Strawberry good to us ... 1-13-04

Utah Fishing Reports & Discussion Utah Fishing General
1

Decided to experience a BUNCH of firsts today in the world of ice fishing. Most of you know that I haven’t gone ice fishing much and, until today, I have never caught a fish on Strawberry.

Bait_Caster picked me up at Sportsman’s at 5:00 AM and we headed for the Berry. Got there shortly after 7:00 and used his sled to get us, our ice hut, and equipment out to a little bay where there was only one other guy fishing.

We set up camp to try out BC’s new Clam Fish Trap 2 ice hut, new Mr. Heater, my newly converted fish finder (from my boat), and a hand full of new rods and reels.

Thanks to some advice from MGB and others, we had an AWSOME day. I had no clue Strawberry had such nice trout in there.

BC’s first drop iced a nice trout before I could even get rigged up! In fact, he kept me so busy unhooking fish, he had five and I still hadn’t rigged up!

We decided to count fish today. Normally, I loose count after about 5 but today, with BC’s help, I can report that I iced 22 fish and BC iced 24.

Frankly, I don’t remember having that good of a day fishing ever in my life … at least for numbers.

BC’s new Fish Trap ice hut was fantastic … very well built. Mr. Heater sure did the job.

Man, those cuts were sure beautiful fish! Not one who know my trouts, I am guessing that they were cutbows. But I’m not sure.

It was cool to watch BC’s Aqua-View. It was fun watching fish and even a big old crawdad. We were fishing in about 32 feet.

We had one heck of a time getting out of there. There was about a foot of fluffy cold snow on a good 11 inches of ice. We had a devil of time getting the snow machine to get any traction on the ice. Finally, BC had to take one sled at a time (we had two) up to a hill side before we could hook up the train to get going.

As others have reported, it was one gorgeous day out on the pond. Cold (-8) but beautiful.

So, anyway, where those cutbows we were catching?

[inline BD-Cutbow-400.jpg]

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Note: BC added a handfull more pics further down in the thread … check them out.

2

Nice Report . Coot , I have never caught a Cut-Bow from there . I really believe there is none .

3

UH OH, now you’ve gone and done it!! Your Hooked! Now comes the hard part, dividing your time between the Berry and the Bear. Both have nice fish and both are a bit of a drive.

Glad to see you had a good trip out on the ice. I have been missing out on the Berry fever for a while but I’m going to get up there this year. I hope anyway.

4

Heck yes there are Cut-Bow’s in there, in fact the biggest fish I’ve ever caught in Utah was there at Strawberry…a Cut-Bow right off the bank a few summers back. I was using an ultra light with 4 lb. test, and right off the bottom with a crawler. As it was sinking, I set my pole down and WHAM…
10 or 15 minutes later I banked a nice fat 8 lb. Cut-Bow.

It was funny, because my brother rushed right over to fish in my ‘spot’ and didn’t catch anything. When I finally rigged up again, I cast out and immediately caught another 2 lb. cutthroat. I vaguely recall my brother muttering to himself about how lucky I was. : )

Haven’t been there in a few years now, but the 'Berry remains my favorite Utah fishing lake.

5

Sir Ralph, they were genuine Bear Lake Cutthroat trout. Not much in the way of hybrids up there. The DWR tries to keep only sterile bows in there so that there won’t be any cross breeding. They also have more color than those caught at Bear Lake…BLM will whine and gripe and moan, but deep down he knows the Berry produces way more quality cutts than the ol Bear can. Heck a good day on big blue will net you 10-15 fish, when a good day on the Berry will net you 70-80 fish! Silly BLM, you will soon have to change your name to BCM (Berry Cutt Man)![;)]

Glad you guys had such a good time Ralph.

6

I used to think there were a bunch of Cuttbows in there, because the only bows I caught seemed to have a little red under the tongue…the DWR has recently cleared this up and said that the bows (pure sterile bows) have the same slash. They are trying to simplify the regs so people know they are catching bows, and not a fish with Cutthroat markings as the regs now say, which by the letter is a ticketable offense.

7

After all the time I have spent chasing big fish at Bear Lake and not doing so well any more, I got thinking today,“boy, I sure have been missing out on a fantastic fishing lake. Maybe I should expand my options to other lakes as well.”.

:astonished: :astonished: :astonished:

8

I didn’t realize you had never been there before! Im glad you got a chance to experience the great fishing at the Berry!

I’ll be there on Monday.

Randy

9

Very nice report Cooter, I’m glad to see that you and Terry were able to get out on the ice. Great pictures also, so can we assume that you are hooked on the Berry? LOL Great job guys.

AFdan52

10

Nice report Ralph, sounds like a good time on your first ice fishing trip to the berry. It’s hard to believe but those fish are Bear lake cutthroats but they are. They have more color than the BL cutts but the last I checked, the DWR was saying, if they have a orange strip under their throat they are cutts. At lot of people call them cutbows but I’d say 90% plus were cutts.
On a different note, it’s about time for the BL cisco run.:sunglasses:

11

Its about dang time you made it up there. I have offered to take you and Terry up there for some soft water fishing but could never get you guys to go.

Glad to hear your trip was a success. Its hard to beat the berry that place can be addicting.

12

Great report! The Berry sure is a fun place to fish. Glad your 1st experience there was a great one. Any big fish today? (22" +):sunglasses:

13

Good for you guys ! Way to get it done !

I’m sure you will be back at Strawberry now that you know it can be a good time. I’m glad you were able to get some info from MGB, he sure knows how and where to fish that pond well.

I could be wrong, but those fish look like cutthroats to me.

14

Right you are Fishhound , they are Cutts . Sure are a lot of folks that think they are cutt-bows . I have caught some cutts with very little orange on the fins which could make it hard to identify for some . This is what a real Strawberry rainbow looks like . Notice the white trim on the red fins . Most bows don’t have this red of a fin too .

15

That there is a pig bow. :sunglasses:

It’s hard to tell in the pic, but in person, it was way fat too.

16

Nice looking bow Randy, is that a recent catch or last years?

17

I remember seeing that hawg! Thats the biggest and only bow I have seen come out of berry this year. It was 24 inches wasn’t it? Thats what I hope to catch at least one of this year. I have not caught a bow out of the berry for years.

18

I had such a great time with Coot at the Berry, I just wanted to Chime in: Coots not been one big on ice’n for fish, so after talking him into hitt’n the Berry with me for some fin, it couldn’t have turned out better! Once there & set up, it was bringing up Cutt after Cutt to the Hard deck. Sweet:

[inline The_Berry_1st_Trip.gif]

Its was amazing how much fight!, & color they all had, Beautifull to say the least.

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It was all that other BFT posts, had been saying and more! Just keep us busy all day hooking into some good fighting fin.

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There were times when Coot and I were both fighting Cutts at the same time, and getting them to the ice deck without getting tangled was a real chore, My hart’s still pounding!

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By late afternoon we had braught to the ice deck, a total of 46 nice fight’n fish, It was tuff to want to call it a day, with that kind of action under your feet. So we decided to catch 1 more each, then head off. Coot nailed #22 as I nailed # 24 for the day.

[inline 24th_Fish-today!.gif]

You can bet Coot likes ice fishing a lot better after this kind of Ice Action, Glad you decided to join with me in a day on the Berry Coot. It was fantastic! The weather was great, the fiahing was fantastic, & the company was the Best!
Were Hooked on the Berry. What a good fishery this is. You can bet we’ll be back. “note” All 46 fish were released unharmed.

19

Hey great pics Bait Caster. Thanks for sharing. [:)]

20

Man, that bite is a light one! Like Fish4fun stated over on another thread, your line just “changes” a little bit … a tiny bit more tension or a tiny bit more slack. Just keep in mind that hook sets are free. Anything at all different about the line … set that hook!

I was also quite impressed with how dependable our 6 lb. test line was. I am always a bit leery about break-offs … especially where I am used to 14-20 lb. But with the drag set just right to give, everything seemed to work very well.

I am definitely re-thinking this ice fishing gig … especially where you (Bait_Caster) are footing the bill for all that fancy ice fishing equipment and snowmobile. :face_with_tongue:

Definitely a big thank you Brother!