Hot Creek Ranch
Call us: 760-924-5637
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Hot Creek Ranch is located in the beautiful Eastern Sierras of California. It is located just East of the Town of Mammoth Lakes, and north of the Mammoth Lakes airport, immediately downstream from the Hot Creek Fish Hatchery. The Ranch is about 35 miles north of the city of Bishop, and 8 miles east of the town of Mammoth Lakes at an altitude of 7,050 feet. Highway 395 is the main route north from Los Angeles and South from Reno. The Ranch is located just east of highway 395 on Hot Creek Hatchery Road.
There are excellent restaurants, complete grocery markets, liquor and other stores and shops in Mammoth Lakes. Non-flyfishers will find numerous other activities in Mammoth such as golf, horseback riding, swimming, biking, and skiing typically until the 4th of July.
The waters of Hot Creek ranch are catch and release, barbless hooks, dry fly only with no wading allowed.
.The Hot Creek Fly fishing Ranch is located in the beautiful Eastern Sierra of California.
The majestic 11,546-foot Mammoth Mountain acts as a back-drop to a sprawling meadow of 300 acres of land located at its base. The spring creek, they call Hot Creek, ribbons its way back and forth through this vast expanse of wildflowers, and tall meadow grasses. When Zane Grey visited this place forty plus years ago, he summed it up best. "This is the most beautiful place in the Eastern Sierras that I have seen yet." We agree. We think you will too. This place is the Hot Creek Ranch.
Hot Creek originates right out of the ground in classic spring creek fashion. Clear, cold water spewing forth from a fissure of lava rock created millions of years ago. A combination of eleven different springs make up the spring creek that flows through Hot Creek Ranch. It is good habitat for trout and all different types of wildlife. The wild rainbow and brown trout now are the primary attraction.
About Hot Creek Ranch
In the early days, the land was a favorite summer home to the Paiute Indians who wandered the banks of the spring creek collecting seeds, and herbs for their medicines and teas. Tall wild grasses were used for their baskets, and obsidian rocks were collected from the nearby mountains to help them shape their arrowheads.
The valley was homesteaded by a family that had direct descendants to these Paiute Indians in the middle to late 1800's. A small log cabin stands there today in the center of the ranch compound that is still referred to as the Tom Poole cabin. Tom, you see, was considered the original settler of the Hot Creek Ranch property. When the Los Angeles Dept. of Water and Power was buying up most of the land in the area for its water exportation projects, Tom held
firm and said, "no way." We are all in a debt of thanks to Tom for his foresight and decision. That was in a sense the first of many un-traditional decisions made by the Hot Creek Ranch to come in the next four decades. In the early 1950's un-traditional decisions were made concerning the fishery that still hold true today. We changed the regulations on the Ranch to catch and release fly fishing. They thought at that time,we were not sane. Then we followed with a "dry-fly only" method of fly fishing. Again, the heads were shaking in disbelief. In the 1960's when the cattle were removed from the riparian habitat that surrounds the spring creek, the echoes of despair can still be heard to this day. My how things have changed over the past 50 years.
Looking back five decades, we are still pleased to be able to offer you something that has not changed. The angling tradition of Hot Creek Ranch, a quality fly-fishing experience, and a beautiful spring creek that still to this day relatively has gone un-changed in those past five decades. Something we are all very proud of...........
As a result to all of this, we have one of the most spectacular fly-fisheries in the country,if not the world. Brown Trout and Rainbow Trout in excess of 20 inches are not uncommon; 14 to 15 inch trout are the rule rather than the exception; and 12 to 13 inch trout are standard. Are they smart? You bet they are. The constant abundance of Mayfly, Caddis, Midge and Stonefly make their selectivity very high. Come challenge your fly fishing skills. Come fish the Hot Creek Ranch. The Hot Creek Ranch also offers something else:
The serenity of the Eastern Sierra with a clear view of Mammoth Mountain and the Minarets in the background, bald eagles, and osprey flying overhead, and the gurgle of a crystal clear spring creek at your feet. Hot Creek Ranch offers nine superbly maintained and fully equipped, all electric housekeeping cabins. We also offer top notch guide service. We are small and unique. You must have a reservation to fly fish Hot Creek Ranch. Our fishing season is from the last Saturday in April to November 15th. We hibernate in the winter........
