Wild Browns in Bobs Creek?

[geebee]

shape, colouring,mouth, adipose suggest wild to me.

 

[BrooksAndHooks]

Looks like a hold over stocked fish to me. I've caught about 100 browns in bobs that looked like that out of stocked holes they hold over in year to year. It very well could be a wild fish though, and I doubt we will ever be 100% certain. It does have the look of a fish that has been in the water for a few years. Either way it's a nice brown.

 

[PennKev]

I don't understand the comments about the beat up fins. I see no damage consistent with the fins of a stocked trout. All the fins look good. The pectoral may appear damaged but all I see is a fin that is awkwardly angled towards the camera.

I've said the following in several other wild/stocked threads:

If you posted that pic and said the fish came from Penns or Spring, everyone would be congratulating you on a beautiful wild fish. No one would be a single bit suspicious of the fishes origin.

Context has a huge influence in these threads.

Kev

 

[Swattie87]

Agree with Kev. I think the OP fish is a wild Brown. 80% certainty for me.

 

[BrooksAndHooks]

You are right context is everything. Knowing this stream like the back of my hand as well as what the stocked fish and wilds look like out of this stream, I gave my best guess. It's a great fish either way, and definitely pretty big for the stream if it's out of the Class A or Wilderness sections of Bobs. Congrats on a nice catch!

 

[K-Ace flyguy]

I got out this morning before Easter dinner on Bobs Creek. I fish it occasionally throughout the year and mostly pick up stocked bows. I know the upper end holds a good population of native brookies, but I've never caught too many browns there. Fins looked pretty nice on this guy and he looked pretty healthy and fat. I pulled him out of one of the heaviest fished holes on the creek which surprised me that he was in there. Think he's wild or just a good looking stockie?

I kno this is maddd years old but the back and forth of possibly wild possibly holdover blah blah is drivin me crazy reading. This is as wild as it gets. That’s 100 percent a wild brown. Even a fingerling stocked brown that grows for yearssss in a stream to get that big won’t look exactly like that. A holdover could never gain sum of these traits. That is a wild brown. Born and raised.

 

[caddisflyer]

I kno this is maddd years old but the back and forth of possibly wild possibly holdover blah blah is drivin me crazy reading. This is as wild as it gets. That’s 100 percent a wild brown. Even a fingerling stocked brown that grows for yearssss in a stream to get that big won’t look exactly like that. A holdover could never gain sum of these traits. That is a wild brown. Born and raised.

Fins are kind of dark and more opaque than most wilds I catch. The tail is also on the small size. Nice fish but I would not say for certain it is wild. It can be hard to say especially with only one photo.

 

[K-Ace flyguy]

Fins are kind of dark and more opaque than most wilds I catch. The tail is also on the small size. Nice fish but I would not say for certain it is wild. It can be hard to say especially with only one photo.

Dude there’s a million different looks for wilds man. I’ve caught half dozen complete different looks for one single stream on many different occasions. All wild. Ones with dull colors. Ones that are butter. Ones with dark blue behind eye. Ones wit no blue. Ones with bright halos around all dots others no halos vibrant reds hardly any reds. Dots and tons of black alllll over and ones with only 5 dots on whole body with huge spaces Alll being wilds. Even from same body of water. This fish here has spots on edges of tail like wilds. It has the black on back that just has that look to it I’ve seen a million times. It bas the white that haloes around both the black and the red dots. It has the look to it’s eyes and it looks like it has chompers in that big male mouth. White and black on it’s fin. And it has red adipose fin!!!! That is 100 percent a wild brown. Plus bobs is known to have a healthy population of wild trout.

 

[falcon]

Now that we cleared that up.