The Blue River flows out of Dillon Reservoir and offers fantastic rainbow and brown trout fishing. It’s just one of 42 excellent trout waters around the state. Photo by Brian Strickland

If you’re a Colorado angler, spring is time to get ready to do some serious trout fishing. Anglers from all over the world make it a point to fish the great rivers and lakes that hold good populations of rainbows, browns, cutthroats, brook and lake trout.

The Colorado Division of Wildlife (CDOW) lists 42 quality trout-fishing waters, at least 12 of them awarded Gold Medal status. These 168 miles of Gold Medal streams are managed to ensure populations of big fish and provide outstanding opportunities for large trout.

There are also lakes and streams that haven’t made the list of notable trout waters. Yet these spots produce great results that only local anglers and guides know and talk about.

One such location is pristine Hermosa Creek by Durango Creek, where Andrew Todd of Colorado Trout Unlimited fishes. It shows trout diversity, but is also a very good spot for Colorado cutthroats.

Let’s try to catalog some of the Colorado hotspots, and how to fish a few with flies, lures or baits.

SOUTHEASTERN COLORADO

Beaver Creek and Clear Creek Reservoirs
Beaver Creek in the South Fork area provides good action on rainbows for shore-anglers using PowerBait, salmon eggs and lures. Trolling produces browns and ’bows. Fly-anglers prefer the “dead chicken” wet fly. Ice-fishing is popular during the winter.

Clear Creek, best known for its ice-fishery, produces excellent year-round catches of nice-sized browns, rainbows and cutthroats. Guide Don Alan, of Your Colorado Fishing Partner, lists Clear Creek as one of his favorite streams. He said the Creek is not a large mountain stream, but is bigger than most. He recommends fishing the stretches of pocket water created when Interstate 70 was built.

“They put in stair steps, and there are some pretty decent pools in some of the sections,” he said.

Clear Creek fishes well up to about the end of April and mid-May when snowmelt begins. Then you might as well wait until the end of July before you get good fishing again.

When fishing flies, he recommends either a 4- or 5-weight rod. Depending on the type of pocket you’re fishing, you might let the fly drift through or strip it back. Elk Hair Caddis, Royal Wulffs and Parachute Adams are recommend dry flies. If you fish a dropper fly below the dry fly, use a Copper John.

Pikes Peak, North Slope Reservoirs
Just outside Colorado Springs, three picturesque reservoirs along the Pikes Peak Highway boast good populations of rainbows and cutthroats, and an occasional brookie. Large lake trout can be caught from Crystal Creek and North Catmount. The waters are generally ice-free and fishable from May to October.

Arkansas River
The Arkansas River, a freestone East Slope river, begins above 10,000 feet and runs through the city of Pueblo. It’s a great river for attractor-style fishing with nymphs. July is premier fishing time. The busiest time occurs in late April and early May when a caddis-fly hatch is in full swing. But hatches throughout the year make this a consistent fishery.