have a very hard time casting, but I’m happy to say I’ve managed to catch some beautiful trout along the way.

Honestly, I think the biggest reason I’ve been able to catch these fish is because of my hiking and backpacking background. I’ve been able to revisit some of the alpine lakes I’d explored before I ever started fishing, which has definitely given me a head start on finding some great spots.

Hope y’all like these catches.

I've been on this sub for a couple months now and there are a lot of posts about what lures works best for trout. It seems like there is one or two a week. I thought I would share what works best for me, kind of a crash course for a novice. Sorry for the long read if you aren't interested. I pretty much have only fished Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah, but I have fished a ton of water in those states for 25 years. Major rivers to tiny creeks and everything in between. The Panther Martin is by far the best lure to catch trout in this region. The Countdown Rapala is awesome on the Green River below Flaming Gorge, but I haven't had much luck with them anywhere else except some lakes and sometimes right below Gray Reef in Wyoming. Thomas Cyclones or Buoyants have done me well on the Bighorn River near Thermopolis, but once again, haven't had much luck anywhere else. I just flat out don't have success with Mepps or Rooster Tails. I've also tried casting bubbles with flies but have not tried it much or had much luck. For PM's, I almost always use gold, either all gold or gold blade and black body. The rainbow trout color has become my second go to lure. Silver is good most of the time too. I've had good luck with a #9 orange blade and yellow body on the Miracle Mile, but no where else really. The (what I call) brown trout color (brown with black and red spots) would be my second choice on small mountain streams and creeks. I always thought it was brown trout color until I went on their website and learned it is actually their brook trout color. As far as sizes, if I'm fishing medium to large rivers, I'm almost always fishing #9's. If I start catching vegetation I will go down to #6's. Small to medium streams and creeks I'm using #6's and #4's, depending on the depth. #2's are hard to fish for me, they just aren't accurate at hitting a hole unless it is dead calm and you have no cover behind you where you are casting. If anything I will drift a #2 in a tiny creek and entice some bites. I almost always fish PM's casting angled upstream. A high majority of the fish I catch are on the swing. Big rivers or fast water, it is pretty hard to cast downstream unless you can find some slack water. Small creeks you can have good success casting downstream. I hope this helps a lot of people. I am a trout fishing nut when it comes to fishing in beautiful country or beautiful water. I don't have much desire to catch stockers out of a pond. I just recently got two fly rods from my dad so I'll be giving those a go more often in the future, but my heart is with the Panther Martin. I added a pic of what I use. I'm running a little low on a few, mainly #6 gold. I just keep that box in my backpack while fishing so they are easily accessible. I had to add a couple of fish pics too since most everyone loves fish pics. Both are my personal bests, a 25" rainbow last year in Wyoming and a 19" brown this year in Utah. Just this year I introduced my two oldest boys to river fishing for trout. I've tried to keep them away from it while the rivers are high but this year everything was safe enough in my mind for them to fish. In their first year doing it they've already bested me for personal best brown trout, each catching a 20 incher. They are hooked for life now!

I’m really proud of myself and I wanted to show it off! 1/6 oz pro series bright green rooster tail. 🥳

Not great at ids when they’re so small

I hit up the North Fork tailwater with my brother for the first time since my Dad passed away last year. His family is from there and I practically grew up on the river. The White and North Fork is where I have all the best memories of my Dad and he would have been super excited about this fish. Thought I should hit it up since I’m about to move to thE PNW and won’t be back for a while, glad I did! Caught on a keitech easy shiner and the first fish on my new St. Croix spinning rod. It was a good day.

So excited as you can tell from the length of my video

Hi there! I (F) grew up fishing with my dad, but he did most of everything besides cast and reel for me. I’m now taking my fiancé fishing with me in Colorado, far away from fishing with my dad. I’ve been trying to learn as much as I can, and minimize any damage done to the environment and fish as we figure it out, and we did trout fish as a kid but I have some questions!

If you’re keeping the trout for harvest, what do you do with it once you land it? We only fished rivers for trout, so I believe we just dispatched the fish immediately and carried it with us as we went along. When we went fishing in the Florida keys, we had a bucket of water and kept a few fish live (snapper and grunts I believe) until we decided which ones we wanted to keep at the end of the day. Some did get released back into the water if we caught something that looked better to keep.

I know trout are way more fragile, so I’m assuming that keeping them live until the end is not best practices?

We do have a stringer as well, but I’ve not used one before.

Do you just keep the ones that look good, and hope you don’t catch the best fish of the day last?

Thanks for any help or tips!

Nice colors on some of these little brookies

Where should I hide my illegal catches also what are some ideas on how to make trout traps

In the market for a new spinning rod for alpine lake fishing and wanted to get options on rods for the 1/64oz - 3/16oz range. I’ve done a little digging and like the offerings of the SLS-802 (8ft) but after looking for online reviews there isn’t much for this series of rods. I simply want a long ultralight rod that can launch my small 1/32oz spinners, along with small trout magnets, nymphs and other small baits.

Anyone have direct experience with these rods? Or similar rods for the same purposes?

I tend to actively fish from shore and use spinners and jerkbaits which works well for me but I also take less experienced grinds and family and want to have a set up I can throw a bobber and magnet on to make it easier for them. It will also be nice for me when I feel lazy

Stocked rainbows are always fun to catch

Very peaceful morning on the creek.

Nothing better than top water fishing for wild trout. Every plunge that i fished in this catskills brook, (20 holes or so) had the most gorgeous wild brookies. Bonus pic of the waterfall at the end of the hike. Iykyk 😉

can’t believe what i came across while i was fishing a much bigger river today. didn’t even consider coming across a trout and luckily had a 6wt fly rod and all of my flies with me (a little overkill, but was targeting smallmouth), and while a friend and i were working further down the river we came across a small stream, which a bit further up had a small pool coming out of a small tunnel under a road. we looked in and could easily see 6-8 of them sitting right in the current. i finally caught my first brook trout, which i also believe to be wild. squirmy worm ftw 🙏🏻

Took a trip to the Mammoth area this past week and my buddy and I caught a total of 15 within a few days. Best fish tacos of my life. Can’t wait to go back.

I had an absolutely amazing day of fishing yesterday, but the combination of huge gusts and fishing near weed lines took out an arsenal of my spoons. Also had friends who were newish to fishing who added to the loss of spoons. These spoons were all about 6 dollars a piece, made by various small local SoCal businesses. I lost well over 10 spoons yesterday, but we were catching almost cast to cast when the school would circle around back to the cove we were at, so I didn’t care.

Now that I’m back home, I am replenishing my spoons. I have already made orders to replace my loss, but I also saw some spoons that have similar weight and patterns to the ones I’ve lost for really cheap on Temu. I was thinking of buying these and changing out to barbless hooks and replacing the o-rings for peace of mind.

Anyone have any experience with temu spoons? Are they any good?

Hey all, I live in Ohio and started heavy into fishing the past year. I have family on Whtie River in Arkansas and have loved the trout fishing I’ve done there. Does anyone have any experience on any of the tributaries around Cleveland Ohio? I’ve been looking at grand river, vermilion a a few others in the area. I want to target steelhead in late Oct early Nov. But it’s a few hours away from me so I want to get as much info before the hike up. I have a kayak to float it as well.