Guide To Fishing For Salmon In Colorado

All about fishing for Atlantic (landlocked) salmon, chinook and kokanee salmon.

Colorado offers limited salmon fishing. They cannot spawn in Colorado, so populations of salmon are replenished by stocking. Two types of Pacific salmon are stocked in lakes and streams. They are the kokanee and the chinook salmon.

Salmon Fishing Waters In Colorado

Blue Mesa Reservoir, Carter Lake, Chambers Lake, Dillon Reservoir, Eleven Mile Reservoir, Grand Lake, Green Mountain Reservoir, Gross Reservoir, Lake Granby, Lake San Cristobal, McPhee Reservoir, Morrow Point Reservoir, Ridgway Reservoir, Ruedi Reservoir, Shadow Mountain Lake, Spinney Mountain Reservoir, Taylor Park Reservoir, Williams Fork Reservoir and Wolford Mountain Reservoir are the primary salmon fishing lakes in the state.

Rivers & Streams

The Upper Gunnison River valley provides the top tier of kokanee fishing in flowing water. River systems surrounding the lakes on the Colorado Front Range also provide some action.

Click the images and links above for species details.

Williams Fork Reservoir produced the state record chinook salmon (king).

The state record kokanee salmon came out of Blue Mesa Reservoir.

Colorado Salmon Fishing

Kokanee salmon are stocked in many Colorado waters including Beaver Creek, Eleven Mile Reservoir, Blue Mesa, Clear Creek, Grand Lake, Blue Mesa, Shadow Mountain Reservoir, Williams Fork Reservoir, Taylor Reservoirs and others.

Salmon Organizations

Pacific Salmon Commission

Pacific Salmon Foundation

Salmon fishing waters and information, by state.