Stocker trout

[dflanagan 0]

Thanks for the responses, guys. Lots of good stuff to think about.

 

I guess I did kind of lump stocked, wild/holdover, and native trout together when asking why trout are so revered. While they might be the same species, they're completely different animals in a sense. And I really hadn't thought about it from the point of view of those fishermen who just prefer trout to other species. Not sure why. I grew up fishing for bass almost exclusively and I know people who fish for crappie or catfish almost exclusively. I think maybe it's just a difference in the way people talk about these different species that's got me hung up.

I haven't seen any deformities coming out of Roaring River, curios where you are seeing this and which hatchery?

Wonder if they are healed injuries?

After some reading, I think what I've been seeing are injuries from the raceways and maybe fin clipping and not genetic deformities. Lots of missing pectoral fins and gill plates that look worn away, exposing the gills. Glad you and others brought it up. I think MDC does a good job overall and hated to think they were perpetuating bad genes.

 

Thanks, guys. I've got a lot to learn about trout.

[Dubs 0]

Guys that fish for crappies and catfish usually do so because they taste so darn good!

I don't believe I have ever caught true native trout, or char, although I am certain I have caught stream bred steelhead in far upstream reaches of small Lake Erie tributary branches. I have also fished where there are stream bred, possibly native brook trout. In northwest PA most streams get too warm to sustain trout or char year round, although a small population does in some places. Stream bred are not native. Not far from me some waters do support year round populations, those waters are being studied and accounted for in an ever improving management program by the state.

 

Streams that sustain significant natural populations should not be stocked. Stocked fish in those areas diminish natural reproduction. Stocking is a way of making a stream carry enough fish to support the fishing pressure. Many streams around either reach too warm of temperatures in the summer, do not have proper spawning substrate, or both. So stock them, catch them, eat them if you want.

 

The great lakes steelhead fishery I enjoy so much is entirely simulated and although some fish do reproduce, and some fish return to the lake to run again next year, most are stocked in the streams as smolts to be raised in the big water, only to return in a few years, eat an egg sac and be threaded onto a yellow rope. Other fates are possible, but its basically put and take.

I reguard real native trout like real western steelhead, better fish from a better fishery.

I enjoy stocked fish, from walleye to browns to steelhead, but I don't put them on no pedistal over natives or stream bred

[Kudu 0]

What are the other options. We have, globally, too many people for a finite amount of resources. Fish farming, hatchery raised fish, etc. are the solutions we have come up with as people for our inability to limit reproduction as a species. We need to strive for zpg.

[mikechell 0]

What are the other options. We have, globally, too many people for a finite amount of resources. Fish farming, hatchery raised fish, etc. are the solutions we have come up with as people for our inability to limit reproduction as a species. We need to strive for zpg.

YEAH !!! ZPG ... or better yet, reduction.

 

Kudu ... you just jumped about 95% on my "I like this person" list. (You were already up there pretty high, so .... )

[ralphs007 0]

Most of the streams here in SE PA are stocked. I can't remember seeing the type of deformities that you describe on any stocked fish I've caught. Even the one wild trout stream I'm familiar with the trout are descendants of stocked trout. The state stopped stocking trout because of PCB contamination in the mid-80's and 30 years later it has a healthy population of brown trout. I seldom go trout fishing on opening day if I do it will be to the wild trout stream which is catch and release because of the PCBs. It's almost impossible to find a parking place to even watch the show on my "home" creek, but a couple weeks after the opening day anglers are convinced the creek is fished out and it's easy to find a spot to fish if I want to. Here's a couple of pictures of stocked trout I've caught.

I was at Valley Forge the day after the stream was poisoned with PCB's.It was heart breaking to see all of those dead fish floating everywhere! Do you still fish Valley Creek?

[phg 0]

 

What are the other options. We have, globally, too many people for a finite amount of resources. Fish farming, hatchery raised fish, etc. are the solutions we have come up with as people for our inability to limit reproduction as a species. We need to strive for zpg.

YEAH !!! ZPG ... or better yet, reduction.

 

Kudu ... you just jumped about 95% on my "I like this person" list. (You were already up there pretty high, so .... )

 

Excuse me, but all the developed countries (US, Western Europe, Japan and even China) ARE declining in native born population. All the growth is coming from the so called 3rd. world. You're barking up the wrong tree.

[Mike West 0]

I grew up in the eastern high Sierras.... Stocker trout were for tourists... they taste like crap and dont fight

I never chased or followed that truck.

 

I have lived in Texas now for close to 30 years and they stocked trout here and I have many friends that go fishing for them but Ive never done it... just absolutely no interest in it .

 

One of these days I do want to go fish the Guadalupe though.

[Flat Rock native 0]

Stay on topic guys... lets not get this board shut down until sometime in 2018.. Please and thank you.

[Kudu 0]

PHG

Must think globally. I was. Anyway, took my son for stocked trout the other day. He caught a ton and had fun. Its easy or was this day. Anyway, he had a good time and that whats important to me. Trout are not native to my home state of Kentucky. Its kind of weird because they are in Tennessee and I only live 30 or so miles from the border. I dont guess it really matters though the streams in the mountains here are too polluted for trout in any event.

[tjm 0]

Trout are native in Tennessee?

[ben bell 0]

bass and bluegill are native everywhere..lol.

[tjm 0]

bass and bluegill are native everywhere..lol.

I'd have to look that up, I don't recall seeing either one in the Great Basin, but my memory isn't always reliable.

[Philly 0]

Ralph007, I still fish Valley. It's a very productive fishery. It's loaded with wild brown trout these days, descendants of the last fish they stocked back in the mid-80s. It's catch and release these days. And it can be very tough to fish but I always manage to catch one or two when I go there. Biggest I've caught is 16 inches but I've seen several fish in the 20 inch plus range and there's rumors of fish up to 30 inches when they come up out of the Schuylkill during the fall spawn.

[dadofmolly 0]

Just thought I would add a stocker trout picture. This was a brood stock that was stocked for a kids fishing derby -- not caught on a fly rod however.

 

 

 

 

[Kudu 0]

Appalachian brook trout are native to TN in the Smokies