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In July 2023, I had to go to Salt Lake City for business. But I decided to drive and to do some fishing and flying along the way. I knew that I wanted to fly my sailplane at Nephi, so that was easy. But I was uncertain about productive fishing spots along I-15 between St. George and Salt Lake City. Then Eric reminded me that a recent speaker at the Club is a Utah guide, and that he recommended fishing the Beaver River and Merchant Creek.
The Beaver River flows out of the mountains near Beaver, UT, a small town on I-15. There’s a surprisingly good, little fly shop on Main Street – Lost River Anglers – https://www.lostriverangler.com/ – and the owner guides. I stopped in, bought some flies and got advice on where to fish.
I fished parts of four days in Beaver Canyon and higher up on Merchant Creek. The lower part of the canyon is narrow, with boulders and pocket water. The river is one to two car lanes wide, so any tackle from 2 to 5 weight would work. Or even tenkara. Up in the high valley, it was even narrower and very willow-y. All wet wading.
There were lots of hungry trout and they were not very picky. Mostly rainbows in 10-12” range, with a few browns and one tiger. The shop said there are cutthroat in parts of the river. My biggest was about 14-15”, though the shop said folks catch fish in the high teens up to 20”. I fished a dry-dropper with a big Chubby Chernobyl and a pheasant tail nymph. About 2/3 of the fish took the nymph.
There are motels and a KOA in town. The Crazy Cow Café is the go-to dinner spot. There are USFS campgrounds up in the canyon. Though it was 100° each day in town, I stayed at a campground in the canyon up at ~7,000’ where it was comfortable during the day, and in the 50’s at night ($8.50/night).
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