I hiked to lower Mohawk lake near Breckenridge, CO today and caught a few cutthroats. It is my understanding that these are all wild, native fish. These aren't the best pictures but these two trout are very different. Anyone know what they are? 

Top looks like a cutthroat, bottom maybe a golden? Tough to tell, but definitely either cutthroat or golden, or one of each. Nice fish! 

Edit*   I see you said cutthroat in your post, are you asking which subspecies of cutthroat? 

Edited June 21, 20169 yr by Jar11591

definitely not a golden as they are only native to another area and they look completely different.  The both look like colorado river cutthroats to me but the top one could be the greenback.

Those are brown trout.

1 hour ago, flyfisher said:

definitely not a golden as they are only native to another area and they look completely different.  The both look like colorado river cutthroats to me but the top one could be the greenback.

Yeah the bottom one is not a golden, but it does look similar with the red gill plate, red belly and red fins. But now I think its a Colorado River cutthroat.  To me they look like different subspecies. The top fish's spots are larger and denser, and the red on the gill plate isn't as intense. But color can vary from fish to fish obviously. Hybrids are always a possibility as well. I am definitely curious now.

Colorado River cutthroat: 

The golden i caught didn't have that red gill plate at all but it wasn't spawning time either. 

I think the top one is a greenback after some more searching.

2 minutes ago, flyfisher said:

 

I think the top one is a greenback after some more searching.

 

I'm thinking you are right. By the images on google it appears to be.

According to Colorado Parks and Wildlife, the Colorado River cutthroat is the only trout native to this area, so now I'm pretty sure both are that subspecies. every fish other than the bottom one looked like the top one, so maybe the top one was just a little different. Maybe the difference is male vs female?