After I first moved to Idaho, practically 1 / 4 of a century in the past, I used to be fascinated with the state’s wild coronary heart. Dwelling to the biggest wilderness space within the Decrease 48 (the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness — the genesis of mighty Salmon River), and essentially the most roadless acreage of any state within the Union, save for Alaska, I used to be awash in a need to see all of it.
In fact, that’s a pipe dream. Whereas I’ve seen my good share of Idaho, a lot has eluded me, and as I grow old, realization is setting in. I’ll by no means see all of it. I’ll by no means get sufficient. However there are corners of Idaho that I’ve seen which have eluded most everybody else. That’s some solace, I suppose.
And, after all, once I arrived right here on the tail finish of the Nineties, I’d heard of the state’s storied rivers. On a job interview, previous to transferring right here as a transient journalist, I talked a newspaper editor into floating me down the South Fork. One of many first issues I did once I arrived a 12 months or so later was boldly march into the Railroad Ranch on the Henry’s Fork, simply to see what all of the fuss was about.
Predictably, I left with a hefty respect for the river’s huge trout that had been clearly a lot smarter than I used to be. And I’ll freely admit that they’re nonetheless fairly damned good. They’ve made me a extra affected person and considerate angler, although, and I can normally maintain my very own on that river.
However — and I’m attempting to determine the best way to put this with out upsetting plenty of my fellow Idaho anglers or disillusioning aspiring Idahoans who wish to come right here to expertise these “bucket-list” fisheries — that’s not the actual Idaho.
The actual Idaho doesn’t begin and finish with a drift boat hatch in a tailwater river. Nor does it present up as a fabled river that’s practically hammered to dying each summer time by anglers who simply have to attempt their luck in fly-fishing graduate faculty.
The actual Idaho? It’s someplace approaching the state’s center, away from the ever-encroaching ooze of hip from locations like Jackson Gap or Solar Valley. It lies not a lot in a geographic locale, however moderately someplace with some notable Western funk … someplace the place we haven’t messed round an excessive amount of, or thrown issues too far out of whack.
If somebody had been to inform me that Mackay, Idaho, is the actual Idaho, I’d have a hell of a tough time disagreeing. And if that very same somebody had been to inform me that the Huge Misplaced River is the fishery that anglers are on the lookout for when they give thought to what Idaho is like from afar, nicely, I’d agree with that, too.
Now, don’t misunderstand. The Huge Misplaced isn’t some excellent trout stream because it flows off the shoulders of the Pioneers. It’s austere trout habitat that possible fishes finest early within the season when the massive cutthroats and rainbows run up from the decrease reaches of the higher river above Mackay Reservoir to spawn. Excessive summer time within the Huge Misplaced excessive nation isn’t actually for anglers a lot as it’s for folk who simply wish to get misplaced. It’s born from distant freestone “cricks” with names like Wild Horse and Star Hope. Within the coronary heart of Copper Basin, the place these little streams come collectively and make the Huge Misplaced, it feels just like the set of a forgotten John Wayne flick. Even immediately, some 25 years after first venturing into its higher reaches, the Huge Misplaced stays principally a thriller to me.
Nevertheless it’s such a cool thriller.
How so? Properly, to be trustworthy, the Huge Misplaced shouldn’t be a trout stream in any respect. Technically, the river’s solely native salmonid is the lowly mountain whitefish. And these whitefish are particular. That’s as a result of the Huge Misplaced and some different streams that stream from the Centennials, the Pioneers, the Boulders and White Knobs are “sinks” drainages–they actually disappear into the sand of the Snake River Plain. They by no means ever meet one other river. That implies that for 1000’s upon 1000’s of years, the mountain whitefish of the Huge Misplaced have advanced on their very own, with no genetic refreshment from whitefish in rivers just like the Snake or the Wooden.
These fish, for millennia, had been on their very own.
After which Idaho occurred. Mining and timber operations confirmed up within the late 1800s. The river was dammed above Mackay, and the poor previous Huge Misplaced whitefish immediately had firm. Properly-meaning fisheries managers launched non-native rainbows and equally non-native Yellowstone cutthroat trout. Browns and brookies had been introduced in, too,, and the whitefish of the Huge Misplaced began to go away.
After which progress took its toll on the launched trout, too, with fish ending up in hayfield irrigation ditches or worse, stranded in puddles because the river was dewatered and diverted for agriculture. About 40 years in the past, the Idaho Division of Fish and Recreation began an effort to decode the mysteries of the river and, with a bit of luck, work with irrigators and water districts alongside the commonly distant waterway to do all the pieces they may to maintain fish within the river. The trouble was largely a monitoring one, however, with assist from personal landowners, nonprofits and federal businesses just like the U.S. Forest Service, just a few ditches have been screened and a few diversions have been improved to maintain fish from changing into “entrained.”
Some ditches aren’t screened, however F&G and USFS staffers dredge the ditches with electrofishing gear yearly and put the fish again within the river. It’s a labor-intensive course of, and, frankly, the river and its fish deserve higher (however these efforts might have postpone the demise of the Huge Misplaced’s particular whitefish–greater than 13,000 of the native fish have been “salvaged” from sure dying in irrigation ditches through the years).
And the efforts have, for higher or worse, labored. In 2012, Fish and Recreation documented about 200 trout (not whitefish, thoughts you) per mile. In 2022, that quantity had jumped to about 800 trout per mile. Take into accout, the Huge Misplaced isn’t precisely “huge” water. It’s miniscule when in comparison with the South Fork or the Henry’s Fork, so 800 trout per mile is definitely fairly respectable. And Fish and Recreation might be most happy with the fish numbers which can be turning up above the reservoir, which traditionally rises and falls on the whims of irrigators yearly.
Over time, it’d seem to the typical angler that F&G has turned the Huge Misplaced right into a grand experiment. First, cutthroats and rainbows had been launched to “improve” the fishery. Then, the favored Hayspur pressure of rainbow trout was launched into Mackay Reservoir, the place they grew huge and burly. Finally, of us began calling them Mackay Magnums due to their propensity to leap from the water as in the event that they had been shot out of a gun. Then, as efforts ramped as much as take away non-native rainbow trout from the South Fork of the Snake River–about 100 miles east–the division began relocating these fish to the Huge Misplaced.
Fish and Recreation seems dead-set on its present course, as high-maintenance as it’s. And the outcomes are promising, even because the purist that also dwells deep in my soul and wonders what it could be like if the river was by no means manipulated and if the river’s whitefish had been left alone to prosper. However that’s simply not the Idaho manner, rattling it.
The Idaho manner? The heavy hand of human manipulation continues to play its function. And Fish and Recreation will play its function, too.
“We imagine that by means of fish salvaging and altering stocking practices we’ve got been capable of enhance the variety of fish on this fishery and enhance fishing for anglers,” reads a current division press launch. “We’ll proceed practising fish salvaging each upstream and downstream of Mackay Reservoir, stocking Yellowstone cutthroat trout, and translocating South Fork rainbow trout to the higher Huge Misplaced River basin to make fishing higher for Idaho anglers.”
And which may be essentially the most Idaho clarification anybody can supply. In a state that continues to be, largely, an undisturbed paradise, the prevailing notion hasn’t modified a lot over the past 40 years. The “we are able to make it higher” method has some help–the angling neighborhood within the Gem State loves the Huge Misplaced, each above and under the reservoir. And anglers clearly love these well-known Mackay Magnums and now these South Fork rejects and the continued plantings of non-native Yellowstone cutthroats.
However the place’s the love for the whitefish? It could be essentially the most Idaho fish of all of them.
