More trout for the Lower Mountain Fork
A Lower Mountain Fork rainbow. Photo by Donny Carter
The trout fishing should be better than usual on the Lower Mountain Fork River over the next three months.
At least there will be more trout than usual in the Lower Mountain Fork, Oklahoma’s most popular trout stream.
Over the next three months, an additional 14,400 trout will be stocked in the McCurtain County river. These fish are in addition to the normal number of trout that are added in the river every two weeks by state wildlife officials.
The extra trout are being provided to the state Wildlife Department by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in mitigation for building Broken Bow Dam.
When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers builds a dam on a river to make a lake, the federal government must provide compensation to offset the loss such things as fish habitat and fishing opportunities.
In this case, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will provide more trout for the Lower Mountain Fork, one of two year-round trout streams in Oklahoma.
Those fish – in addition to what the state already buys and puts in the stream – means 40,000 trout will be released into the river over the next three months.
Additional stocking dates are scheduled for Jan. 27, Feb. 10 and 24 and March 10 and 24.
Now the trick is to get them to bite.
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Comments
Mark, The Lower Mountain Fork at Broken Bow, Ok. is a great “tail water” trout stream. It has good wading and is barbless fishing. There are rainbow and brown trout. There are two good fly shops. One near the stream and one right on the highway by the turn off that goes to the stream. They are operated by good people and at least one of them offers guide service. It is a fun and challenging stream to fish. It is better to go during the week instead of the weekend tho. On the weekend it is almost “combat fishing” there are so many fly anglers there. There are also a few spots for “non-fly anglers too. They sometimes migrate into the fly angler only area, so you have deal with that. It is not legal for them to do that, but hard to stop them of course. It is catch and release there, but you may keep “1″ trout if it is over 20″, if you want. The non-fly fishermen may keep “6″ as long as they are smaller than 20″. My personal best at Mountain Fork was a 21″ rainbow! I was excited about that!
There is one other year round trout stream also. The Lower Illinois River. It is another tail water stream that comes out of Lake Tenkiller, up by Gore, OK. It is a very long stream and has rainbow and brown too. The bad thing about the stream is that the generating dam is almost always generating! So I have just about quit going there. Seems like everytime I get there they are generating and I have made a long drive for nothing! It is almost like when they see a fly angler show up, they start generating! The state fisheries has promised to make the area better, but they have done NOTHING!!!!!!!!!!! So much for their promise. When they are generating the river can be as high as 18ft!! Try wading that!
Anyway, I hope you get to try Mountain Fork. It is not a San Juan, but it is a good place and it is pretty there. There are also lots of cabins in the area to rent and there is camping right next to the river too.
Good luck.
Dan
This comment is for Ed Godfrey. Ed, when is the Lower Illinois going to be a good place to trout fish again???
I used to like going there, but not anymore. The generators are going all the time or they stop during the night and start again at 7a.m. till around 2 or 3p.m. Very frustrating! It is a 2.5 hour drive to get there for me, and I do not mind, but I want to be able to fish! I hate the drive to Mountain Fork! That is 4.5 hours for me! I have to spend the night cause I do not want to spend 9 hours on the road and fish for only a few hours!
Help us anglers Ed!
Dan
I sure would like to get together with a few of you all and make the trip to the Mountain Fork for a few days! Split the cost of lodging. Like I said, I have only been fly fishing about 4 times but have fallen in LOVE with it from my time at the San Juan! I am here in OKC so I imagine that the trip would be a good 3-4 hours as well?? I would like to go with some experienced fisherman from that area so I could learn the lay of the land! Any idea of the name of the fly shops in that area that offer guides??
Dan, the last time I checked with the state Wildlife Department about the improvements to be made on the Lower Illinois River was in November. At that time, they said the project was on hold for the very reason you are complaining about: the water releases. Fishing is not the top priority for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and state wildlife officials say they have to work around the generation schedules. I will check again. Mr. Framel, a good source of information about fly fishing in Oklahoma would be our two local clubs, the Prairie Fly Fishers and the 89er Chapter of Trout Unlimited. The Web site for the Prairie Fly Fishers is http://www.prairieflyfishers.org. A link to the local Trout Unlimited chapter also can be found on the Web site.
Also, the Three Rivers Fly Shop in Hochatown does offer guided fishing trips on the Lower Mountain Fork River, http://www.threeriversflyshop.com. Tell them I sent you.
To Ed and Makr, Thanks Ed for the info about the Lower Illinois. I know it will be a long time before things can be arranged for a good constant flow stream. Maybe not in my life time! But somewhere down the road.
Makr, As Ed said above, Three Rivers Fly Shop is one of the ones I mentioned. Great guide service and fly shop. Jess and Linda (the owners)are very nice people and try to help every angler with what ever they need. Their phone number is: 580-494-6115. Be sure and check out their website that Ed gave above too.
I will try and give you a shout next time we head that way. Maybe you can join us there.
Dan, I visited again today with Barry Bolton, chief of fisheries for the Wildlife Department, and asked about the Watts project on the Lower Illinois.
Bolton said the state intended to start making those improvements last year, but the flood damage and subsequent repairs that had to be done on the Lower Mountain Fork River forced the delay.
The Watts stream project should begin sometime this year.
Ed, thank you sir for taking the time to check on it for all us anglers. I am hoping that Lost Creek re-work starts pretty soon too. It would be nice to have that back.
Has the Wildlife Dept. considered stocking trout in the Oklahoma River in the winter. I hear they are attempting to make more of an effort to provide “Close to Home” fishing there. It would seem a better fish habitat for trout than Dolese Park.
That’s a good question. I asked the Wildlife Department about that and received some interesting answers. Check out my column Sunday. I am going to write about this.
I sure would like to read an article that gives in depth detail about all the fly fishing spots here in Oklahoma. I am from NM and I make it back a few times a year to fly fish in the San Juan. Place is amazing. I really have hit an end in the road when I have searched for real “quality” waters to fish here in Oklahoma. I am talking about wading, barbless hooks, catch and release, fish 18 inches and over. I wonder if there is any place like that here?? Can you help us out??