Trout again! Anyone?

[Bucksnbows]

 

The fact that the Flatbrook or any other stocked rivers will suffer next season is no different than previous years. There will be many holdovers and newly stocked Trout to enjoy.  There have been years of spring Low Levels to Flooding but the seasons have endured.   

 

 

True, but electro fishing this past summer proved that our wild and stocked trout numbers have been decimated by low water not only during summer months for both wild and stocked trout, but by low water during our critical fall spawning periods the last several years.  Stocked trout are like Doritos, they'll make more.  But wild trout are much more prone to the pitfalls of Mother Nature, and our wild fish have suffered in NJ trout country for at least the last 3 years with this past fall being among the worst in memory.  As with everything, trout numbers will rebound, but it's going to be a few more years for those of us that care deeply about our wild trout.  If you fish for stocked trout, you won't notice much of a change.  But if you target wild fish, it's going to be another tough year on most NJ streams.  

[1957Buck]

Going    Wild trout fishing has a very small audience in streams. In select lakes, there is a better success rate. The vast majority fish Stocked Trout.

Just as the very small group of state lipped Steelhead fisherman that proved it could happen. It took me many many trips to finally be successful.My Point this river also sees ups and downs. As the very select streams that contain so-called wild trout.

NJ compared to many other States is a failure when it comes to Fish Managment. 

So all this falls on deaf ears to someone posting about wanting to go to Flatbrooks no kill stretch  that gets refreshed with stocked trout 

 And on the low results on stocked trout, many Ponds Rivers that historically are stocked are stocked to provide put and take they are not Natural places that trout would have any chance to survive.    

Edited January 31, 2017 by 1957Buck

[Sticks n' Stones2]

Ever try taking trout on a fly mate? Lot more successful, or at least more action. Better fights too on a fly than on hook n' bait. Anyway nice catch, purty looking rainbows.

[TDietz]

I have no problem with snapping a few stockers' necks for the smoker one in a while, but if I'm releasing they stay wet. If the tippet is heavy enough and the trout is small I'll grab the fly and shake em off. Everything else goes in the net.

 

Here's a wild Upper Delaware brown that my buddy took a pic of before I pulled the fly out of her jaw, leader slipped behind her gill plate and sliced her gill, killing her almost instantly. Oh well, live and learn, she sure tasted good!

 

[1957Buck]

I have no problem with snapping a few stockers' necks for the smoker one in a while, but if I'm releasing they stay wet. If the tippet is heavy enough and the trout is small I'll grab the fly and shake em off. Everything else goes in the net.

 

Here's a wild Upper Delaware brown that my buddy took a pic of before I pulled the fly out of her jaw, leader slipped behind her gill plate and sliced her gill, killing her almost instantly. Oh well, live and learn, she sure tasted good!

IMGP0879_954.JPG

 

Thats what Im taliking about. At what point do you gut the fish? 

[hemlock]

This trout ate so much yellow power bait that floated down from upstream he changed colors lol. Definitely the prettiest golden rainbow I ever caught and I got him a few times before the eagle ate him.

[GhostBear]

Looks like he had some pink too!!! Lol

[TDietz]

I generally gut em before I leave the stream, I've been amazed at the eels that sometimes appear in broad daylight to feed on entrails

[GhostBear]

The streams I fish don't have eels, that I know of, I know Flattbrook has them as I've seen them there. But I've never seen any in pequest, though thats not to say they aren't there, just never saw any. One of the coolest things I did see was a common water snake about 18" or so wrestling with a 13" rainbow! The snake had it by the side of the head and was washing down a riffle, after a valiant effort the trout escaped. I saw another one at shepards lake, about 12" that had just swallowed a small bluegill, it was sideways in its throat just behind its head, made it look like a little cobra!!

[1957Buck]

The streams I fish don't have eels, that I know of, I know Flattbrook has them as I've seen them there. But I've never seen any in pequest, though thats not to say they aren't there, just never saw any. One of the coolest things I did see was a common water snake about 18" or so wrestling with a 13" rainbow! The snake had it by the side of the head and was washing down a riffle, after a valiant effort the trout escaped. I saw another one at shepards lake, about 12" that had just swallowed a small bluegill, it was sideways in its throat just behind its head, made it look like a little cobra!!

 

If any river or stream is somehow interconnected to The Delaware or Hudson Rivers the possibility of Eels is all but guaranteed.    

Edited February 1, 2017 by 1957Buck

[TDietz]

Where I grew up, Tarhunt knows it well, there's a small unstocked trib of the Musocnetcong running next to the house and due to mining there was a small rivlet going across a portion of our lawn. So my Dad stopped it up one day with a little concrete dam and I put a brookie in there, gave him a little rock to live under and tamed him up. He would come out and take nightcrawlers from my hand. One day he disappeared. I'm talking a piece of water about the size of a bathtub. Pop found him. About a third of the way down a big ol watersnake. I was about 12. I killed the SOB.

[GhostBear]

Oh man!

[Bucksnbows]

The streams I fish don't have eels, that I know of, I know Flattbrook has them as I've seen them there. But I've never seen any in pequest, though thats not to say they aren't there, just never saw any. One of the coolest things I did see was a common water snake about 18" or so wrestling with a 13" rainbow! The snake had it by the side of the head and was washing down a riffle, after a valiant effort the trout escaped. I saw another one at shepards lake, about 12" that had just swallowed a small bluegill, it was sideways in its throat just behind its head, made it look like a little cobra!!

 

Lots of American eels in the Pequest.  The Flatbrook has both American eels and sea lampreys in it.  Same with the lower Musky.  Whenever I electrofish with the Division biologists, I am always amazed at the incredible number of American eels we find even way up above some very large dams.  They can slither up and over most anything!    

[GhostBear]

I kinda guessed at pequest since it dumps into the Delaware, though I've never seen any, but I only fish a few spots and not as often as I'd like! Lol

[hemlock]

Before they removed the  dam on the Neversink river in NY by Cuddebackville. You could watch the American eels by the dozens slithering up and over it and lampreys too. The lampreys one time were so thick it looked like something from a horror movie they were stuck too the walls all the way around and that was a good size dam.