Fish Lake

Overview

Fish Lake lies at more than 8,800 feet in the Fishlake National Forest of central Utah, the largest natural mountain lake in the state, in a long glacial basin with Fish Lake Hightop above the west shore and the Lakeshore National Recreation Trail along the east. It carries Utah's Blue Ribbon designation and a reputation for very large lake trout, or mackinaw, which the Forest Service says can exceed 50 pounds. Splake, the brook trout and lake trout hybrid, are the fish most fly anglers target: they patrol the weed edges and the inlet at Twin Creek and take streamers readily. Rainbow trout, kokanee salmon, yellow perch and tiger muskie round out the list. There are no tiger trout in Fish Lake; the striped hybrids here are muskellunge, and a 24-inch trout or salmon of any species counts as your one big fish for the day. Perch are the forage base and the winter attraction. Ice fishing pressure has passed summer pressure over the last decade, with safe ice usually from New Year through March and Highway 25 plowed to the lake. Once the ice is off, the weeks into June are prime: splake and rainbows are shallow, and a black Woolly Bugger or leech on an intermediate line along the weed line at first light is the standard approach. Chironomids and Callibaetis take over on the flats through summer, and the mackinaw drop deep. A mile southwest of the lake on Highway 25 is Pando, a single aspen clone of more than 40,000 stems across 106 acres, thought to be the heaviest organism on earth, and in late September the whole basin turns gold.