South Slope!

SOUTH SLOPE REC from Jamie Roth on Vimeo.

I think we stumbled on the answer of how to establish a silly good fishing pond full of beautiful aggressive fish..... All you have to do is close the place for 101 years!

The South Slope was deeded to Colorado Springs Utilities in 1913 and has been closed to the public ever since. Ben and I heard about the reopening this month and Ben was lucky enough to get a pass! This pass, to me, was just about on par with Pearljam tickets! We knew the fishing would be good but we had no idea just how good it would be.

From Colorado Springs Utilities: "The South Slope watershed lands consist of approximately 9,000 acres located on the south side of Pikes Peak. Elevations range from approximately 10,000 feet to more than 12,000 feet. Although the site is located within 10 miles of the western end of Colorado Springs on a direct line, the watershed lands are situated in a remote setting and requires approximately a 2 hour drive that includes narrow sections and rough, unpaved surfaces.

The South Slope watershed is a diverse and biologically rich landscape. Sub alpine and Engelmann spruce forests rise above fens and wetlands. It is home to bighorn sheep, cutthroat trout and an array of migratory birds. Recreational opportunities are designed to be as low impact as possible to protect sensitive areas. Future allowable activities will include hiking, biking, equestrian and fishing in McReynolds and Mason Reservoirs only."

The future is now!

I had seen Dave Herber posting some great pics from the first two weekends so I hit him up for some advice before we went and as always he did not disappoint. Basically the message is, fish Mason Res (about a mile hike from the parking lot) and use big dries and/or streamers. Sounds good!

It was good before we even started fishing. We had a nice layer of fresh snow to stomp through on the way to the lake. It was a nice surprise. We had a beautiful morning and started hiking just as the sun hit the snow. Really pretty hike to the lake.

We took Dave's advice and started out with streamers but we never got to the dry flies. Why!? you ask... Because we didn't stop catching fish long enough to really even consider doing anything else!

A conservative estimate we came up with is 150 fish between Mike, Ben, and me. It was probably closer to 200 and we probably averaged a fish every 2 to 3 casts. It was really unbelievable. By far the best day of streamer fishing I've ever had.

The cutthroat weren't too picky about pattern or size but size 8-10 seemed to be the best bet. Black, olive, and rust slump busters and wooly buggers all took fish but the best pattern of the day for me was a size 10 rust slump buster. I put this on about an hour and a half after we started fishing after Ben said that rust was doing well and didn't take it off till we were getting ready to leave. If I had one fly to take up there it would be that. Make sure to pinch your barbs down and stay away from big hook gaps. These fish aren't too big and a standard barbless streamer hook allowed us to get a quick release. These fish are all in really good shape and using barbless will help keep them that way.

Retrieve didn't really seem to matter too much either but quick long strips followed by a good 3 second pause seemed to work best. Some fish would follow the streamer all the way to your feet. In that case all you had to do was stop the streamer and hold it in the water and most of the time they'd eat it! Sooooo much fun!


It was interesting to see so many color and pattern variations in the cutthroat we caught. Some had more of a gray/silver base color and some had more of a tan/yellow base color. Some had lots of big spots and some had just a few small spots. Some had red blushing on their sides and bottoms and some didn't. It really kept things interesting. A few were just unbelievably beautiful.

Size ranged from 10" to 16" for the most part with a few that pushed 17-18". Takes ranged from a subtle "tic" to a pull the rod from your hands MOW. Mike even had some top water takes with an unweighted muddler which was really cool to see (check vid).

We were speechless at the end of the day. It was silly good. We even had triples several times during the day. Everyone there seemed to do well. I think I stopped fishing long enough once or twice to take a good look around and I don't think there was a time where someone wasn't landing a fish. Everyone we spoke with on the way out had the same sort of experience we did.

Unfortunately all passes for 2014 have been sold out. BUT..... the South Slope is set to open again this coming spring. Hopefully they will keep the number of passes per day to 16 and only allow fishing on the weekends. I am happy to wait my turn if it means keeping this place as pristine as it is now and getting part 1 of Dave's advice taken care of!