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Our "Mountain Streams" include such gems as Racehorse Creek and Cataract
Creek, as well as numerous other streams (that will go unnamed) that flow into the Highwood, Oldman, Crowsnest, and Castle rivers.
These streams may have not gained the notoriety their bigger siblings have,
but they are no less wonderful fisheries, and in many ways provide the "ultimate" fly fishing experience. Most of these streams
are perfect places to get started in fly fishing, as there's no shortage of hungry trout. At the same time, the older and
larger residents have been around enough to challenge even the most advanced angler, so whether you're just starting out or
looking back on a few decades of fly fishing, SW Alberta's mountain streams are about the closest thing to perfection as you'll
find. Another bonus is nearly all these streams are easily wadeable even in hip waders.
Racehorse Creek has excellent fishing throughout for cutthroat, bull, and the odd rainbow trout.
Cataract Creek is most widely known for its plentiful population of willing brook trout, but provides
good cutthroat fishing in its lower reaches.
Other streams have managed to "stay below the radar" and have virtually no pressure, which is a treasure
to be carefully guarded...so we won't name them here. We fish streams where the average size runs from 6-14 inches, and
we fish streams you can step across where larger cutthroats to 20+ inches rise willingly. In almost all these streams
Alberta's native predator, the bull trout, prowls the pools and rocky walls.
Days of 100 or more fish are a fairly regular occurance on many of our mountain streams, but of course each
fishery and experience is unique so be sure to communicate to us if you prefer quantity or fewer but larger fish.
Mountain Streams Fish Species:
Cutthroat trout
to about 18-20 inches (larger ones present but very rare)
Rainbow trout
to 12-16 inches (only present in a select few streams--occasionally
you may encounter a Bow River spawner over 20in)
Bull trout
to 26 inches plus
Brook trout
(Cataract Creek and some Oldman tributaries)
to 12-14 inches
Mountain
whitefish
to 14-16 inches
Trip Information:
You may choose between full-day trips or all-inclusive multi-day mountain
stream tours. Please see our Trip Information page for what is involved in each and current rates.
Your day will start and end in Pincher Creek or Calgary,
or a meeting place en route to the river. If you do not have your own transportation, we can arrange to pick you up at
the Calgary airport or your hotel--call for availability.
After arriving at our stream of choice, we'll walk a ways before starting
our fishing, and spend the rest of the day plying the structure, banks, runs and pools with our flies. Most days we will fish
with dry flies only or a dry/dropper tandem rig. Of course, stripping a wooly bugger or other streamer through the pools can
result in a lot of excitement with larger predatory cutts or bull trout.
What to Expect:
Mountain stream trips usually mean a day spent walking in and along small, easily-crossable rivers. There are abundant,
wild cutthroat in most of these streams, and it's quite easy to lose yourself in presenting dry flies and landing scrappy
cutts. Days of 50 to 100 fish are common, though 25-50 is probably more "normal".
Expect beautiful forest settings and spectacular vistas. And in some of our unnamed streams, expect to be blown
away by the size of the fish. The image on the header of this page is an example of a nice but only average-sized cutthroat
from one of these SW Alberta lesser-known streams.
Mountain stream trips are my (John) favourite trips to guide...mainly because they are often remote, filled with eye-candy,
and our clients always leave with this permanent joy-induced grin on their faces after a day of playing in paradise.
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