I was fishing with some friends over the weekend on a small mountain lake in western Montana. The ice has just come off, in fact there was still quite a bit of ice on half of the lake and around the edges. There were some midges hatching, and the fish weren't the least bit picky. We caught trout after trout, mostly with dries, and decided to keep a few to cook up that night. We kept 6 cutthroat, and when we cleaned them we found something we'd never seen before - salamanders in the stomaches! 3 fish (each about 14 inches) had a salamander in the stomach, and 1 fish (a 17 incher) had eaten 2 salamanders. We didn't even know there were salamanders in this lake, and definitely didn't expect them to be a significant food source since the fish are so easy to catch.


Has anyone had any experience with trout that feed on salamanders? What about any salamander patterns? I'm wondering if there are some really large trout in this lake that may feed exclusively on them so I would like to give it a try. I don't even know where to find salamanders in a lake....I'm assuming not in deep water, but near the banks or maybe the ice edges?

Anyway, if anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, please let me know! And if you know of any salamander patterns I'd appreciate it.


Thanks!