Ep 110: Fishing the Alpine Backcountry, with Mark Merritt
Mark Merritt is a diehard alpine angler who spends most of his summers high in the backcountry fishing alpine lakes. When he’s not chasing cutthroats, he’s scouring the internet, books, and reports to find his next spot. In this episode, we talk about the resources he uses to plan his backcountry adventures, what he loves about the remote alpine setting, the gear he brings, and how to be a good steward of the resource.
Instagram: @thedirewulff
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Katie
You're listening to the Fish Untamed podcast, your home for fly fishing the backcountry. This is episode 110 with Mark Merritt on fishing the Alpine backcountry. Well, yeah. If you listen to the show, then you know how I start things off. But I always just start with a background of my guests to find out how they got into the outdoors. So tell me how you got into the outdoors and into fishing.
Mark
So I was born and raised in Virginia in kind of like the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains. I think my first fish was like a, probably a bluegill or like a tiny little sunfish maybe fishing corn under a bobber with an ugly stick at Boy Scout camp. I was probably like 10 years old maybe. And I was in, I was in Boy Scouts growing up and just kind of being in that area. You know, there's plenty of time to be spent outside but fishing itself really didn't take up a huge bunch of my personal time until college. I went to College of Virginia Tech, so not far from where I grew up. And I moved in with some guys up there, one of which who I became incredibly close with, still incredibly close with, shout out to my boy JT. He was a big fisherman and his kind of deal was a lot of kayaking, kayak fishing, bass, sunfish, every now and then we'd go try and catch a muskie. Never caught one, but the hunt was always fun. And a lot of that was kind of centered around the New River 'cause that was, you know, that was our local kind of watershed. So a lot of warm water species, almost exclusively on spin gear at that time. We would go out and target trout every now and then, but just, we were kind of stuck on the river and that was just our thing. But that kind of got me into spending my free time fishing and just understanding fisheries and how it all works. Graduated college and moved up to the DC area for a couple of years. Kind of did the same deal up there, kayaking on the Potomac. We'd go chase stripers sometimes. That was always fun. But DC wasn't really my scene. I was working a government contractor job, you know, getting up at 4.30 in the morning, putting on a suit every day. And that just wasn't really me. And I had a bunch of buddies living out in Colorado at the time. So after, I think, two years in DC, I quit my job, put everything in a truck, and just headed out here. My buddy had a spare bed in his apartment and I had no job or anything, just kind of shooting for the stars. I was kind of more driven by like snowboarding and kind of the winter sports aspect of the outdoors back then. So that was a huge draw to coming out here, being able to play around in the snow. I was doing a lot of kind of like off-road exploration, four by four roads and stuff like that. And that's kind of where I first found like high lakes. And I had spin gear at the time. I kind of was poking around with spin gear. And I had a fly rod in college, but you know, as college kids do, you know, you're working hard, but partying much harder. And it met its fate getting closed in the car door, like so many rats do. And as a college kid, I just never spent the money to go buy one. But after a few years out here, kind of poking around the lakes with spin gear, I figured it was time to go buy another fly rod and kind of get back into the swing of that. So I went out to Bass Pro, I think one day, and got like one of their out of the box setups. And the first place I took it was on a 15 mile backpacking trip with my wife and her sister and some of their friends. It was a, I think it was a seven and a half foot four way, but it was a two piece. So the things like super long in this tube. That was the first backpacking trip I had been on probably since Boy Scouts. So I was totally unprepared. I was using like a 45 liter back country ski touring pack as my backpack. I had this huge rod strap on the side of it, but we went out to a wilderness area kind of on the front range outside of Denver. And when we got up to this lake, I put this rod together. And I had, when I fly fished back in college and back East, It was very sparse and definitely not anything complex. So getting, rebuying gear out here, I kind of just, you know, I didn't have anything to, I didn't have any flies, I didn't have any stuff. So when I was at Bass Pro getting that kind of out of the box setup, I bought, you know, a couple of random flies. I think I had an elk hair caddis or something like that. Tied that on and walked down to the lake and threw it out there. And I saw a fish come by. I was like, oh man, is he gonna eat it? He stopped and looked at it, didn't eat it, threw it out there again, you know, threw it out there a couple more times. Eventually a little brookie came up and ate it. And I reeled him in and I had a net with me, had him in the net, tiny little brookie, you know, six, eight inch brookie. But that dry fly, he just got me so stoked. So I was kinda suckered in at that point. And I actually, a buddy at the time who saw photos of a couple of little brookies that I had caught on that trip and he was doing a bunch of alpine stuff. And he was like, "Hey, let's get out on a hike." So I ended up getting up with him one day. We went up on the West side of the Continental Divide to a lake out there and fished the whole day. I was watching fish ignore me left and right. I didn't catch a thing. And he only ended up with one, but at the end of that day, that one he reeled in was probably one of the reddest cutthroat I've ever seen, just lit up. And that was the first cutthroat I'd ever seen. And so that was the nail in the coffin. As soon as I saw that, and spending a day at 12,000 feet fishing for those kind of fish, that sealed the deal. And that was, I think, 2018. And then that very next winter, I ended up shattering my ankle into a million pieces snowboarding. So I had a whole lot of time through the winter to kind of sit around and be inside. And that just went straight down the alpine fishing rabbit hole, looking up species of fish and different places and stocking reports and looking at maps and reading books. And just, you know, that was what I did. I couldn't put weight on my foot for four months. So sitting there on the couch, I had plenty of time to research and just get myself completely addicted. And that's exactly what happened.
Katie
I hesitate to say I'm jealous of you 'cause I don't wanna shatter any of my body parts, but I wish I had an excuse to look at maps for four months straight and not feel bad about it.
Mark
Yeah, I still do the same now and I'm fully able to walk, so.
Katie
I'm also glad to hear that I'm not the only person who started with a two-piece rod, but was still trying to force it onto long hikes. I still have it, but I started with a two-piece five-weight because I didn't know that four-pieces existed. I was determined to carry it wherever I went, instead of just borrowing the many four-pieces I had access to through my friends. I remember doing the same thing, where I would haul up this giant thing. I would carry it sideways across my body and not be able to fit through trees and stuff with it. Now it doesn't get fished very often for that exact reason.
Mark
I'm looking at my tube here in the corner and it is the very last rod in the corner all the way against the corner, which means it hasn't gone out in a very long time.
Katie
Yep, I know how that feels. But that's cool that you have kind of, I feel like in just a couple years, really gone from zero to 60 with some of the trips you're doing now. I don't know where all you've gone, obviously, but it seems like you get out a lot to a lot of these more remote lakes and are really kind of embracing that new freedom you found and the cool fish that you can find up there.
Mark
Yeah, it's completely taken over a huge portion of my life. And as anyone who knows me, they're like, "Oh, why don't we see you in the summer? And what have you been up to?" The answer is always, "Working and fishing." But yeah, just being up in those places is kind of healing for me in a way. just, you know, getting out and even the, you know, the challenge that it takes to access some of them is kind of its own physical beast in itself. So that is actually a great way for me to keep my ankle from rusting. It's got, you know, six pins in it now. So the doctors always say motion is the key. So I'm gonna keep moving it as much as I possibly can.
Katie
So what is your favorite part of that remote setting? I'm sure it's a little bit of everything, but there's exercise, there's the fish themselves, the fact that sometimes it's a little bit easier to catch them, and then some of the pressured rivers, and obviously the beautiful scenery. But if you could pinpoint one thing that really draws you to that kind of fishing, is there something that really stands out?
Mark
Picking one would be tough, but I'll give you a couple.
Katie
OK.
Mark
First is definitely the challenge. I go out on the river all the time. I drive up to places all the time. No shade on any of that type of fishing. But I've definitely drawn to the not everybody's going to go hike a couple of miles, five, 10, however many miles back, or spend the night sleeping in the cold or sleep in the car to wake up at 3 a.m. and start hiking in the dark. And so with that kind of extra effort comes the extra reward of the solitude and seeing these places that not a lot of people see, seeing these fish that not a lot of people see. It's great to, I do IT work for my day job. So I'm in front of screens from the time I open my eyes I shot them. So being able to unplug and get away from screens and internet and, you know, the, the craziness that takes up our mental space these days, um, is wonderful. The scenery is second to none. You know, I, I send photos back home to my parents and stuff like that. And they're just like, this is America. Like these places exist in, in the U S and I'm like, yeah, it's wild. Right. And just the, I feel like it's always constantly changing up there. You know, you might go to a lake one day and catch 30 fish and you go back the next week and you don't even see one. And so it's kind of never the same, even if you're going back to the same places. So just the kind of the constant change and development of it all is exciting and keeps me on my toes and doesn't let me get comfortable.
Katie
Well, I'd like to pick your brain a little bit, I guess, on, you know, how you do it, what your gear setup is, how you plan and all that, because I like to hear everyone's little tips and tricks. I feel like I'm constantly looking for ways to improve, you know, like my gear setup and how I go about finding places. So maybe start with how you go about finding spots and obviously don't, you don't need to share, you know, any specific spots you found, but just, you know, if you're, if you're itching to go to a new spot, you know, walk me through the process of how you're going to find a spot, figure out if there's fish there, figure out what you might want to use and how to get there and all that.
Mark
Yeah, well, the nature of these fisheries, you know, they're only, a lot of them are only accessible for, you know, three, four, maybe five months out of the year. And, you know, like I said, I get out on the river all the time. I do, you know, alpine's not my only deal, but it's definitely the bulk of what I do and the bulk of what I like to put my efforts into. So a lot of my time, more time than fishing, spent researching, looking at maps and all. There's so much out there, especially with the internet these days. And I feel like my process kind of really falls out into three pieces. And the first of those pieces is definitely the internet, scouring blogs and I mean, wherever you're looking to go, there's so much on the internet that these days, you'll probably be able to find something. You may not find stocking reports or blog posts from someone who's been there in the last two years. But with everything that's out there, with various mapping platforms and satellite imagery and trail reports, I'm looking at snow tail data from Colorado snow tail sites to see what's melting out faster than other areas. I'm looking at, you know, I'll look at trail reports from all trails to see who's been walking around in the area, you know, even if it's not a trail I'm going on, you know, maybe someone hiked up the next basin a couple weeks ago and they've got conditions on the snow or something like that. And then there are those kind of like treasure trails of information. I mean, Colorado publishes a lot of their stocking data, definitely not all of it. But if you dig enough out there, you can find it. There's sampling studies on certain lakes. You know, they might not be the most up to date, but they're out there and they're valid. Weather, weather's a big thing. There's so many apps and programs these days where you can keep an eye on, you know, I can dial in. I don't, it's proven to be fairly accurate, but even getting a forecast for somewhere above 11,000 feet, I mean that, You know, years ago, that was unthinkable. So that's a big part. The second piece, I would say, is reading books, picking up like an actual book made out of paper. I feel like a lot of people these days kind of assume that like, well, if it's in a book, it's probably online somewhere too. So you know, I'll just, you know, dig hard on the internet and be able to find everything. I've found tons of valuable information in actual paper books. And sometimes it's not the most recent, sometimes it is. I know you had Ron Belak on the show in the past and I love his books, his books are awesome. So I spend a lot of time reading books, sit there with the highlighter and highlight names of places that look interesting, or if there's something that says, "Oh, I caught a 18-inch cutthroat," and something, something, something. I might take a picture of that with my phone or highlight that in the book or notate that down some way. So definitely books, not to be overlooked. And then the third, and I've kind of feel like I've gotten more information this way than any other way, is just talking to people. And that could be anything from like someone you see standing at the lake you're going to fish someone on the trail, somebody at the trailhead, at the fly shop, maybe you're like sitting at the bar having a beer one night, you got a fishing shirt on and someone's like, oh cool shirt, you know, strike up a conversation with that individual. They might have all kinds of information that would be prevalent to what you're looking for. And then, you know, local game officials, ask CPW, ask the people that, you know, should have the answers to the questions that you're asking. And then social media is definitely a big part of that. Fly fishing online and blogs and Instagram and TikTok and all that has kind of exploded in the last, you know, five plus years. And I think there's, you know, some good and bad things about that, but it definitely opens up a forum to kind of meet like-minded individuals, you know, talk to folks that you wouldn't necessarily meet in other ways. And social gets kind of muddy sometimes in those areas. I feel like these days it's kind of evolved into, we'll keep it PC, we'll call it a fish measuring contest. It's kind of like a trophy cabinet for a lot of folks. And that kind of sucks away some of the fun parts of it. But I try to not let that detract from, you know, actually meeting cool folks. I've met a lot of nice folks, not necessarily all fishermen. Sometimes it's a backpacker or a trail runner or just other hunters, people that like to spend time in those areas. Just talking to those folks gleans a ton of information.
Katie
Yeah. So tell me what your thoughts are on good versus bad use of social media and phishing. Because for example, we met over social media and there's quite a few people that I've met via just like direct messages on social media that I talk to regularly now or fish with or whatever. But in general, my attitude toward it is kind of like negative. Like most content, I'm kind of like, is this just being created for the sake of content and attention and the spot burning and all the different negative things that come with it. So what are your thoughts on kind of like a good and/or responsible use of social media in helping fishing in a positive way versus kind of the negative sides of it?
Mark
Yeah, um, you know, sometimes I think about that stuff, especially when I'm posting photos of fish or, or, uh, you know, thinking about backgrounds and stuff like that. A lot of the content that I share, uh, will you'll usually be looking at a fish and not much else. Usually not a background. Sometimes I'll show the place, but it's very rare that I'll show the fish and the place in the same photo. So I might show a place that doesn't have any fish in it, but it looks really pretty. Maybe I'll show a place that has some fish in it, but you're not gonna catch me holding a 20-inch cutthroat with a big old obvious background in the back. And I'm not here to tell anyone that the way they're doing it is wrong or to kind of shake my finger at anyone. Some of these things I think will prolong the life of the fishery. Some of these fisheries are pretty fragile. They're in places where the growing season's incredibly short. A lot of them are dependent on regular stocking from CPW. Some are not, but I think a lot are. And so just anything we can do to keep these places wild. And I think a lot of it is also to not spoil the adventure. Right, like I'll have people reach out and be like, "Hey, you know, you just posted a photo "of this great looking fish, "like where can I go and catch something like that?" And like, yeah, I could tell you where it came from, but you know, kind of what I was saying about all the research, like more than half the battle and more than half the fun really in my mind is, you know, going down the adventure yourself and doing the research and figuring out where you could go. And, you know, the good ones aren't so good if you don't hit a couple of bad ones in between and you kind of got to pay your dues. But just a couple of the things that are big no-nos for me and a lot of this is really obvious, and I'm not here to talk to the, there's always the folks that are, you know, I've been up here doing this for longer than you've been alive. And you're going to tell me that- you're going to come out here and tell me what I'm doing is the wrong way. I'm not talking to those people. I'm more here to just kind of speak my piece and what I believe. And if that influences some other folks, then wonderful. I know there's a lot of people that- you might post a photo holding a fish, and then you get grilled for holding it the wrong way. And this person's like, I don't even know how to hold the fish. Why are all these people so mad at me? So to just kind of talk about it in a light of not pointing fingers or calling people out. But a lot of these fisheries in the summer, these fish don't have a big spawning window. So finding spawning fish in these alpine lakes is not, you know, not uncommon at all. Not casting to spawning fish is a pretty easy way to help them exist and continue to exist for everyone else. Snagging fish, you know, there's a certain lake, and I'm not, you know, I'm not couple years I've been up to and every year I'm just more amazed by, you know, the first year was, you know, four or five people standing up there throwing big streamers at spawners and the next year it's six or seven. And I went up there this year and it was like elbow to elbow people standing on the bank of this lake above 12,000 feet, you know, throwing big barbed flies at these fish that are trying to do their thing in the shallows. And it just makes me a little sad. I think there's always going to be those places and those people. But just to see it kind of slowly growing every year and not necessarily doing the opposite of that is no fun.
Katie
How easy is that lake to access? I know you said it's above 12,000 but you know can you drive close to it as a short hike or because I don't feel like I ever see like elbow to elbow elbow people at lakes that are kind of far enough off the beaten path but I don't know if you know this is like a famous area where people are like yeah that's where you're gonna catch like 24 inch spawning colored up cutthroats or something and that's just like drawn people.
Mark
Yeah I think that's definitely the case it's not incredibly hard to get to it's it's in in the vicinity of some 4x4 access stuff, which, you know, that's kind of how I found out on Lake. So I can't, you know, no-no people for driving up to Lakes. But I think I almost wish that, you know, if CPW is not going to have a presence up there or really manage those type of areas, when they start stocking, I mean, I don't know, I would almost rather them not stock something that's next to the road that's going to enable people to do things that I think they probably shouldn't do that CPW probably thinks they also shouldn't do. But you know I'm not a biologist. I don't stock fish. I'm not I don't make those decisions. So that's just kind of my view on it.
Katie
It feels kind of like a hard decision there because I feel like an answer could be that you could just stock like brook trout in there and they're not going to grow, you know, you're not going to get like a 20-inch colored up spawning brook trout. You're going to get like probably an 8 to 10 inch, you know, zillion of them. But then you don't have the, you know, the native fish put in there. So there's kind of like, what do you want? Do you want the arguably like the "better" fish to put in there, but then you get all these people coming in and kind of destroying it as a resource? Or do you put the not as desirable fish in there, and you know, they're not native, but you don't, the population isn't being torn to shreds by people come in to get like content so I don't know like I don't know which one's better but it seems like those are kind of like two of the options that aren't just not stocking it.
Mark
Yeah I'm not a huge fan of putting non-native fish where native fish could thrive.
Katie
But if they weren't there originally anyway you know there's also kind of the argument if that lake was barren naturally does it really matter? I don't know these are just all you know thoughts that I feel like they're probably thinking through. I'm sure CPW has to weigh this out for basically every lake they stock and you know they're gonna do what they're gonna do.
Mark
Yeah absolutely and I'm you know I don't want them to not stock because people don't don't know how to behave because that just ruins it good for everyone.
Katie
And I know you had mentioned before we started the argument that you sometimes hear about like what's the problem they're just stockers like what are your thoughts on that if you know these are just stocked fish. Some of them are not native, some of them are, but at the end of the day, most of them are stocked fish. So, you know, do you get that argument that they're just stockers and like, why do you care about them?
Mark
Um, yeah, I think that's kind of, you know, maybe more of an excuse that some people want to use when they get called out for doing something that they maybe shouldn't have been doing. Um, and my view on that is just kind of my view on the whole thing really is I'm not so much worried about a lake or a fish or a population, but something that just enables people to do those things and not really have consequence for it might encourage them to do that in other places that aren't so easy to access. Or if people see somebody posting photos or videos of content doing stuff like that, then it just kind of perpetuates the idea that it's okay to do. And so, you know, whether it's a stalker or whether, you know, you might stumble onto one of those lakes that does have natural reproduction and, you know, then it's not a stalker. But I guess my view is it doesn't really matter if it's a stalker or not. Treating the fish with respect and the area with respect should kind of come first and foremost, at least in the way I see it.
Katie
Do you see abuse of the resource much when you are talking about one of those more remote lakes that takes, I don't know, I would say that I feel like once a lake takes three to four miles of hiking to get to, I start to see the people up there as generally like good users of the resource. Like I don't run into a lot of people, you know, six miles back that are just being assholes. Do you, do you feel like you have like noticed where there's a threshold of, you know, the people who make it this far tend to treat things right? Or have you noticed that same pattern?
Mark
Yeah, definitely the further back you go, the less, you know, I think those people that just kind of want the photo of their big cut that they can slap on, show their friends or brag about at the bar or whatever, are usually not as motivated to get back into those places that, you know, are, you know, three, four, five, 10 miles deep. So definitely the further you go back, it tends to be the way that people get. And I've ran into folks on lakes this year that were, you know, we were five miles back and I see some folks fishing across the lake on me all day and end up walking around the lake and run into them and it's, you know, folks that I had actually been talking to for years on the internet about fishing. And so, you know, it was like, oh, you know, great minds think alike. We're in the same place at the same time. And, you know, you don't see a lot of shenanigans out there.
Katie
Yeah. So tell me about your gear setup. Because this is probably what I'm most interested in. I'm like very confident in my ability to find lakes and go fish them. But something I'm always trying to improve on is my backcountry setup. Because for me, it's the net. And I know there's things in the works that are going to hopefully make that easier. But tell me how you carry like a lightweight setup into the backcountry and still have it be fully functional for catching the size of fish you want to catch.
Mark
So I kind of tailor it whether I'm on a day trip or I'm backpacking. I tend to do more day trips than backpacking a year just because I've got to work five days a week. I'll squeeze in a hike, you know, after work if I can slide out a couple hours early, I'll go climb up something. So my day setup, I do a 32 liter day pack. I think it's from, it's sitting right over there. I think it's from R.I. Nothing fancy, but it's got straps on the sides. Those are a big deal for me to, you know, strap rods and nets too. I always carry two rods, you know, any number of miles is too many miles to walk to break a rod and then have to be done for the day. So always two rods, but I still have them in the same tube. So I fish a nine foot, Right now I fish a nine foot six weight. I'm looking to bump that up to a 10 foot just for a little bit of extra reach. Went out to Pyramid Lake this year and actually got to fish my first switch rod setup and fishing, I think that was an 11 and a half foot. And just noticing the extra reach that a couple extra feet gives you was amazing. Especially in, you know, roll casting when you're backed up against a bunch of trees standing on the edge of a lake. So I think a 10 foot six way is gonna be my sweet spot, but I've fished a nine foot six way for the past few years, no problems. I tend to stick with floating line almost all the time. I know a lot of guys will bring the extra spool of sink tip to strip buggers or bigger streamers. I'll sometimes use like a sinking leader to achieve that effect, but I don't carry a spool of sinking line. I just use regular weight forward, six way floating line. I've got it run up on a hatch five plus, which has been butter smooth for me for years. And then as far as flies go, I carry every, all the flies. I know some guys try to dial it down to like a single box of what you're gonna use here. I'm indecisive chronically. I think I bring, I've got a box that's kind of designed for alpine still waters. Half of it's probably leeches. The other quarter of it's probably chironomids and scuds and then stuff, you know, kind of in between that and the subsurface realm. Then I've got a whole box of dries, you know, tons of foam. The late August this month is my favorite month in the alpine. For August, the thing that gets me fired up the most is fishing big foam, dry flies. Chubbies, Amy's ants, hippie stompers, anything you can tie a big, not necessarily a big, but a tungsten weighted J-dropper off the back is my go-to dry dropper. Outside of the pure fishing gear, I always take an extra pair of socks. I've used them more times than I want. Quick dry pants are huge. I've fallen in the lake plenty of times trying to net a fish or balance on a log or whatever. And the weather changes quick up there, so being wet when it gets cold and windy is not fun at all. So quick dry pants. I bring an extra shirt because usually the first thing I do when I get up there is change out of my sweat soaked shirt from hiking up there. So having an extra shirt is great. Gotta have a rain jacket. Wouldn't go up there without it. Polarized sunglasses makes a huge difference in sight fishing. What else do I carry?
Katie
Do you bring waders?
Mark
Sometimes. Very, very, very, very sparsely.
Katie
Okay. That's about, that's probably like the same amount I bring them.
Mark
There's a select few lakes that I know when I get there having the waders you know might make the difference between a great day and a skunk and when I go to those places I'll tend to just hike in in the waders which you know makes for being extra sweaty and hot when you get up there uh but kind of lightens the load on your back a bit um and I'm not a fan of wet feet so like standing in my hiking boots in the in the lake is usually not my preferred method. I'll, I do a ton of wet wading, maybe some crocs or like a pair of tacos or something and just, you know, hop in. Depending how leech infested the waters might be, there's a couple lakes that I know I want to wade and I know that I can't get in them safely without waders. So I'll bring them to those spots. But if I can wet wade, I'll usually, I'll usually wet wade.
Katie
Yeah, I feel like that's a problem that sometimes can be solved with looking at satellite imagery before you go. Like if you see that there's a shelf, and sometimes this you can't tell from the satellite imagery because you can't see how deep the shelf is, but you know I've been to lakes where the shelf goes out like 60, 70, 80 feet and the fish are all hanging out right on the edge of that shelf. So if you don't walk out on the shelf like you're not going to hit them, especially if you've got brush behind you. I mean the shelf might only be 30 feet out, but if you have to roll cast then you know you still might be limited. And you know if the shelf is two feet deep and that's great. Like I'm going to wet wait. If the shelf is three, four feet deep, then it starts to get pretty chilly. Like if you're up to your waist in some of that Alpine water, like that's not going to, you're not going to be able to be out there for very long. And a lot of times you can't really tell until you get up there because you can't see what the actual nature of the shelf is and whether the fish are on the edge or on top of it. But that's a way that sometimes I can figure out whether I'm bringing waders because if there's no shelf, then I'm not going to bring them because I've got nowhere to wait anyway. But when I do, I feel like a pair of Tevas on the waders at least saves the weight of boots. But that's something that I'm hoping someday someone invents like a super lightweight pair of waders that's also not going to tear the first time you wear them. Because that's I feel like that's a need that can't really be filled by anything else. If you've got a wade, you've got a wade. And I don't think there's really a good solution for that yet.
Mark
Yeah, I've seen some stuff flown around. They look kind of more like, you know, first iterations of products, but I have seen they almost look like waterproof leggings, but I don't know how effective they might be. But hopefully, yeah, in the future, that would be definitely something worth the space in my pack.
Katie
How often do you find that you actually need to use all the flies that you bring? Or not all of them, obviously, but I feel like when I go to an alpine lake, I'm either casting one fly and catching 100 fish on it, or I go through my entire box before I find something that actually works. There's not a lot in between. How often are you having to sort through a whole bunch of flies before you find something that works?
Mark
It's kind of like your experience. Either you tie on your tried and true and you get it out there and it's working, it's great, or I'm sitting there digging through trying to figure out what's working. Sometimes I find on those days that nothing's working and you dig through your whole box and at the end you're just as empty-handed as you were at the beginning and then I'm sitting there like, "Hmm, maybe I should have just kept fishing the leech in the sky." I find it tends to be more about depth and retrieval speed and those type of things than whether you've got a blue or a red chubby sitting out there. So, the way you drag it across the water if you're fishing a dry fly, are are you dead drifting it or are you stripping it? Do you have a dropper on it? Is it so low? You know, size always plays its part. But yeah, I didn't have the same kind of experience where it's, you know, either I find that one and it's working and it's working really, really well or I'm digging through all of them. But that definitely doesn't stop me from bringing all of them. And it's usually not a, I've had, you know, sometimes you have those days where anything you throw out there, they're just gonna whack it 'cause they're just hungry and that's what they wanna do on that day. But those days are definitely not the majority. Those tend to be few and far between, although highly celebrated when it does happen. It's always fun to, you get one six to eight feet down on a leech and then, or you get a couple and then you're like, oh, well, let's see if they hit the dry. And then they start hitting the dry and you're like, "Oh, let's see if I, you know, sink a bugger and strip it, if I'll hit that." And they start hitting that. And those are always, you know, the perfect days we're searching for, but those don't tend to be the majority of days up there.
Katie
Do you find that that happens more on dry flies than nymphs? Because I feel like for me, it's usually the dry flies that they're extremely picky about, if they are super picky. It's like, I could go through all my dries and they might be rising, but they just don't want anything. Or have you found it kind of across the board that when they're being picky, they're being with dries and nymphs and streamers and everything else?
Mark
I'll sometimes run into cases where, you know, they're more picky on a certain presentation than others. Usually, in my experience, when they're picky, they're kind of just picky and maybe that's, you know, me not giving them what they want. You know, maybe I should expand my offerings a little bit more. I'm not the most for someone who carries way too many flies. I'm not like incredibly dynamic. Like I'm not gonna fish a leech with a gold head and get refusals on that and then switch to like a leech with a black head and think that's gonna make you know all the difference. Maybe sometimes it would. But usually if I'm making a change it's gonna be kind of a drastic one.
Katie
A big change like change the size or the shape or the color or something. it the whole fly that's going to be different.
Mark
Yeah. Yeah, for sure.
Katie
Well, last thing I kind of want to actually, there's two things I want to touch on before we wrap up. One is, is there a like particular kind of backcountry experience that you like the most? Like, it seems like you really like the Alpine lakes. I don't know if you do any backcountry streams or anything like that, but you know, what's your perfect scenario, your perfect backcountry day, like walk me through, you wake up and you've got one full day to have your like backcountry dream. Where are you going? What kinds of stuff are you looking for? What kind of fish are you targeting? Just kind of walk me through that.
Mark
If I've got one day, ooh that would be tough. I hope I never hit that point where it's only one day left. If I've got one day, I'm definitely going to a lake. I enjoy the streams as well. I honestly don't know what it is is about the lakes. It just kind of draws me. I know, you know, the fish tend to be a little bit bigger in lakes, but that's not, you know, a hard fast rule. There's plenty of big fish in streams too. And sometimes you can, sometimes the little ones are more beautiful than the big ones. But if I've got one day, I'm going to a lake, it would probably be, you know, on a day trip, I try to keep it under, you know, 12-ish miles, just so I don't, you know, like I said, my foot's kind of jacked, but just so I don't blow myself to smithereens. But I would like to get, you know, out there, kind of like how we talked before, you know, I kind of believe the further out you get, kind of the better experience you get at least in terms of the things that I'm looking for. So somewhere with some solitude, I'd love to be the only one up there. Cutthroat, you know, native cutthroat. I kind of go back and forth between, you know, what's my favorite, you know, they're all, all three Colorado native species are beautiful in their own right. Recently I've kind of become partial to Rios. of something about that, you know, orange-ish glow they tend to have is just, you know, really eye-catching and their spotting patterns kind of tend to differ a little bit. So if I've got one day, let's say we're going, you know, somewhere in southern Colorado above 12K, we're looking for rios in a lake, you know, five or so miles back. I'm the only one up there and they're just loving, you know, whatever it is they're loving, I have found it, be that a dry or a leech. And those are just kind of the perfect days you look for. I feel like when you're setting out to do a bunch of alpine, your success rate, you can't really expect like a massive success rate. You're not going to go to, you know, 10 lakes in the summer and knock it out of the park every single one. And so just finding a couple of those really amazing days each year where, you know, the weather's right, you're in the right place at the right time with the right bug and the fish are just on it, you know, it really doesn't get much better than that.
Katie
And is this like you'd be going late summer? Is that your, you said that August is your favorite month to fish?
Mark
Yeah, especially down south, you know, August and September is even good down there. The warm tends to stick around a little bit longer than it does further north in Colorado. So yeah, August is definitely my favorite month. Maybe late August, so you can go out there and throw the really obscenely big drives.
Katie
Yeah. Last thing I wanted to ask about is this isn't things that you've invented necessarily, but just your best practices for how people can the backcountry well. I know we touched on it a little bit before with like some, you know, what not to do not to throw big streamers at spawning cutthroats elbow to elbow. But you know, if you're going to give someone some advice who's maybe going to venture into backcountry for the first time, and it's used to just driving the car to some pull off fishing and getting back in, but now they're going out into kind of this more pristine wilderness area like what, what are some recommendations you'd have for just treating the place with care and leaving it as good as you found it or better?
Mark
Yeah, leave no trace is huge. You know, pack in what you pack out. Don't, you know, even, you know, we're all guilty of cutting some tippet and it might get away from us, you know, even just trying to keep a hold of your, you know, chopped tippet or ruined flies that you're gonna toss at the end of the day or, you know, baggy corners from your snacks that you're eating, you know, leave a no trace and maybe even leaving it a little better than you found it if you see something laying on the ground, you know, pick it up and take it out. You might, you know, maybe, maybe you put some good alpine karma out there into the world for yourself and find yourself a big fish for hauling out a bunch of trash. I practice catch and release, especially in those areas. That's not to say that, you know, there aren't places in the backcountry where you can go harvest fish. I'm not against harvesting fish. Sometimes fish harvested. But practicing catch and release definitely works. There's been more than one occasion where I've caught the same fish again later that season or even the next season. And that's always a really cool experience to, you sit there and you're holding a fish in your hand and you're like, "Oh, this guy looks kind of familiar." And then you go back in your photos and you're like, "Oh yeah, I found him last year." Or, "I ran into this this guy a couple months ago and he's still out here, you know, sucking drives off the surface, just happy as can be. So it's cool to see, you know, kind of your efforts working in a sense like that. So I practice catch and release, especially in those areas. Keeping the fish wet, keeping them in the water, you know, keeping them, you know, if you're gonna take a photo, take them out of the water for a couple seconds, get your photo and put them back in there. you know, minimal handling is always best. I was kind of saying before a lot of my photos, you'll just see a fish and not much else. Usually that fish is sitting in the net in the water just to, you know, give the fish every possible chance it can have. Proper reviving of fish, you know, you don't wanna, obviously you don't wanna play a fish, you know, to exhaustion, but if you got a huge fight on your hands and you get a man and you take your photo, don't just toss them back in the water and assume they're gonna be all right. Spend some time, brush them some water over them, try to oxygenate their gills. When they're ready to go back, they'll let you know. And seeing a fish swim off strong is always a great feeling. And then there are just some of the kind of day-to-day things you can do to just be mindful of where you are and how lucky we are to get to go into these places and just treating everything with respect. treat it, you know, like you were, like you'd want someone fishing in your backyard to treat it. And hopefully if, you know, if the majority of folks kind of do that, then these places will live on to be enjoyed by people for years and years and years and years.
Katie
That's a, I think that's a good way to end it. Well, Mark, where can people find you if they want to follow you on social media or if they want to reach out? I don't know if you have an email you want to give out. It's fine if not, but if you have a social media handle that you want to share, feel free to do so.
Mark
Yeah, I'm on Instagram at the dire wolf, W-U-L-F-F, like Lee Wolf and the fly. That's pretty much the only place to find me. I'm not on Facebook or Twitter, TikTok, or any of that stuff. But, you know, I tend to post what I'm kind of doing at the time, and then as I get kind of stuck in the winter, I'll flash back to the summer and start digging old alpine stuff. So if you want to see some alpine stuff in the winter, we share that in common. And don't hesitate to reach out, you know, like I was talking about earlier. Talking to folks is, you know, I have fun meeting new folks and just kind of chatting about fishing and love to hear from anyone who wants to talk about alpine or anything like that.
Katie
Awesome. Well, Mark, I appreciate you coming on here. I know we just basically met via an Instagram message. So it's cool to, you know, see you in person, well, quote unquote, in person over video and get to know you a little bit. And I just appreciate you taking the time and working with me through the internet issues that we're having.
Mark
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much for having me on. You know, like you said, we kind of met through a DM talking about Alpine and this kind of just spurred up. But, you know, I've been listening to the pod for a couple years and, you know, some of the guests you've had on here are super awesome and interesting and to kind of be sitting on the other side of it and sitting here recording with you is kind of surreal but super awesome. So thanks a ton for having me on. I really appreciate it.
Katie
Absolutely. It was great talking to you. All right, that's a wrap. Thank you all for listening. If you want to find all the other episodes as well as show notes, you can find those on fishuntamed.com. You'll also find the contact link there if you want to reach out to me and you can also find me on Instagram @fishuntamed. If you want to support the show you can give it a follow on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcasting app and if you'd like to leave a review it would be greatly appreciated. But otherwise thank you all again for listening. I'll be back here in two weeks with another episode. Take care, everybody.
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