Really, the only thing a psychiatrist can do that a good fishing guide can't do is write prescriptions. John Gierach
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It happens every year, rainbows get stocked by the truck load BUT by mid summer they are a dissapearing act. But browns seem to hold over through the Summer into the Fall. You see this every year and the surveys through the Summer prove this. I've been envolved with some surveys by the DFW in September where all we sampled into September were browns. This is really true on the Millers. Where do the bows go? The ANSWER is they just don't make it through the Summer, period!!! There is the odd year where you can catch bows late into the season BEFORE the Fall stocking as in 1992. Lets face it - bows don't make it though the Summer season!
The exception is the EB of the Westfield where, for some reason (very good water flows) they seem to survive.
Why am I venting? It's because we would like to see (I hope) trout that will provide SEASON LONG fishing. That makes sense to me. No mistake, I'm talking about freestone streams like the Millers and the Ware. We would have great late Spring and Summer fishing if the game was with browns and not the reliance on bows. I saw a video of some anglers waving the pom-poms because of a Fall rainbow stocking on their NH river. How about browns?? That river just SCREAMS of brown trout!!
Remember, the early season bows that you catch are easy fish and are not an indicator of your angling skill. That skill comes into play when the insects really start hatching.
Ken
20 comments:
Why Rainbows? Because you gotta satisfy the casual fisherman. Here today and gone tomorrow. Fish and fishermen!
Anonymous,
Of course!!
Ken
Hi Ken,
You have been advocating for a change for years. I sure it feels like you are talking to yourself. My belief, times always change, so why not try a different message.
BROWNS ARE GOOD FOR THE ENVIRONMMENTAL HEALTH OF RIVERS..nothing more and nothing else..I believe there is data that will support this message. Time to tap into "Climate" is changing message. Perhaps the powers at the DFW can get funding from Beacon Hill to support this message..
You are 100% correct on this. They stocked bows and browns in a section of the Ware that I frequent last year. I only caught bows for the first month or so after stocking and saw many dead. I kept catching browns regularly until July. I see my local brookie stream is on the stocking list again this year too. This stream has almost no access to fish whatsoever and the native fish do very well. No reason to stock it but they keep doing it anyway. Really wish they'd start to put some thought into what they're doing.
gerry's
The DFW has told me that they don't want to stock more browns and fewer bows because the rank and file fisher doesn't want to see that even though the rank and file fisher doesn't fish as much as the die hard flyfishers do. They don't want to get hammered by complaints that the browns are smaller than the bows (it's true) even if the rainbows disappear by Summer. The average Springtime fisher doesn't give a dam about the CLIMATE, just a full stringer!!!!
Ken
Ryan1993,
Stocking fish in a stream that has mostly native trout is a joke and a waste of resources!!
Ken
Ken,
Have you ever spoken with any of the MA fish biologist to get their opinions on this topic? I would imagine that based on the water quality, water chemistry and seasonal early warming water temps, many of the biologist would be in agreement that brown trout would have better survival rates than rainbows. I believe the real reason is $$$. Brown trout grow 1/2 as quickly as rainbows, so to stock 12-14" browns would cost the state more money/time investing in feeding and growing them. Maybe they should talk with CT and learn their model. Seems to work a helluva lot better than what we have in this state...
I have spoken to them over the past 30 years. They also bring up the slow growth of browns but that doesn't stop Connecticut or NY from stocking mostly browns.
Ken
I whould like to see more fall stocking. The fish stocked in April are going to die by mid summer anyway in most years. Last summer, an exception, the Ware was flowing in the single digits fps. By stocking in the fall the fish spread out, learn to eat natural food and last a lot longer. But F&W seems to prefer to get as many of them onto a stringer as easily as possible and be done with it. And of course more browns!
"Stocking fish in a stream that has mostly native trout is a joke and a waste of resources!!" Actually criminal!
Lunasea,
The largest cause of trout mortality in a freestone stream is WINTER Kill.
Browns survive better than rainbows in the Summer but the DFW believes their task is to fill the stringers of anglers who will playing golf by early July instead of casting a dry fly on the Millers.
Ken
I don't think we'll ever see a full replacement of rainbows for browns, at least anytime soon, but I'd love to at least see the main rivers getting browns. Rainbows for worm and bobber guys in kettle ponds are totally fine by me - its just a different audience and different public service in general. Its not for me, but so be it. Some guys just like full stringers of farmed trout that are as equipped to survive in nature as goldfsh lol.
I figured that rainbows are easier to grow and fwiw - we have some absolutely enormous rainbows now and the colors are fantastic especially compared to stocked rainbows i've caught in NY and CT.
But man it sure would be exciting to have consistently stocked (and maybe reproducing) brown trout fisheries. I freakout whenever I get a good one on the deerfield.
Unknown,
NY and CT are known for their browns and not their bows.
Ken
…..and that includes the Swift! :). As unpopular as it is, I’d be happy to see the Bows go and only stock fingerling Browns. That is my ideal scenario.
The Housy is only stocked with Browns and it gets very warm in the summer. Still, on hot summer nights at dusk or dark they’ll be some risers.
Put the Bows in the Ponds
Maybe winter kill is the number one killer of fall stocked fish but I have good fishing on fall stocked rainbows on the Quinebaug from Jan. 1 till they stocked in the spring and I seriously doubt those fish survive the summer kill in 80 degree water. If they do I can't find them!
IMO, our state's stocking program is a joke. They have a room- full of bright, educated, fisheries biologists on staff whose job it is to determine the existence of wild or native trout in rivers, streams and brooks in MA. Which they've done, by the way. Yet rather than selectively stock only certain waterways they know cannot sustain self populating cold water fish, or worse, that can,... they feel the need to infest every single drop of moving water throughout the state with man made tank trout. It's insane. First, why not focus greater effort on protecting (tighter restrictions) while restoring (habitat improvement) those rivers known to harbor self sustaining wild and native trout populations (Swift, Hoosic, Deerfield to name just three examples),and focus spring and fall stockings to only non sustaining rivers. Secondly, increase the % of brown trout stocked vs rainbows (IMO 60% brown, 40% rainbow) would suffice. Basically, what it all comes down to is that the states "good ole boys" are either too dumb or too lazy to use the data they have to properly to design a true "management plan" rather than the same old stocking plan.
Todd Richards Assistant Director of Fisheries 508-389-6336
I live and fish mostly in New York State. The only rainbows I ever see or catch are in the Lake Ontario and Erie tributaries in the Fall and Spring, and in a few streams in the Southern Tier where there are naturally reproducing rainbows. Occasionally will see them in the Lower Genesee, where they are stocked. Beginning last year, New York will also not stock any stream that supports natural reproduction, which is a good policy. HOWEVER, the DEC still allows fishermen to keep native fish from unstocked streams, which is lunacy. Even with reduced creel limits, the native streams don't support large populations of fish and an early season fishing derby can deplete a section of stream (that happened last year.) Better policy would be to direct fisherman to stocked streams and let them keep what they catch, while making all wild trout streams catch and release. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen.
Matt,
Good comment!!
Ken
I caught a brown yesterday in a stream that hasn't been stocked with brown since last spring. This brown was caught in a place where stockers wouldn't be right now. This is proof that browns can survive our hot summers and droughts.
Dear Ken,
In my opinion wild rainbow trout from their native West Coast drainages are magnificent quarry for the fly rod, far superior to all other wild trout and char species. I've been privileged to fish the Lake Iliamna region of Alaska repeatedly, where rainbow trout routinely exceed 28 inches and 8 pounds in length/weight. No other native trout offers the same combination of strength, aggression, tenacity, and aerial acrobatics as does the Alaska rainbow, as anyone who has fished the mid-June Katmai 'smolt runs' will attest.
I agree with you that a Massachusetts stocking program modeled after those of New York State and Connecticut, which emphasizes brown trout stocking of appropriate freestones and tailwaters, would be preferable to our current indiscriminate stocking strategy. However, we must admit that all trout species raised in hatcheries are pale imitations of their wild cousins, meant for near-immediate harvest, with very few fish equipped to survive adverse conditions as 'holdovers'. Favoring one species over another will do relatively little to improve this situation, for this is a matter of habitat.
Four hundred years of habitat degradation in Massachusetts has left its indelible mark; our state depends on aggressive trout stocking of (mostly marginal) waters to meet high angler demand. You said it yourself in your 1/29/21 posting: "If we stopped stocking for five years the catching of a trout in most New England rivers would be an event."
-Mike
I hear you Ken. Sorry for putting a bug up your ass about bows surviving the summer in the Miller's. It was a one off. I'm older and wiser and take your word for it. Love your blog old man. Hope to see you out there some time.
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