# Uinta Brookies



## dank80 (Oct 31, 2007)

I decided to make a detour on my way to work yesterday. I ended up in the Uintas and just happened to have my fishing gear, float tube, and waders in the back. Hmmm, how did they get there? lol. Wanted to do a bit of exploring and ended up at a lake I've never been to. The forest service map I picked up and the fee station wasn't super detailed and I had to a bit of searching. I ended up getting into some pretty hairy stuff in my Equinox, the type of roads that need an atv or a truck with some clearance. The Equinox doesn't have a ton of clearance. I scraped and scratched and banged the underneath of my vehicle so many times I'm surprised it still drives. Not to mention a few new racing stripes.

I arrived at the lake to find that it had better than average brookies with a few hold overs. No big-headed snakes either. They were in really nice shape. Most were 12-13 inches with a few around 14 and one at 16. They were some beautiful fish.
[attachment=2:vdx7wti1]Brookie1.jpg[/attachment:vdx7wti1]
[attachment=1:vdx7wti1]Brookie2.jpg[/attachment:vdx7wti1]
[attachment=0:vdx7wti1]Brookie3.jpg[/attachment:vdx7wti1]
The weather was perfect. 75 degrees, clouds to shade me from the sun but no rain, no bugs, and best of all not another soul in sight.


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## Caddis-n-Cutts (Sep 28, 2007)

Good looking fish. Isn't it strange how the gear just ends up in the vehicle and nobody knows why or how?

I always sneak in at least a spinning rod every time my wife wants to go for a picnic.


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## HighmtnFish (Jun 3, 2010)

Awesome, I love those kinds of detours.


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## Jackalope (Oct 30, 2007)

Nice! I'm just getting started with my Brookie addiction. Last weekend I struckout on my very first Uinta Brookie trip.


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## brookieguy1 (Oct 14, 2008)

Deleted


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## brookieguy1 (Oct 14, 2008)

Seams like most the Uinta lakes have above average brook trout this year. The reason is because none of the Uinta lakes were stocked with brookies last year due to the Kamas Hatchery incident. The results are impressive. I have been finding fat Uinta brookies exceeding 18". Hopefully the DWR will learn from this and slow their stockings down to alternate years. I'll take fat brooks over stunted snakes anyday. They need fisherman input to decide which lakes need a booster-stock. I know I'll give them my findings!
Oh, nice fish dank80!


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## cfbiologist (Apr 12, 2012)

Brookieguy,
Give me a call sometime, I am the Uinta lake Biologist for the Northern Region. I gladly take info about angler finding.
Wes Pearce
801-725-4122
[email protected]


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## brookieguy1 (Oct 14, 2008)

cfbiologist said:


> Brookieguy,
> Give me a call sometime, I am the Uinta lake Biologist for the Northern Region. I gladly take info about angler finding.
> Wes Pearce
> 801-725-4122
> [email protected]


Thank you! I'll be speaking with you.


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## Bax* (Dec 14, 2008)

Wes, Im glad to see you taking an active role on this forum. Your insight is very appreciated on here.


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## brookieguy1 (Oct 14, 2008)

Bax* said:


> Wes, Im glad to see you taking an active role on this forum. Your insight is very appreciated on here.


+1 his insight is invaluable! We should start seeing some vast improvement in brook trout fishing in the Uinta Mountains. From this year on, all brook trout stocked will be sterile. This is BIG! The problem in the past with brook trout is that they were fertile and in many lakes became prolific and reproduced to the extreme of becoming stunted, a condition where there are simply too many mouths for the body of water to feed. Now with the sterile fish, numbers can be controlled. It also gives the DWR another species to compliment the cutthroat restoration going on without having to resort to those damned (sorry) tiger trout. 
It's a win-win in my eyes. Bigger brook trout in the Uintas without any negative affects on the cutty restoration. Sure beats the "no brook trout" approach some fisheries folks are headed to. Brook trout may not be native to Utah, but by gawd they sure belong here!


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## dank80 (Oct 31, 2007)

That is good news. It will be nice to have quality brook trout fishing without having to travel 4+ hours to get there.


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## HighmtnFish (Jun 3, 2010)

brookieguy1 said:


> Seams like most the Uinta lakes have above average brook trout this year. The reason is because none of the Uinta lakes were stocked with brookies last year due to the Kamas Hatchery incident. The results are impressive. I have been finding fat Uinta brookies exceeding 18". Hopefully the DWR will learn from this and slow their stockings down to alternate years. I'll take fat brooks over stunted snakes anyday. They need fisherman input to decide which lakes need a booster-stock. I know I'll give them my findings!


There are many lakes on the Boulder that are overstocked. I wish the DWR would stock them every other year or every 3 years. It would save the state some money and improve the quality of fish in many of the lakes. A lot of the lakes on the Boulder are stunted because of overstocking and not because of overpopulating. Hopefully, they plan on planting more sterile brookies on the Boulder as well. I would like to see what sterile Brookies do in some of the cutthroat lakes too.



cfbiologist said:


> Give me a call sometime, I am the Uinta lake Biologist for the Northern Region. I gladly take info about angler finding.
> Wes Pearce
> 801-725-4122
> [email protected]


I am really impressed that you would be willing to listen to what the anglers have to say about the Uintas and take Thier opinions into consideration when managing the fisheries up there Mr. Pearce
Would the southern biologist be willing to do the same thing?


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## Ifish (Aug 22, 2008)

Great looking fish! It's lucky you were prepared for the detour! 8)


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## LOAH (Sep 29, 2007)

Haha, beating up the car for some fish? Sounds familiar!

Nice work, dank80. Anything over 12" in the Uintas is worth the trip. Nice detour.

And a big thumbs up to cfbiologist for welcoming the angler insight.


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## tye dye twins (Mar 8, 2011)

cfbiologist said:


> Brookieguy,
> Give me a call sometime, I am the Uinta lake Biologist for the Northern Region. I gladly take info about angler finding.
> Wes Pearce
> 801-725-4122
> [email protected]


I applaud the fact that you would listen to BG1 on his findings. With that said please don't pay too much attention to his narrow mined views on the awesome tiger trout.  :lol:

Some of us like them very much.


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