High Sierra Topix

Turns out that some of the lakes near the PCT in WA have fish, too.

Went on a day trip yesterday and found a nice looking little lake not far from the PCT.



Was hoping to find some little goldens, but instead ran into a few of these feeding on the surface:



This nice rainbow gave me quite a fight on my 3-weight. I've always liked the coloration of this particular strain, especially when compared with the more silvery variety. It looks to be inspired by both goldens AND cutthroat (see throat in first picture).



Thanks for looking!

Matt

Looks like particularly colorful cutt to me but could be a cutbow! I caught a couple colored similarly in the Sawtooths.

Mike

Or, it could be a rainbow..
from: http://californiaoutdoorsqas.com/2015/0 ... us-waters/

pics look similar..

It could very well be a cuttbow, but because of the stocking history of the lake (WDFW stocked rainbows in 2006) and the fact that spawning seems marginal at best, I think these are just really mature fish from the 2006 planting class. I've caught big old rainbows like this one and the ones that Russ posted in the Sierra before. Think WDFW says they stock from two different strains of rainbow, too.

Those are some quality fish you're getting up there. First those wonderful silvery cutts, now these red banded rainbows. Yunno the High Laker's 20+ thread once had two posts from the High Sierra, one of which lost its photo when the host website vanished, but the other one (ie the one that wasn't mine) is exceedingly interesting because it is a rainbow from a trailless lake in Yosemite. Off trail enthusiasts examining the photo will figure out which one.

Matt,

What about the orange under the jaws? Never seen that in a rainbow.

Mike

I would lean more towards your trout being a cuttbow than a rainbow due to the crimson slash under the jaw and the large spotting toward the tail. Rainbows don't have the slash, and the spotting on the tail region of most rainbows is more uniform in size, not like the larger spots on the fish that you caught. Cutts have the larger spots closer to the tail. Pure goldens do too. Of course, Snake River Fine spotted cutts are the exception to this rule, but your fish certainly isn't one of those. All the same, it was a really nice fish and it sounds like a great trip. Thanks for sharing!

Oldranger and Dave, you guys were right! Talked to a prominent member of the Trailblazers and Hi-Lakers groups in Washington and he confirmed that the fish is indeed a Westslope cutt in spawning colors. Apparently this lake has a small population of self-sustaining cutts in addition to receiving rainbow plants in 2006, and golden plants in 2012. Thought this was a really old rainbow, but guess not!

Pretty fish. I thought I'd caught rainbows that looked like this before, but now that I go back through my old photos I realize that even those mature big rainbows with the deep red stripe had consistent and smaller spotting all the way along their backs. Nice to start getting into different species up here.