We're just doing a bit of exploration today... trying to find the falls on "Backcountry Creek". We're at an out-of-the-way spot at about noon, just looking around, when a good-sized cougar materializes on a log about 200 yards downstream! Mark and I watch as it glides into the underbrush. The hair on the back of my neck stands up involuntarily. Anyhow, we're off and fishin' shortly thereafter, but not without some nervous glances behind us at first. There are chunky cutts most places they're supposed to be in the creek, but not so much in the best pools. Turns out that those pools generally have a few big bull trout in them! Mark takes a shot at the bullies; breaks one off, misses a couple, but they are pretty much not buying this afternoon. We run into a couple of guides and their clients. Guide #1 does mention that the bulls are up here on their annual spawning mission, a couple of weeks early this year. Some discussion of the merits/ethics of targetting pre-spawn fish ensues. Apparently targetting pre-pre-spawn bulls is cool, 'cause that's what this guy's client had been doing earlier in the day. Hmmmm. Always an interesting discussion, amongst folks who are all catching fish solely for their own amusement in the first place.

While Mark is bullfighting, I am after the cutties, and get a good number to hand on the usual chernobyl ant type stuff. There are a few bugs around, and some rising fish. We spend about four and a half hours hoofing it up and down the creek. Rick gets a whitefish and a rainbow in addition to cutthroats. At one point I am taking some pics of a cuttie as I'm landing him, and a largish bull trout zooms in to grab the cuttie. I get a vague photo of the action; this behaviour is a pretty common occurence where these two species share habitat. Roast beef on the barbie tonite, with roasted corn ears and asparagus... mmm.