The Spinney Reservoir Tailwater of the South Platte

This week's business trip to Salida suggested we might have time to make a detour on the way home through South Park.  That mountain plateau area of Colorado is home to the headwaters of the South Platte River, one of the state's very high profile streams.  It's also the site of Elevenmile & Spinney Reservoirs, two of the better large trout & pike stillwaters in the area. (Although I packed a kayak on the car, the lakes didn't look worth visiting this time around.)

A brief summary of the trip is as follows.  The Arkansas was still running high when we arrived in Salida, and having an hour to waste before my meeting with the county Assessor, I stopped off at the bridge into town & cast to some water previously fished.  Too much flow prevented accessing much of the best shore pocket water, but the browns we could find did respond to #16 & #18 hair wing caddis cast close to shore.  Soon a red quill hatch began and that made for even more action.   No fish were large, but we probably touched a dozen or so in that loose hour of time.

After the business meeting we headed North on 285 towards Buena Vista & the turnoff up to Trout Creek Pass & South Park.  The thunderstorms followed us - and stayed with us all the way to the main parking area for the tailwater of the Platte below Spinney.  Only one other idiot fisherman sat through the storms for the next couple of hours, but once the rain stopped, a half mile walk upstream revealed some fishy mouths on the surface of some pools.  For the next twenty minutes until the sun reappeared we caught a half dozen 12-14" rainbows & browns.  Boy did this seem easy pickings, but was I ever to be surprised.

Once the sun came back to the water we were completely shut out for the next two hours.  I had no clue what to do.  After gulping down dinner and waiting for the sun to go down, things changed again.  The short fading light window of opportunity yielded a couple more rainbows & a fat 18" brown on large surface caddis with other missed strikes.

That night we slept in the vanagon at the upstream parking area of this short tailwater section.  I'd guess it's about five miles total between the two reservoirs for this stretch of stream.  The following morning we hit every pool & riffle hard and tried all the flies in the book.  To make a very long story short, I fished about eight hours this day and maybe touched twenty fish.  It's the hardest I've ever worked in my life for that little success.  Most were rainbows & in the 12-14" range.  But talking to fishermen afterwards it appeared we did reasonably well as most other folks averaged only five fish on the day.

The conditions can be very difficult here.  Releases from the dam disturb the water below, throw sediment, and wrench aquatic vegetation into the flow.   Best success this day was on a #20 CDC winged RS-2 with an occasional take on the caddis strike indicator.  As the water became roily, a change to a tiny bead head caddis emerger proved more productive.  The night casting was nowhere as good as the previous day & I only touched two more fish before hitting the hay.

Today was a complete reversal.  It's one of the top 20 finest days of fishing I've ever had in my life.  The dog & I were awakened at 5:15 this morning by a lone fisherman driving into the parking area, donning waders, & sprinting to the water.  That suggested it might be in my best interests to do the same, so after a short hike to loosen the joints, Sky & I hightailed it down to a favorite bend we'd fished the previous day.

Sure enough, a few casts brought two nice rainbows of 14" & 16" to hand - all to that tiny RS-2.  But after that, the next thirty minutes were a bust.  But then some big heads started peeking from the film, and the real action was on.  I could not believe the quantities of nice trout that were suddenly seeking something on the surface.  There was no sign of any kind of active hatch, but a fly of some type was aggressively tweaking their interest.

Eventually I surrendered and tied on a surface x-caddis of the new style with no hackle, but the complex body dubbing - size 18.  It did the trick in spades.   Admittedly there's no chance of a strike on every cast on a stream like this full of P.H.D. level trout.  But in the next hour on one short stretch of the creek, I landed a good fifteen fish.  Most were rainbows in a range of 12-16".  Two other bows were between 17-19".  The best fish of the day, and one of my best ever, was a log of a brown that had to be between 22-25".  It's truly bizarre to find a fish of that age, size, and supposed intellect taking a caddis on the surface like any rookie fingerling.  Anyway I appreciated him (and it was a him), patted him fondly, and blessed the day he rose to my fly.

Leaving this particular area because of the plethora of fisher people who suddenly arrived (there's at least one body on every run during the day), I found a delightful piece of stream down below and had it totally to myself.  It's amazing given the pressure this tailwater gets, that people completely ignore water that just looks "different".  It proved to be wonderfully productive although the fish were smaller.  All ten or so I released here were between 12-16" and all were rainbows.

My god it was fun.  To go to a place that's so heavily hyped by local outdoor writers and have this much success in between dozens of other fishermen truly is one of life's great experiences.

Mostly for my future reference there's another supplementary sheet of information on the insect life and fishing tactics needed for success on this water that can be reached by clicking here.

Home, Main Fishing Page, Stream Flows, , 1999 Archives, Eagle River Access,                 Local Ten Commandments, Successful Fly Patterns, Search For Something