- I'm Coyote Peterson and this morning
I'm gonna go into a freezing cold river
to try to catch a trout with nothing but my bare hands
and a makeshift net.
This is gonna get interesting.
(splash)
(tribal music)
Snaking between the epic mountains
that give Montana its magnificence
are a series of rivers that have cut through
the bedrock of time.
Today the crew and I are headed deep into the wilderness
to explore the freezing cold waters of Belt Creek.
Getting there will be a challenge of its own
as we need to take rugged backcountry roads
that are usually only traveled by open-range cattle.
(cow moos)
Belt Creek is the perfect environment
to encounter the rainbow trout.
A lightning-quick fish species
that is typically caught with rod, reel, and fly.
Only today I won't be fly fishing.
My mission is to use a slightly more primitive method
by safely capturing a trout using nothing more
than a makeshift net that I have built
from a willow stalk.
Now that is perfect.
Some paracord and my shirt.
The producing team thinks this is impossible
and I bet you do too.
But I'm confident that if I can find a trout
in shallow water I'll be able to pull it off
and essentially, catch a fish with my bare hands.
Wow.
Yeah, there are definitely trout down in that water.
I see a whole big pocket of them right here.
The good news is that I'm seeing lots of fish.
Bad news is they're in deep water.
What I'm gonna do is move upstream,
find a narrow pocket of water where I can get it,
just about knee-deep, try to scoop one of these fish up,
get it out of the water
so you guys can get an up-close look.
Alright, let's keep moving
and hopefully we come across some shallow water.
I'm looking to see if there's any fish
that may have gotten marooned
off the main course of the river.
Out of any of the pockets what I've seen today
this is probably the best spot for us to find a fish.
But if there's anything in there it's probably up
underneath the back of the rocks.
It's darker back there.
Now, trout are very sensitive to light.
They want to stay out of the light
so they can stay away from any potential predators.
Let me just check up in this corner here.
There's a fish right there.
There's a fish.
Right back in that corner.
Do you see his face sticking towards us?
- [Mark] I got him.
- That is a rainbow trout.
I'm gonna go in very, very slowly.
Now these fish are incredibly timid.
What I want to do is scoop him up as gently as possible,
get him over here in the main section of the river.
Now we're only gonna have a couple minutes
to film with it if I can actually catch it
so this is gonna have to be quick.
Alright, I'm gonna get this behind him.
Definitely don't want it to dart backward.
- [Mark] There he is.
- There he is.
- Good, good, good.
Go, go, put it to the rocks.
- Hold on, hold on, don't...
(water splashing)
OK, he's still up there.
He's up there.
- OK, yeah.
Move slow.
Move slow, slow.
(splashing)
- Ahh, I lost him.
Almost though.
Almost.
They are fast, that's for sure.
- [Mark] How does a trout even end up in a pool like this?
- You can see at some point
where this water fed off up here.
It probably got confused in this area,
found itself in the rocks, floundered into here,
and then said, "OK, I'm in water that's comfortably deep
to swim back and forth."
And now it's pretty much marooned.
I mean, this is like almost a little pond
off the side of the main river.
What's funny is you guys are only gonna ever see
one take of this.
But what, are we gonna do our fourth attempt now?
- Yeah.
- Alright, fourth time's the charm.
The reason that Mark is using a stick
is not to poke the fish but we're creating vibrations
on the back rock wall
and we're hoping to kind of corral it
toward the shallow water.
This is definitely the most difficult capture
we've ever attempted.
Oh, there he is.
Ah!
(sighs)
Now we're gonna make our seventh attempt
at rescuing this trout.
Alright, ready?
- [cameraman] There he is.
- You see him?
- Yeah.
- Shallows?
- Yep.
- Figures.
- [Coyote] Right under your legs.
Attempt number nine.
(groans)
Oh, he was right there.
Attempt number ten at catching the fish.
The water is freezing cold.
What would you say, Mark?
About 35 degrees Fahrenheit?
- Yes.
- Oh.
And this is where is happens
every single time.
- There he is.
- To my left.
(splashing)
I got him!
I got him, I got him, I got him.
Yeah, I got him.
- [Mark] Don't let him go.
- I know, I know.
- Do not let him go.
- OK, hold on a second.
I got a seal, I got a seal.
- Very delicate.
- Here we go.
Look at that.
Alright, hold on.
- OK, easy.
- Wow.
Look at that.
That is a rainbow trout.
Alright, let's get him up here into the light.
And we're gonna have him out of the water
for a couple seconds.
- [Mark] We did it. (laughs)
- Look at how beautiful that fish is.
- [Mark] I can't believe you caught that fish.
- I can't believe I caught is either.
The reason that I'm keeping this fish under water
is because they stress very very easily.
I'm gently just holding onto it,
making sure the water's flowing through its mouth,
and out its gills.
And we're only gonna be able to hold onto this fish
for a couple of minutes.
And one amazing thing about rainbow trout
is they actually return to the spot they were born
during spawning season.
And that's why we're seeing so many
of these beautiful trout swimming up river.
Now the quick way to easily identify the rainbow trout
is this greenish coloration
and this beautiful pinkish stripe
that runs down the lateral line of the body.
Let's talk about what the rainbow trout eats.
This is an opportunistic feeder.
They'll eat anything from crustaceans
on the floor of the river, little fish,
other fish eggs, you name it.
If they can get their teeth on it it's fair game.
Now a group of trout is called a hover.
And that's because when they float in the current like this
they swim back and forth very slowly,
keeping their balance, water just flowing through the gills
and then in bursts of speed they shift up through
these white waters and get into the deeper, darker pockets.
He just wants to get back into the water.
But what an experience.
It took us about three hours to catch this fish
but I did it with your help, Mark,
and the makeshift net.
And there you have it:
one beautiful rainbow trout.
My goodness, what a beauty.
- [Mark] I would high-five you right now
but I don't want you to drop the fish.
- No, I don't want to drop the fish either.
He's really wanting to get back into the water
at this point.
Oh!
And he got away.
That must have been the moment that he decided,
"that's it, I'm heading back off into the wild."
Wow.
What an experience.
Working all afternoon to save a rainbow trout
out of a maroon pool.
Have you guys ever had any up-close fish experiences?
Tell me about 'em in the comment section below.
I'm Coyote Peterson.
Be brave.
Stay wild.
We'll see you on the next adventure.
Man that was awesome.
Woo, I can't believe we did it.
Ah.
If you thought that was one wild adventure
check out these other animal encounters.
And don't forget, subscribe to follow me and the crew
on this season of Breaking Trail.
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(various animal sounds)