Gus Lake

Drainage: Clarks Fork (MT)
Approaches: Clay Butte Trailhead, approximately 13 mi round trip; roughly 2,750 ft of climbing along the way. On trail, then a short walk off it · From Island Lake, approximately 7 mi with 3 of it off-trail
Elevation: 9,997 feet
Fish: Brook trout (FWP)
Coordinates: 45.0038, -109.61035
Bugs: Minimal on our visit

Getting there

The Clay Butte Trailhead sits off US 212 west of the Beartooth Lake turnoff, up the gravel Clay Butte Road toward the lookout tower. The signed trailhead is on the left just before a hairpin switchback, at approximately 9,555 feet.

The trail drops roughly 345 feet over the first mile and a half, climbs north past Native Lake at about three miles and through the small lakes beyond, then pushes up onto the higher shelf past Lonesome and Abandoned. Gus comes at approximately six and a half miles.

FWP describes it as easy access from Lonesome, which sits about four tenths of a mile east.

The hike

Approximately six and a half miles from Clay Butte with roughly 2,750 feet of climbing along the way. By this point you are on the shelf and the walking is straightforward, just high and open.

Around sixteen and a half acres at 9,997 feet, running about nineteen feet at the deepest. It sits right on the Montana and Wyoming line, which is why it turns up in the records for both states.

Tips & safety

• Navigation: on trail, then a short walk off the line. Open country with long sightlines at this height.

• Camping: the lake is above timberline. Level ground is not the problem, wind and firewood are. Bring a stove.

• Fishing: brook trout (FWP), abundant and self-sustaining. Nobody is certain how they got here. The lake was presumed fishless, and Marcuson thought brook trout from the Wyoming lakes could not reach Gus in summer. FWP's own note wonders whether they came up on a spring freshet. The 2018 survey caught thirty fish averaging about eight and a half inches, and the crew said there were plenty of eight to ten inch brookies. A 2008 survey found the same average.

• Bugs: minimal on our visit.