Below Garrison Dam in North Dakota, anglers fish for cutthroats and browns. "It is fast, so I use a big boat," said Newcomb. "With the water so low, it is treacherous."

But the fast current adds to some of the fun. Newcomb catches brown trout there that weigh 4 1/2 pounds. "Most of the fish are 4.5 pounds and are browns," he said. "They are nice fish when you get them." That's generally larger than the trout in the still-water lakes, which are often 2 to 3 pounds.

"I like mostly streamers," said Newcomb. "Wooly Buggers and different types of streamers. Sometimes when the midges hatch in spring there is a strong hatch. I use floating line and get real shallow in spring. It is mostly sight fishing where you try to sneak up on them.

"Later in the summer you go deep to sinking line to get down 20 feet. That is usually best because the water gets pretty warm. We had 100-degrees last year. Usually when it gets that warm I go bass fishing. It is more stressful on the trout when the water gets warm."

When summertime water temperatures in the Missouri River below Garrison run in the 50s and 60s, that's not the case. "Downstream for 10 miles it is pretty good," said Newcomb. "Mostly you stay up below the fast water.

Anglers at North Dakota's Lightning and Northgate lakes cast the usual fly-fishing patterns to catch fish. In the lake environment, nymphs and streamers tend to be the more successful patterns, because they imitate the lifeforms that these venues' fish eat.

"They eat smelt. I use big white Zonkers, usually. Or big white Wooly Buggers work well, too. You dead-drift them, or cast out with a type 2 sinking line and peel them. The cutthroats don't quit until they get it. If they miss it the first time, they come again. They don't quit until they get it. They are a lot more aggressive than the browns. The browns see the boat and they are gone."

In South Dakota when summer turns hot, anglers can also catch trout in the Missouri River, where the fish lurk in the depths and along the current of the tailraces. Here, it is rainbow trout that anglers are after below Oahe Dam, and brown trout below Fort Randall Dam. Lots of forage fish swim about there, as well, so once trout get big enough to devour other fish, their growth rate is rapid.

"It changes by season," said Bob Hanten, fish biologist with the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks in Pierre. "When they are small in size they are eating different types of bug hatches, mayfly hatches."

That changes to a more substantial diet later on.

"Depending on what is available coming through the dam -- rainbow smelt, and later in the year when gizzard shad move up into the tailrace they take advantage of the juvenile gizzard shad," said Hanten. "That is how they get big, when they switch over to the fish diet. You see 2- to 6-pound rainbow trout. They can grow, with estimates of 4 pounds in two years. We have documented anglers catching rainbows in the tailrace as big as 13 pounds. There aren't many, but there are some real trophy rainbow trout."

All the trout are stocked, and there is no natural reproduction. The fish are coming from McNenny State Fish Hatchery west of Spearfish while the Cleghorn Springs Hatchery in Rapid City is presently being renovated.

One of the main stocking areas below Oahe is at the Oahe Marina. There, a small pond connected to the main river channel protects the newly stocked fish from the hectic Missouri. Once stocked, the trout stay in there for a couple of weeks before venturing out into other parts of the river. And of course, they can be caught readily at that time. Stocking is usually in April for the 10-inchers.

Prime time for catching this area's really large trophy fish comes during late February thorough March. That's when the 2- to 10-pound trout are taken most easily.

But in summer, flyfishermen also pick up these fish on the edge of the main current below the dam. Walleye fishermen will accidentally catch some when fishing there.

The SDDGFP also stocks rainbows in the fishing pier area in the Pierre city limits. Generally, the trout inhabit all of the area from the dam downstream through Pierre, and even into Lake Sharpe. The stilling basin below Oahe Dam can also be a good place to catch them.

"With the rainbow trout stockings in the Pierre area, when they are initially stocked in the Oahe Marina they spend the first two weeks in that marina basin, in that marina pond," said Hanten. "Then they move out into the tailrace and can be found from the tailrace down to Pierre to the bridges. Some do show up at the fishing pier. We have documented a few trout in the lower end of Lake Sharpe later in the summer. But most of them, as the water temps warm up, are in the cooler water right here below the dam. It holds most of the trout up in the river or tailrace portion."

The growth rate is so swift that anglers can go after trophy fish that are only 2 or 3 years old. They'll weigh several pounds by then, and get even larger as they ravenously snatch up the baitfish that are plentiful below the Missouri River dams. All they have to do is survive for a while, particularly that first period when they are less than a foot long and quite vulnerable to anglers. Of course, they're stocked to be caught, but a fair portion do make it long enough to bend rods and break lines.