A frog in his throat?

Penns is one of the most beloved streams on this board and the trout was obviously adjusting nicely by its stomach contents. Hopefully Pennsangler will return to the spot and wish the trout was still there to fish for. I didnt pay for the license that gives him the right to keep it (I'm sure hes let his share go), but this boards probably not the best place to post that either.
No frogs, but I remember a 15" wild brownie from the Little Lehigh that spit out about a 6" long baby bird of prey, talons and all, right after it took a size 22. Theres a varied diet for you.
No rocks were harmed in the making of this story.
 
Obviously, no one can make a judgement on the fish I caught or my habits as an angler based on my post. This fish was caught in an area of Penns Creek that has very few wild trout and it was obvious to me that this trout had been stocked as soon as it was landed. I did not shed a tear for this fish and I don't miss it in the least bit. It will probably be the only fish I keep all year. (unless I catch one closer to 30")

I was on Penns today until noon. I had my son with me so I only fished half heartedly when he was bored with fishing. I caught a good number of trout (all wild) including a nice 17.5" brown. All of these fish were carefully released to be caught again. I already miss that 17.5" fish and will look forward to meeting up with him again during the march browns or sulfurs.
 
pennsangler I guess I just don't understand your apparent need to kill large trout, stocked or otherwise. Especially if it was caught in an area where it was not a threat to many wild trout. Maybe where you fish 20 in. plus trout are a dime a dozen but I doubt that. I have been fly fishing for over forty years all over the state of PA. and average somewhere between 800 and 1,000 trout a year, a high percentage of which are wild trout. That only includes fish actually brought to hand. I am not stating this to brag, but only to make a point. Not counting the large trout I used to catch out of the "ditch" at Big Spring Creek which no longer exists, I can count on one hand all the trout over 20 in. that I've caught in my entire life. So maybe you don't miss that 23 incher but I certainly do, knowing how rare a fish that size is anywhere in this state. I just hope and pray you don't catch a 30" fish so that you don't need to dutifully kill that one as well. I think that's a pretty safe bet though as I doubt that many trout of that caliber exist in PA public waters. Maybe in some of Beaver's private streams, but not in public waters. I don't think I've ever even seen a trout that big in a hatchery.
 
Don't worry about it Pennsangler. There is nothing wrong with keeping the occasional trout. It was a stocked trout, and they will make more. Just my humble opinion, and I am entitled to it.
 
A friend and I hit-up a Wilderness trout stream on Sat. We cam across an open area with a lot of frogs. As i fished an undercut bank I spooked a good sized frog--pretty common. However, as soon as it hit the water a 8" brookietook hold of its head. Then another, slightly larger fish shot out from under the bank and stole the frog. We watched it for about 5 minutes wrestle with the frog. That is the 1st time I have seen anything like that.
 
you know its kinda funny that i never thought about this before. the last four brookie streams i have been to this year have had alot of frogs. didnt really notice until this thread....now as i look back i remember almost always seeing them on brookie streams. gonna have to tie some small frog patterns. i bet they nail them, :-D
 
pennsangler wrote:
I caught a 23" brown trout on Sunday morning on Penns Creek. She was sacrificed for my parents dinner because he was a holdover with a clipped tail. When my dad checked the stomach contents it contained three 3" long minnows, one 6" long trout and a small frog.
Click to expand...

Are you sure that is was a holdover? It could have been a wild brown. The PFBC does fin clips during their electrofishing surveys. So the fin clips do appear on wild fish. The C&R area and the "Trophy regs" area that extends from the C&R area up to Coburn are unstocked waters. Some fish may drift down from stocking above Coburn. But the very great majority of the fish in there are wild fish.

Also, there actually aren't many "holdover browns." Not many stocked fish live a full year in the stream. The great majority of trout that people call "holdover browns" are actually wild browns. People say "that brown has been in the stream a long time." Yep, ever since its mom laid the egg in the gravel. Most of the so-called "holdover browns" have never been in a hatchery or white truck. The "holdover brown" idea one of the most widespread myths among PA trout fishermen.
 
Any stream that supports wild trout populations will holdover stocked trout quite easily. It doesn't take more than a few short weeks for the stocked trout to adapt to a fertile, cool stream. Whatever the merits of criticising the fellows decision to keep the trout may be, attempting to shame him into believing that it was most likely a wild fish is just bad form in my opinion.

However, if stocked fish do not last a year in these streams, why the clamor about how harmful it is to stock over wild populations?

Just saying, is all....
 
JackM wrote:
However, if stocked fish do not last a year in these streams, why the clamor about how harmful it is to stock over wild populations?
Click to expand...
Because during the time that they are in the stream they can be very disruptive and stressful to the wild ones.
 
All discussion and pontificating about the killing of this fish aside, I guess my only comment would be that many years ago, I caught and killed a brown of about the same size out of Muddy Creek in Crawford County on a Rebel Crawdad while fishing for smallmouth. If the fish being discussed here tasted anything like the one I caught, I feel worse for the people who ate it than I do for the fish...
 
.....and stocking fish concentrate a lot of fisherman in certain parts of a stream. Many of these fisherman don't know or care about wild trout and how long it takes to grow to a decent size. A lot of the bigger wild fish are put on a stringer and many of the smaller fish are also caught and released only to die later from being hokked deeply and/or mishandling. Other than that......
 
I'm not sure why I feel it necessary to defend keeping one stocked trout a year, be it 23" long or 9" long. It is just crazy to tell me that this was not a stocked trout but a wild trout when only about ten people have ever seen this fish and none of them other than me post on this board.

The trout was caught near the old girlscout camp. There are a couple of wild trout in this area, but not many. This fish had it's tail clipped, not a fin. I fought it for all of about 5 minutes, compared to the 15 minute battle I had with a 17.5" wild trout this weekend.

It is not nearly the largest trout I have caught in Penns Creek on a fly. To imply that there are less that 10 trout larger than this in open water throughout the entire state is laughable.
 
I'm with Pennsangler on this. There are probably 10 trout larger than that in a few miles of the Delaware.

I do agree, though, that a few 10 or 11 inch fish would have been better eating.
 
This fish may very well have been a stocked trout. But many, many times anglers I've heard anglers talk about a brown trout and say something like, "That's a nice holdover brown" and not a single one of those fish ever WAS a holdover brown. They were all wild browns.

It's not the case that stocked trout "hold over" very often, even in good wild trout streams. It happens, but it's rare.

If you catch a fish that has the appearance of a wild trout, the chances that it IS a wild trout are very high, and the chances that it is a "holdover" is very low.

There just aren't many holdovers in the streams. In limestone streams there are a few. In freestone streams it's very rare.

Just to be clear the term "holdover" indicates a fish that has over-wintered, not just a fish that was stocked in the spring and is still around a few weeks or a couple months later. Those are referred to as "carryover" fish. These are the terms used by the PFBC and others in the fisheries field.

There are several problems with stocking hatchery trout on top of wild trout.

On waters with the 5-fish-day-rules, the main effect is that stocking greatly increases harvest of wild trout. Because stocking attracts a lot more fishing pressure than you would have if the stream was not stocked, and it especially attracts harvest-oriented anglers. They harvest both the stocked trout and the wild trout.

On streams that have C&R or DH regulations that keep the stockies in the stream. the main effect on wild trout populations is crowding & terretorial problems. If a pocket is occupied by a 12 inch stockie, a 7 inch brookie cannot occupy that spot. It will be driven out. In this way the wild trout population of a stretch is reduced. Examples: White Deer Creek, Young Womans Creek.
The stockies still die overwinter and won't be around come spring. But they already did their damage.
 
I fish a lot of stream in a years time and the number of times I've run into anglers who said the fish they caught were holdover browns is quite high. I'm the kind of guy who does like to miss a chance at education even if I don't always communicate very well at times. So I always ask to see the fish in question and if the angler is will they are always proud to share there prize.
Of all the "Holdovers" I've seen only a couple were actually holdovers, the rest were wild fish. Holdovers are just very rare unless the conditions are ideal stocked fish don't survive. The Survey guys usually clip the tails of fish caught during a survey, being that the fish was from Penns Creek it probably is one of a few of the fingerlings stocked a couple of years ago, being that it had a clipped fin. PFBC is now doing this at least some of the time when stocking fingerlings where there are wild trout.
And Jack, say whatever you believe but you've never shown us any study that indicates that trout holdover, nearly everything I've seen indicates they last either as long as it takes for the bait guys to kill them or until about Memorial Day, and by the way the holdovers you catch at the jamboree this year from Pine Creek, are wild trout.
 
well said chaz. most guys that think they are "holdover browns" are wrong, and they are wild fish. those "holdover browns" (wild browns) might still be there during the jam. if not, they are up the tribs. i know ive caught them there :-D
 
Chaz wrote:

And Jack, say whatever you believe but you've never shown us any study that indicates that trout holdover, nearly everything I've seen indicates they last either as long as it takes for the bait guys to kill them or until about Memorial Day....
Click to expand...

It shouldn't take you long to produce the studies "you have seen" or were you refering to the science of anecdote by agenda?
 
Though I havent caught any of the fingerling stockies on Penns in that size range yet, I do know Chaz is correct about clipping the tails , not the fins, during a survey.
One would think with a trout of that size, the answer would lye in the color of the adipose (fatty) fin.
Was there red in it, orange in it, or all brown?
All this Penns trout talk is gettin to me. Thats it. I'm going tomorrow.
 
Just to clear something up re the Penns fingerlings. They were planted back in 2003 I think. The adipose fin was clipped down to a nub - not the tail. If you caught one, you could tell it was a stockie fingerling easily. Now, when the PFBC does their surveys, they will clip the TAIL. Supposedly one or two fingerling stockies turned up in the 2005 Penns study fwiw. Where did they go?? If they can not survive in Penns, then they can't surivive in most places...and I agree with Chaz and sf and troutbert and others that the holdover talk is sort of a myth. Remember 2004 was big time wet.

As far as harvesting that fish, I do not have much of a problem, as I am sure it did pass on its good genes, but I will be curious to look at the Penns study whenever it is finally released to see if there was a 21-22" fish marked. . . that just might have been pennsangler's fish. :-D I personally do not think there are that many 22"+ truely wild trout in Penns. Anyone ever take out the tape measure to a fish that size? That is one big trout.
 
Amen to that vcregular. I fish one heck of alot and often see guys call a 12" fish a 15 incher. !8 inchers are always judged at over 20. There are of course several streams or more correctly rivers, the Delaware for one, which contain good numbers of 20" plus fish. But of the hundreds of miles of trout water in the state very few hold any number of fish that size. Even the old Heritage section of the Little Lehigh which has been no kill for years and has excellent water quality holds very few fish over 20 inches. You're right, a 20 in. fish is one heck of a trout.
 
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