Lost River Outfitters

The outfitter’s page for this water leads on its hatches: Brown Drake and Trico emergences that it says draw anglers from around the world, followed by hopper season. Large rainbows and browns feed on mayfly hatches all season long, and the sheer variety of what comes off puts a premium on presentation and fly selection rather than on covering distance. The water is described as a preserve, and the combination of abundant hatches with large, healthy trout is what makes it both challenging and worth the trip. One tactic gets singled out that shops rarely advertise: spending an evening on the creek pursuing large browns with a mouse or a streamer, fished when the light has gone. Guided days here are wade trips.

Lost River Outfitters also guides the Big Lost, and splits it into pieces: the lower tailwater below Mackay Reservoir, the upper meadow streams and tributaries of Copper Basin above it, and a private leased beat of about two miles below the dam that can only be fished with one of the shop’s guides and carries a rod fee on top of the trip. Rainbow and cutthroat trout are the primary targets, with brook trout and the occasional Arctic grayling in the upper tributaries. The hatch list the shop publishes for the drainage runs to stoneflies, caddis, pale morning duns, blue-winged olives, crane flies and tricos, and the emphasis is firmly on dry fly water. The Big Lost is also one of its two winter fisheries alongside the Big Wood: midges are the most prolific cold-weather hatch with a few baetis showing in early spring, nymphing carries most days, and dry fly fishing opens up whenever the air climbs above freezing.