Vermont's trout water is small, clear, and wild. The Battenkill is the name everyone knows, a no-stocking, wild-fish river that has punished and rewarded dry-fly anglers for a century. Beyond it, the White, the Winooski, the Lamoille, and hundreds of mountain brooks hold wild brook, brown, and rainbow trout in water cold enough to fish all summer.
Beyond it, the White, the Winooski, the Lamoille, and hundreds of mountain brooks hold wild brook, brown, and rainbow trout in water cold enough to fish all summer.
The Battenkill does not give its fish away. The river runs clear and low through the valley between Manchester and Arlington, and its wild browns have seen everything. Hendricksons start the season in April. Sulphurs and caddis carry May and June. By midsummer the browns feed on terrestrials in the shade of the banks, and the best fishing moves to the first and last hours of the day. Anglers who learn the Battenkill's moods can fish anywhere.
The rest of the state is a bonus most visitors skip. The White River near Bethel is a freestone stream full of willing rainbows and browns that makes a fine day after the Battenkill has humbled you. The Winooski and Lamoille offer bigger water with mixed trout and smallmouth fishing. The Mettawee and Otter Creek's tributaries fish well in spring. And the Northeast Kingdom's remote streams and ponds hold native brook trout in country that still feels like the Vermont of fifty years ago.
Prime season is May and June, then again in September and October when the crowds leave and the leaves turn. Summer trout fishing is best early, late, and on the coldest tributaries. Brook trout ponds fish well through the warm months. Check flows after rain: the Battenkill and the White rise and fall fast.